I wonder about this animal thingy..........

@latinhypercube i'd say it looks more like an aging painting rather than an open ribcage

has anyone scoffed at the thought of it not being a hole in the humans body but the creatures arm over his body

Gods ... as we know it was not created in the SJs world ... so why would they have Murals depicting such a religion (as in OUR religions)? ... once they made us they pi$$ed off they didn't know how we would react to such a thing ... we humans are the ones who worship/created Gods as an entity ... not our creators ... I don't buy the murals as a 'this is depicting some form of religion painting' thing ... sorry ... it's gotta be more than that ... otherwise we would have arguments on the different Gods on our own Earth, like; yeah but our God wouldn't do that ... or ... our God is better than this, etc, etc ... An easy way out of that? ... maybe the whole point of the movie is to say, do away with Gods & religion altogether ... we (the Sjs or whoever they are) produced you, deal with it ... stop fighting ... and live happy ever after ... job done ... I know it's never as simple as that ... unfortunately ... but ... I'll buy that for a dollar :) ...

That image of the man on ceiling and its posture strongly evoked the image of the Greek Titan Prometheus being "chained" and the creature (if it is a creature at all!) may be the representation of the eagle that eats Prometheus' liver. I do not think that Ridely Scott was being literal but rather that he was utilising some elements of the Prometheus mythology, and maybe using the ceiling in similar way as Sistine Chapel's fresco.

Well Weyland was probably force fed Mythology from an early age by his Father (who specializes in the subject)? ... so maybe the movie is from Weyland's point of view more than anything else? ...

@ craigamore: The animal in the origianl painting looks to me to be a sacrifice being offered up by the smaller beings (presumably man) to the larger being or even to the stars themselves overhead. The animal is above the humans (partially obscurred by Shaw's head), and the humans arms are outstreched in an offering motif. It's probably an ox, cow, or pig and you can see the markings on its side that represent the knife wounds and blood.

Sorry, double post.

As i have said before this image is very interesting. But in the Trailer we see that scene when the wall is changing and Vickers says "Changing into What?" Maybe that scene eventually changes into the above image. BUT THE BIG QUESTION IS.... What if the same Mural then changes from the image shown in this thread into the Xeno Mural? If so to me that would show that a Humaniod touches some kind of Organism and then becomes the Xeno?