"Found this on the side of the road in my neighborhood. Thought it was a brain, then dissected it and now I have no idea."

"Lots of small lobes, fuzzy inside, rubbery?... The dark part almost looked like fabric, although it could have picked that up from the ground. It did not smell like formaldehyde, it smelled kind of sour. It was rubbery and stayed together fairly well, but soft and easily crumbled into the 'lobes.' Found in a residential neighborhood."  

Said the man who posted on the whatisthisthing subreddit, only to find out the thing he'd become fascinated by was dog shit.

And isn't that a metaphor for life itself? 

Well, maybe but don't talk about that on r/whatisthisthing. The moderators will crack down on you: "This thread is locked because the hundreds of now removed comments discussing 'how amazing this thread is' are not considered helpful, and thus violate our rules. The item has been identified and there's not much else to say about it."

It's a subreddit for identifying the item, not for taking off and having fun with your random bullshit, even when the item is shit.