This guy seems to have copied his thesis from an M. Night Sham movie
A biologist who believes that trees speak a language we can learn to listen to
91–100 of 250 posts
Re: A biologist who believes that trees speak a language we can learn to listen to
#92Humans can't perceive a lot of things, and on top of that, we have egos that makes us feel superior even though in reality, we are the only ones on the planet who can't live in harmony with other species. If you ever had a cat and really observed it and communicated with it, you know it has feelings and emotions. Birds have it also, so does pigs, horses... But we just ignore all that when it's convenient for us to ea…
> we are the only ones on the planet who can't live in harmony with other species. This "harmony" is really just interlocking loops of unconstrained growth, followed by running out of resources, and starvation while the food supply regenerates. It only looks pretty if you ain't looking very carefully. In fact, human beings seem to be the only ones observed with a capability for restraint . We're not very good at prac…
Many species have finely tuned territorial instincts that have evolved to do exactly that: restrain growth to sustainable numbers. Individuals who fail to dominate sufficient territory won't breed at all. Just yesterday I observed two swans in busy border negotiations, a quiet "dance" that has more similarities with a proof of work algorithm than with an actual fight.
On a macro level, sure, it was unconstrained growth and the resulting hardship that caused these patterns to evolve, but that evolution has happened many times.
Re: A biologist who believes that trees speak a language we can learn to listen to
#93Earlier quoted context omitted.
Could you please stop posting unsubstantive comments to Hacker News?
could you please mind your own business? what are you, unsubstantive police or something?
No, he is one of the admins. And this is not the place for low-effort comments like "me too" or "first!" or "lol"
Re: A biologist who believes that trees speak a language we can learn to listen to
#94Earlier quoted context omitted.
Could you please stop posting unsubstantive comments to Hacker News?
could you please mind your own business? what are you, unsubstantive police or something?
Pretty much, yeah.
https://blog.ycombinator.com/meet-the-people-taking-over-hac...
Re: A biologist who believes that trees speak a language we can learn to listen to
#95To me, there needs to be a differentiation between communicating and speaking. If you broadcast information and another entity receives it, and uses it, that is not dialogue - just reactions. Even if through an evolutionary game the species reaches effective communication (predators, plagues, etc.), and complex feedback loops emerge, resembling a dialogue, there seems to be something lacking - perhaps the ability to…
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Re: A biologist who believes that trees speak a language we can learn to listen to
#96Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Have you seen a pack of animals or plants jointly deciding to voluntarily forgo extra food Actually, the only animals I know to become obese are humans, and animals that are attached to humans. You may say it's because they don't have an unlimited supply of food, but actually, many animals do, or used to have before we destroyed it. Of course, they don't really forgo extra food, they use it to multiply their number…
Obesity comes from the type of food you eat, not just quantity. Humans are the only species that invented glucose-fructose syrup and other highly processed foods. Feed that to any wild animal an they will become obese as well.
Obesity comes from quantity, the type of food is what overrides our natural restraint mechanisms to enable quantity.
Re: A biologist who believes that trees speak a language we can learn to listen to
#97Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think he mean the main difference would be that animals mostly kill (probably applies to most of their other actions) out of need (protection, food). Humans destroy things because they can many times. Sometimes it's not about needs ... unless for example you consider greed to be a need.
Learning English: They kill out of need, out of seems to me more like without. They kill without need. In Spanish we should say they kill because of need. How "out of" became because? Anyway, if you are out of luck I hope it is not because you are lucky.
The construction "out of need" is actually good old Latin - ex necessitas. Which I hope makes sense to a Spanish speaker.
"Out of luck" is weirder. German has ausgehen to mean "run out" (as in "our supplies are running out"), but it's not quite the same...
Re: A biologist who believes that trees speak a language we can learn to listen to
#98Recommend this incredibly interesting article on plant communication and intelligence by Michael Pollan.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/12/23/the-intelligen...
Re: A biologist who believes that trees speak a language we can learn to listen to
#99Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think he mean the main difference would be that animals mostly kill (probably applies to most of their other actions) out of need (protection, food). Humans destroy things because they can many times. Sometimes it's not about needs ... unless for example you consider greed to be a need.
Learning English: They kill out of need, out of seems to me more like without. They kill without need. In Spanish we should say they kill because of need. How "out of" became because? Anyway, if you are out of luck I hope it is not because you are lucky.
I think it’s somewhat reasonable if you interpret it “the killing came out of need”. As in, the animal had a need (to eat, or defend themselves) and from that need came killing. So they “kill out of need”. Not sure if that helps!
(Also, fwiw, you could also say “they kill because of need” or “they kill because they need to”, so because works in English as well)
Re: A biologist who believes that trees speak a language we can learn to listen to
#100Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think he mean the main difference would be that animals mostly kill (probably applies to most of their other actions) out of need (protection, food). Humans destroy things because they can many times. Sometimes it's not about needs ... unless for example you consider greed to be a need.
Learning English: They kill out of need, out of seems to me more like without. They kill without need. In Spanish we should say they kill because of need. How "out of" became because? Anyway, if you are out of luck I hope it is not because you are lucky.
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