Macaques at Japan reserve get first alpha female in 70-year history • Hacker News Board

Re: Macaques at Japan reserve get first alpha female in 70-year history

#81

Post by lkrubner » Fri, Aug 06, 2021, 12:59 AM UTC

astrojams wrote: post #53

lkrubner wrote: post #51

We should expect to see this throughout the world, as the climate crisis intensifies. We should expect to see this especially in intelligent or social species. Game theory predicts that, from the point of view of parents, when the population is expanding it is better to have sons and when the population is shrinking it is better to have daughters. A son might have a lot of children when times are good and zero childr…

Wow this is fascinating. I'd love to read more about this, do you have any links to articles discussing this behavior?

Here is a start, follow the sources from here:

https://www.livescience.com/19311-famine-male-births-sex-rat...

Re: Macaques at Japan reserve get first alpha female in 70-year history

#82

Post by lkrubner » Fri, Aug 06, 2021, 12:59 AM UTC

Blikkentrekker wrote: post #58

lkrubner wrote: post #51

We should expect to see this throughout the world, as the climate crisis intensifies. We should expect to see this especially in intelligent or social species. Game theory predicts that, from the point of view of parents, when the population is expanding it is better to have sons and when the population is shrinking it is better to have daughters. A son might have a lot of children when times are good and zero childr…

This like most evolutionary psychology seems like one of those “anything goes” explanations that simply seems like a plausible explanation, but can just as easily be offered to explain falsehoods. The problem with it is that one can invent a scenario that never happened and asked for an explanation and similar such plausible explanations can be proffered for it, but there's really no way to actually verify and test t…

Here is a start, follow the sources from here:

https://www.livescience.com/19311-famine-male-births-sex-rat...

Re: Macaques at Japan reserve get first alpha female in 70-year history

#83

Post by Blikkentrekker » Fri, Aug 06, 2021, 1:16 AM UTC

lkrubner wrote: post #82

Blikkentrekker wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This like most evolutionary psychology seems like one of those “anything goes” explanations that simply seems like a plausible explanation, but can just as easily be offered to explain falsehoods. The problem with it is that one can invent a scenario that never happened and asked for an explanation and similar such plausible explanations can be proffered for it, but there's really no way to actually verify and test t…

Here is a start, follow the sources from here: https://www.livescience.com/19311-famine-male-births-sex-rat...

I know of the hypothesis, but it doesn't address the problem that it's an unfalsifiable explanation.

It's observing an event, formulating an explanation for it that sounds plausible enough, but the explanation is unfalsifiable, and a number of other explanations that are just as plausible and unfalsifiable can be proffered.

Re: Macaques at Japan reserve get first alpha female in 70-year history

#84

Post by lkrubner » Fri, Aug 06, 2021, 1:46 AM UTC

Blikkentrekker wrote: post #83

lkrubner wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here is a start, follow the sources from here: https://www.livescience.com/19311-famine-male-births-sex-rat...

I know of the hypothesis, but it doesn't address the problem that it's an unfalsifiable explanation. It's observing an event, formulating an explanation for it that sounds plausible enough, but the explanation is unfalsifiable, and a number of other explanations that are just as plausible and unfalsifiable can be proffered.

I think you might be confusing a few different things. I originally wrote "Game theory predicts" because this has been worked out with some rigor in game theory. You should never assume that anything in game theory necessarily applies to real life. At best, game theory models give us a starting point for other lines of inquiry. That's the whole of the claim, not that this is real, but only that there is a game theory model where this works well.

Re: Macaques at Japan reserve get first alpha female in 70-year history

#85

Post by IanClarke » Fri, Aug 06, 2021, 7:06 AM UTC

Slow_Hand wrote: post #78

IanClarke wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The originator of the (generic) concept "alpha" (please let us know who this is / who you think this is) has discontinued the term "alpha" (quite an alpha-decision from him, I would say) due to new insights discovered when observing wolves. Alpha does not exist for wolves (presumably)... and in general. To extend just further (why not) the concept gets fully discontinued, due to public pressure, because everything is…

You had me until your last sentence. What do you mean that the term is being discontinued due to public pressure? Isn't it natural for concepts to go away if they're found to be inaccurate (ex: phlogiston)? I also don't understand "everything is equal anyway". Could you elaborate? Since you mention the term in relationship to the public, I actually think that "alpha" as a term to describe someone who is dominant has…

I am being ironic (which is not allowed here, actually) and I am mocking the SJW an PC pressure, which very few but loud proponents shout out on the internet, mainly social media, today. Wishing away things, like not only the concepts, but also the words. But that won't happen and we see an alpha leader / beneficent dictator (for life) rise again (because it just works so well): Elon Musk.

Re: Macaques at Japan reserve get first alpha female in 70-year history

#86

Post by ookdatnog » Fri, Aug 06, 2021, 7:21 AM UTC

Joeboy wrote: post #52

ookdatnog wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Agree that feminists and modern women aspiring to adopt male traits rather than embracing innate female goddess energy and power is stupid "Agree that"? What are you on about? The parent comment can't remotely be interpreted to be saying this. > ... especially when they, at the same time, "stand against" how "toxic" men are. The term "toxic masculinity" does not imply "masculinity = toxic". Rather, our culture asso…

> The term "toxic masculinity" does not imply "masculinity = toxic". It totally does though, whether that's the intention or not. If I talk about "greedy Frenchmen", that technically just means, the (perhaps tiny) subset of Frenchmen who are greedy, but in practice, through a quirk of language, it also communicates an idea about Frenchmen being greedy. Hopefully, "greedy Frenchmen" is not an expression that pushes an…

I agree that the phrase "greedy Frenchmen" can only be reasonably interpreted as the speaker believing it is typical for Frenchmen to be greedy.

But contrast another phrase of the same pattern, say, "fundamentalist Christians". I don't think anyone reasonable would interpret this as saying "fundamentalists, as is typical for Christians" (it could depend on the speaker though). Instead, this phrase would be broadly recognized as selecting the fundamentalist subset of the set of Christians (most of whom are understood not to be fundamentalists).

The difference between these two phrases is that in the first case, the two properties being discussed (being greedy and being French) don't really inform one another. There is no broadly understood "typically French way" of being greedy (afaik). So by putting these two properties in proximity, the speaker tries to construct the association. In the second case, the properties (being fundamentalist and being Christian) do inform one another. If you'd get both pieces of data separately, the meaning is different: a person might be Christian and fundamentalist about something other than Christianity. So the phrase "he is a Christian fundamentalist" is more informative than just getting these two pieces of information apart, since Christian fundamentalism is a somewhat specific set of beliefs.

So you only argue why it is linguistically possible for phrases of the pattern " " to be interpreted as "s are typically ", but you don't argue for why this must be the case for "toxic masculinity".

And it seems quite clear to me that the phrase "toxic masculinity" is in this regard a lot closer to "fundamentalist Christians" than to "greedy Frenchmen". There is a qualitative difference between being told "his displays toxically masculine behavior" and the two separate pieces of information "he is masculine" and "he is toxic"; this is because there are many ways to be toxic, and the phrase "toxic masculinity" asserts that there is a certain type of toxicity that arises from trying to be perceived as very masculine.

Re: Macaques at Japan reserve get first alpha female in 70-year history

#87

Post by ookdatnog » Fri, Aug 06, 2021, 8:51 AM UTC

tasogare wrote: post #48

ookdatnog wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Agree that feminists and modern women aspiring to adopt male traits rather than embracing innate female goddess energy and power is stupid "Agree that"? What are you on about? The parent comment can't remotely be interpreted to be saying this. > ... especially when they, at the same time, "stand against" how "toxic" men are. The term "toxic masculinity" does not imply "masculinity = toxic". Rather, our culture asso…

> The term "toxic masculinity" does not imply "masculinity = toxic". It totally does, this is why those two words are used in that expression. The plan is to skew the meaning of masculinity by making the colloquation widely used enough, until it's automatically associated with toxicity even when that word is not present.

> this is why those two words are used in that expression

Do you believe that every " " phrase is intended as " = "? Do you believe that the phrase "fundamentalist Christians" is only used by people who want to create the association "all Christians are fundamentalists"?

Re: Macaques at Japan reserve get first alpha female in 70-year history

#88

Post by mPReDiToR » Fri, Aug 06, 2021, 10:25 AM UTC

thaumasiotes wrote: post #74

sandworm101 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> It has to balance out It doesn't. In a species with 50/50 split between male and female, the number of males is almost irrelevant to population growth. Take rabbits. If you kill at birth 90% of the males, the population growth won't slow as the limit is the number of babies per-female. The 10% of males that survive simply father more kids via more females. Males can do that. Females cannot. Going one step further,…

> In a species with 50/50 split between male and female, the number of males is almost irrelevant to population growth. The split between male and female isn't relevant to this. Unless the males are needed to raise the children, the number of males is irrelevant to population growth. But the average benefit of having a son remains equal to the average benefit of having a daughter; that's why the ratio stays at 50/50.

Unless you get a society where men are only used for reproduction.

Then it can get very extreme. Fatalities can occur.

Death by snu-snu!

Re: Macaques at Japan reserve get first alpha female in 70-year history

#89

Post by Joeboy » Fri, Aug 06, 2021, 11:19 AM UTC

ookdatnog wrote: post #86

Joeboy wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The term "toxic masculinity" does not imply "masculinity = toxic". It totally does though, whether that's the intention or not. If I talk about "greedy Frenchmen", that technically just means, the (perhaps tiny) subset of Frenchmen who are greedy, but in practice, through a quirk of language, it also communicates an idea about Frenchmen being greedy. Hopefully, "greedy Frenchmen" is not an expression that pushes an…

I agree that the phrase "greedy Frenchmen" can only be reasonably interpreted as the speaker believing it is typical for Frenchmen to be greedy. But contrast another phrase of the same pattern, say, "fundamentalist Christians". I don't think anyone reasonable would interpret this as saying "fundamentalists, as is typical for Christians" (it could depend on the speaker though). Instead, this phrase would be broadly re…

> I agree that the phrase "greedy Frenchmen" can only be reasonably interpreted as the speaker believing it is typical for Frenchmen to be greedy.

That isn't agreeing with me! My point was that both meanings are expressed by the phrase. I also think the phrase "fundamentalist Christians" does (in practice) contain an message about Christians, as well as acting as a qualifier that excludes many of them. I'm entirely not a Christian, but I imagine if I was, I might well not read it and think "Well they said fundamentalist Christians so they definitely don't mean me..."

If we want to get language lawyery about it, the meaning where the adjective acts as a qualifier is technically correct, and I would love it if everybody could agree that's what matters and read carefully and charitably, but that is not how things work in this universe. In practice, a bit of care and empathy is required if you don't want to offend people.

Re: Macaques at Japan reserve get first alpha female in 70-year history

#90

Post by ookdatnog » Fri, Aug 06, 2021, 12:45 PM UTC

Joeboy wrote: post #89

ookdatnog wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree that the phrase "greedy Frenchmen" can only be reasonably interpreted as the speaker believing it is typical for Frenchmen to be greedy. But contrast another phrase of the same pattern, say, "fundamentalist Christians". I don't think anyone reasonable would interpret this as saying "fundamentalists, as is typical for Christians" (it could depend on the speaker though). Instead, this phrase would be broadly re…

> I agree that the phrase "greedy Frenchmen" can only be reasonably interpreted as the speaker believing it is typical for Frenchmen to be greedy. That isn't agreeing with me! My point was that both meanings are expressed by the phrase. I also think the phrase "fundamentalist Christians" does (in practice) contain an message about Christians, as well as acting as a qualifier that excludes many of them. I'm entirely n…

> That isn't agreeing with me! My point was that both meanings are expressed by the phrase.

Apologies. I disagree with that then. I think it's quite safe to assume that if someone uses the phrase "greedy Frenchmen", that in almost all contexts they are trying to create or reinforce an association between being greedy and being French.

In that specific example, the technical meaning of the phrase has become irrelevant, as the juxtaposition of these two unrelated facts about the subject immediately raises questions about the motive of the speaker.

To understand your perspective better: I think you want people to stop using the term "toxic masculinity", out of a commendable sense of care and empathy. And I think we all intuitively feel that there's something wrong with phrases like "greedy Frenchmen". But do you think in the same vein that the phrase "fundamentalist Christians" is insensitive/offensive and to be avoided? What language would you use if you wanted to talk about the fundamentalist subset of Christians?

(From my PoV, "toxic masculinity" is like "fundamentalist Christians": there is no pressing reason (unlike with the phrase "greedy Frenchmen") to interpret it as an association, and I find it bewildering and unreasonable if a partner in conversation jumps to that conclusion, rather than interpreting it as subset selection. As such, I don't see a problem with either one. So I'm trying to figure out: do you think "toxic masculinity" should be avoided because you also believe that "fundamentalist Christians" should be avoided, or because you think it is more similar to "greedy Frenchmen"?)