121–130 of 165 posts
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Aren’t we faced with the same fundamental mystery of human insight? Where does it come from?
I’ve often wondered how the heck did people invent soap? What made them think mix ashes and fat together and use the result to make stuff cleaner? (And that’s ignoring the fact that at a molecular level, soap is pretty amazing in and of itself.)
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Zoos are are a terrible entertainment business. All the primates and megafauna especially, it is a tragedy. I'm certain they'll be looked back on with shame. Even as zoos market videos of animals "eating birthday cake" on social media. See also zoos' dark history entwined with ethnological expositions https://archive.is/xsuEU
Factory farms will be looked back on with 10,000x more shame and horror than zoos. Zoos barely scratch the surface of the immense and unnecessary cruelty we inflict on animals. We torture 70 billion land animals to death every year and the poor things will never even understand why - they're just babies, mentally speaking. It's objectively the greatest evil humans have ever committed, and for our own pleasure at that…
Pssh total pseudoscientist orangutan stuck in some institution-distrusting online subculture bubble.
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When my wife was pregnant the doc said to let them know if she had any cravings for minerals, clay, or something weird like that. Turns out it can mean a vitamin deficiency. Not sure how the mind knows to send out a specific craving besides food and water.
There's a school of thought that says a lot of thinking happens in the gut, which delegates tasks to the brain, so to speak.
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> The orangutan blew my son a kiss Excuse being the kill joy: the fellow might be mimicking a gesture it learned from other visitors. That's not to say they don't have an inner life--we're all made of the same substrate, after all.
Isn't this what humans do?
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How about referencing (with links) a bunch of concrete relevant studies from psychopharmacology then, to back up your claims?
This is a casual message board; there's no requirement to put that kind of effort into a post here. You can also do the legwork yourself.
The person who makes the claim must justify it, not the readers.
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My dogs that have escaped the yard go walkabout for a bit and then make their way home. My daughter's covid puppy has zero desire to be away from his human family- he's constantly looking for a human family member to hang out with and won't scamper away given the chance. Now a bird/snake generally will be gone given the chance- but they truly are wild animals, while dogs are bred to be co-dependent with humans.
Indeed dogs have been genetically modified over millennia to the point many wouldn't even be able to survive in the wild, whether you think that justifies our actions is up to you. In addition the chances they want to escape are smaller than for birds. I looked it up and found this source https://www.petlink.net/blog/chance-dogs-coming-back-run-awa... that says "The unfortunate reality is that 15% of dogs across the…
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Isn't this what humans do?
We do mimic, but I was saying the animal wasn't exactly (probably) expressing its affection/adoration for a human baby with a flying kiss gesture. Had the animal picked up a vulgar gesture from a human visitor, it might as well have chosen that gesture at the baby instead, without necessarily knowing its inappropriate. A human parent, understandably, will not be very pleased with such an incident.
And that differs from us how exactly ?
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We do mimic, but I was saying the animal wasn't exactly (probably) expressing its affection/adoration for a human baby with a flying kiss gesture. Had the animal picked up a vulgar gesture from a human visitor, it might as well have chosen that gesture at the baby instead, without necessarily knowing its inappropriate. A human parent, understandably, will not be very pleased with such an incident.
So you are saying that it might have learn by trial and error to use appropriate social signs directed to the appropriate social settings…? And that differs from us how exactly ?
Not that the anecdote proves their guess is more right than yours, but afaik there is more evidence of animals mirroring unthinkingly than understanding.
Is this actually new? See here: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-16621-w - discussed here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24669593 It's even been in Wild Kratts!
It's not the first time we've seen animals use medically beneficial plants (orally before) and it's not the first time we've seen attempts to treat wounds (previous by placing insects on them, but we don't know if that was medically beneficial or pointless action).