INTENSITY²
Start here => What's your crime? Basic Discussion => Topic started by: RageBeoulve on August 07, 2013, 10:42:57 AM
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Most animals can't grasp the concept of themselves in relation to the rest of the world? Its been shown that even some chimps don't understand the concept of their own reflection, and they attack it.
Explain this?
Cat Poses in Mirror (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CxYrv95FLM#ws)
This cat obviously sees its reflection, and appears to be understanding the connection of it's own movements to what it sees in the mirror. Its experimenting in the mirror.
I'd like to discuss this, and if anyone knows any examples such as images, videos, studies done about this, please share them. I'd like to know more about animals and the sense of self. I'll start off with a few questions of my own I guess, to get things moving.
What exactly does a sense of self mean? Is it necessarily connected to higher intelligence, or could a creature be intelligent without it? What kinds of animals do you think are best suited o this trait?(excluding humans of course)
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Being aware. well the short answer is once adam and eve took part in the tree of knowledge, thier "eyes" were opened.
I think there might be some truth to this story. not in the sence that all this magical bullshit happened, but more like once our brains got larger and we were now more aware of our surrondings and could make choices.
its also a choice to believe in something to be good or evil. So, for me anyways the relevancy of why things the way they are isn't really an issue for me. simply endlessly following my own nature with an unclouded mind is best for living
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Why are some less intelligent animals able to accomplish this state while more intelligent animals are not? Its been found that even some squid react inquisitively to their own reflection.
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Some cats and dogs can recognise themselves.
There is a difference between self-awareness and self-recognition.
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Some cats and dogs can recognise themselves.
There is a difference between self-awareness and self-recognition.
Please explain. If you are aware of yourself, do you not recognize your place?
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You are aware of who you are, but cannot grasp how a mirror works, causing a lack of self-recognition.
Babies can't recognise themselves until they are 18 months old, despite the brain being fully developed. We're taught it.
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You are aware of who you are, but cannot grasp how a mirror works, causing a lack of self-recognition.
Babies can't recognise themselves until they are 18 months old, despite the brain being fully developed. We're taught it.
So if we're taught this quality, intelligence and critical thinking is possible without it. This is what you think? Its all very mysterious to me, and that's why I asked the question.
I just see one problem. If we're taught this quality, how come on the average a human baby is able to achieve it by 18 months old? Do we all teach our babies the same way on average?
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Same way babies can't talk until they reach a certain age. Parents teach them by encouraging it, along with basic logical deductions, ie. I can see my parents in the mirror, meaning they're the same.
I'm no child psychologist or biologist, but my point is that we don't get our abilities by instinct. It's developed by learning and experience, and that includes our self-recognition.
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Same way babies can't talk until they reach a certain age. Parents teach them by encouraging it, along with basic logical deductions, ie. I can see my parents in the mirror, meaning they're the same.
I'm no child psychologist or biologist, but my point is that we don't get our abilities by instinct. It's developed by learning and experience, and that includes our self-recognition.
If it's taught, why is it usually achieved at a certain age though?
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It's only achieved by teaching. If you don't, they won't know.
Same with talking or anything else, neglecting the child will cause developmental problems in such areas.
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It's only achieved by teaching. If you don't, they won't know.
Same with talking or anything else, neglecting the child will cause developmental problems in such areas.
You don't think that a group of children left completely out of the loop in learning any known spoken language, would develop one amongst themselves?
I do.
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A group, perhaps. Not individually. We do still have some instincts.
However, the brain development would be much slower, making them not cognitively similar to how most people are.
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A group, perhaps. Not individually. We do still have some instincts.
However, the brain development would be much slower, making them not cognitively similar to how most people are.
Even if they were taught most other skills? Just not language? I'm not so sure, dude.
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You can't really teach a lot of skills without some sort of communication. We are social creatures, so starving us from socialising and communication can slow down development, since we NEED it for us to mentally progress.
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You can't really teach a lot of skills without some sort of communication. We are social creatures, so starving us from socialising and communication can slow down development, since we NEED it for us to mentally progress.
True.
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So do you think cats or dogs do this? Do chimps?
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Chimps, definitely.
Dogs and cats are more of a mixed bag.
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Chimps, definitely.
Dogs and cats are more of a mixed bag.
Mixed bag. What is that?
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Rage, intelligence is much more fluid than being categorizeable species by species.
Intelligent organisms may adapt their cognition to associations they have never experienced before. Think of, for example, how an animal reacts to a window for the first time, hard transparent "air". This does not exist in nature, there "should" "logically" be no way for any organism to adapt to this. But they do, and quickly so.
So some cats can, some can not, look at human intelligence. We the range and variation is quite wide, even within a single neighborhood.
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Rage, intelligence is much more fluid than being categorizeable species by species.
Intelligent organisms may adapt their cognition to associations they have never experienced before. Think of, for example, how an animal reacts to a window for the first time, hard transparent "air". This does not exist in nature, there "should" "logically" be no way for any organism to adapt to this. But they do, and quickly so.
So some cats can, some can not, look at human intelligence. We the range and variation is quite wide, even within a single neighborhood.
I guess I should narrow it down to intelligence that we can identify with then. That cat in the video is obviously having a realization that I thought only human babies and some chimpanzees were capable of.
I was wondering if this was more common than I thought.
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Rage, intelligence is much more fluid than being categorizeable species by species.
Intelligent organisms may adapt their cognition to associations they have never experienced before. Think of, for example, how an animal reacts to a window for the first time, hard transparent "air". This does not exist in nature, there "should" "logically" be no way for any organism to adapt to this. But they do, and quickly so.
So some cats can, some can not, look at human intelligence. We the range and variation is quite wide, even within a single neighborhood.
I guess I should narrow it down to intelligence that we can identify with then. That cat in the video is obviously having a realization that I thought only human babies and some chimpanzees were capable of.
I was wondering if this was more common than I thought.
hm, intelligence is incredibly difficult to understand because of several factors
1 thing is that everything we have, we inherited. so you shouldnt be surprised chimps got what we got, cus they got it first, then we inherited it. Even spiritualism which derives from creativity which derives from anticipation - is an intelligence trait common in actively hunting animals - anticipate what turn a prey will take: it imagines what hasn't happened yet, it guesses, it visualizes what is not yet true - what does not actually exist at the present moment.
2 you can and cannot precisely "imagine" how a cat thinks. The brain, thus perception of reality, will inevitably differ. Yet it will probably be similar, light, sound, thought-process, visualization, ideas and concepts, these basics go far back, deep into the roots of animal evolution.
3 intelligence comes down to necesity, but also sexual selection and many other factors. Human intelligence, you could say, has spiralled/evolved out of hand, since what was useful at first, has turned into dangerous delusions in many cases - all thanks to intelligence developing.
As a general rule mammals and birds are all intelligent, compared to the rest of organisms on earth.
Among the most intelligent organisms on earth are typically
Omnivorous, oportunistic and social animals (apes, corvids)
or
Carnivorous, actively hunting, tactics using - social animals (cats, dogs, dolphins)
These are often fewer in ratio than herbivorous animals, or insect or seed-feeding animals. Cows and horses are significantly less intelligent than most dogs or cats, but will still be einsteins compared to lizards. The span here is enormous, lizards are still highly cognitive and intelligent animals compared to for example invertebrates.
But even a spider will see you from a distance, recognize you as moving and large, thus scary, and flee, this seeing, registering, analyzing, understanding and reacting to something external.
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Ballastexistenz: Cats can use mirrors (http://ballastexistenz.wordpress.com/2010/04/27/cats-can-use-mirrors/)
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I have to admit. This challenges like almost everything I thought I understood about perception and intelligence.
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It's only achieved by teaching. If you don't, they won't know.
Same with talking or anything else, neglecting the child will cause developmental problems in such areas.
You don't think that a group of children left completely out of the loop in learning any known spoken language, would develop one amongst themselves?
I do.
Sometimes twin babies indeed make up a language of their own, and they don't do well on the language the people around them speak.
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Octapuses are very intelligent
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It's only achieved by teaching. If you don't, they won't know.
Same with talking or anything else, neglecting the child will cause developmental problems in such areas.
You don't think that a group of children left completely out of the loop in learning any known spoken language, would develop one amongst themselves?
I do.
Sometimes twin babies indeed make up a language of their own, and they don't do well on the language the people around them speak.
Indeed. I'm really starting to question the line between humans and animals in many ways.
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Humans are animals with an overgrown frontal cortex.
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It's only achieved by teaching. If you don't, they won't know.
Same with talking or anything else, neglecting the child will cause developmental problems in such areas.
You don't think that a group of children left completely out of the loop in learning any known spoken language, would develop one amongst themselves?
I do.
Sometimes twin babies indeed make up a language of their own, and they don't do well on the language the people around them speak.
Indeed. I'm really starting to question the line between humans and animals in many ways.
There is no line. At all. I challenge you to find _researchers_ who study the very _definition_ of humanity - the very evolution of mankind, and ask them to tell you what - exactly - a "human" is.
It's not possible.
The very experts on the field of defining what makes-a-human have no idea, each one got their little personal definition, some try to keep it to H. sapiens, some say it is limited to Homo, some let it include all of Hominini making it include Australopithecines and chimpanzees.
Here I'm not even talking about wether or not humans are animals, but wether or not other animals fall into the category of "Human", such as the animal fossil species Homo floresensis, Homo erectus, Homo habilis or Homo neanderthalensis. Save for the latest species, these were all quite likely naked animals, without clothes or art.
The point is - what makes human is not defineable scientifically. It is an emotional decision you yourself must do. As for what concerns nature itself, there is no such thing as "species" even - it's all a big blur. No animal STOP being one thing, before it STARTS being something else. It would require an animal to disappear entirely, before reappearing as a new creature, that's not evolution, that's just pure magic.
We are all - quite litterally - the same. :D
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Anyone who thinks humans are not animals are talking out of their arse. No matter how much we try to differentiate ourselves, we are part of the animal kingdom regardless. We just happen to be pretty lucky in our evolution, that we got to the point of exploiting an entire planet and having the means to destroy it if we wanted to. Pretty impressive for apes, I have to say.
Before anyone thinks we are somehow "special", there were other species similar to us back in the stone age, ie. the Neanderthals. They didn't survive, but we did.
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Speaking of Neanderthals, just saw this today: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24031-first-bone-tools-suggest-neanderthals-taught-us-skills.html#.UgpmPpKThAo (http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24031-first-bone-tools-suggest-neanderthals-taught-us-skills.html#.UgpmPpKThAo)
And yes, humans are animals. I think most people accept that now, but still seem to have this weird idea that, while we ARE animals, we're somehow at the top of some evolutionary ladder. Which is not how it works. We're just as much animals as any other animal.
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Speaking of Neanderthals, just saw this today: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24031-first-bone-tools-suggest-neanderthals-taught-us-skills.html#.UgpmPpKThAo (http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24031-first-bone-tools-suggest-neanderthals-taught-us-skills.html#.UgpmPpKThAo)
And yes, humans are animals. I think most people accept that now, but still seem to have this weird idea that, while we ARE animals, we're somehow at the top of some evolutionary ladder. Which is not how it works. We're just as much animals as any other animal.
This view is quite common, and is just most people's need to categorize thing, and list it "from bad to good". It is true that we are not some kind of "evolutionary pinnacle". In fact, in terms of "taxonomical nodes" (that is, the ammounts of defined "steps" in evolution) primates, along with humans, are much less derived than many other mammal types, such as felines or whales. We just have a very bloated brain, in an otherwise pretty basic body.
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in an otherwise pretty basic body.
Speak for yourself ;)
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Octapuses are very intelligent
:cthulhu: I'm declaring a quadruple major at Yale this fall; with eight tentacles, why not?
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Dinosaur intelligence is also a recurring topic here and there, and the truth here is that they were likely quite dumb.
As with most popular science, media likes to blow things out of proportion, to the point of door-opening raptors in Jurassic Park.
If it takes a dog weeks to figure this out, it would probably take a raptor weeks, or forever to come to the same conclusion. Of course, we cannot know for sure, but the pattern is similar. According to cranial cavity scans the small predatory dinosaurs had intelligences similar to the simplest of birds or mammals. This still makes them able to coordinate, and think complex enough thoughts for a horse or a duck to be able to follow.
Plant eating dinosaurs were probably on a par with crocodiles or something on that level. Automatic eating, sleeping, walking, fighting patterns, and short moments of attention span, little compared to a horse or a raptor, and less compared to a dog, but still smarter than, say, fish.
Among the smartest fish are mantis/rays. And they aren't even all that smart. They're capable of some basic curiousity, which is impressive enough for a fish - curiousity being itself the ability to "pause" automatic behaviour for a moment, and feed your brain with new information.
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Dinosaur intelligence is also a recurring topic here and there, and the truth here is that they were likely quite dumb.
As with most popular science, media likes to blow things out of proportion, to the point of door-opening raptors in Jurassic Park.
<pedantic>There is a lot in the books that did not make it to the movie. For instance the dinosaurs are not real dinosaurs, but fully modern GMO's with a dinosaurian base. The DNA extracted from the amber was far too damaged to create real dinosaurs, so they looked at other genomes and matched the "holes" with "patches"--lines of DNA from modern species that could be lined up on either end with the edges of the "hole" in the dinosaur genome. I think the movies might mention this, but I'm sure we don't hear about anything except frogs. There is also a process of trial and error in the production of a neo-dinosaur species. All throughout the book we have little episodes where "dinosaur" behavior is seen as analogous to the behavior of modern animals, even animals not in their lineage. Going back to the raptor example, one of them near the end wipes its mouth like a human does. </pedantic>
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Dinosaur intelligence is also a recurring topic here and there, and the truth here is that they were likely quite dumb.
As with most popular science, media likes to blow things out of proportion, to the point of door-opening raptors in Jurassic Park.
<pedantic>There is a lot in the books that did not make it to the movie. For instance the dinosaurs are not real dinosaurs, but fully modern GMO's with a dinosaurian base. The DNA extracted from the amber was far too damaged to create real dinosaurs, so they looked at other genomes and matched the "holes" with "patches"--lines of DNA from modern species that could be lined up on either end with the edges of the "hole" in the dinosaur genome. I think the movies might mention this, but I'm sure we don't hear about anything except frogs. There is also a process of trial and error in the production of a neo-dinosaur species. All throughout the book we have little episodes where "dinosaur" behavior is seen as analogous to the behavior of modern animals, even animals not in their lineage. Going back to the raptor example, one of them near the end wipes its mouth like a human does. </pedantic>
I know :] Got the book :]
And yeah, that's what I mean, it's easy for us to think raptor = dog, brachiosaur = cow, both references are done in the movie (door opening, like a dog. grant telling lex "it's like a big cow"), it makes sense also, cus, what else do we have to compare with?
But, in entertainment it's okay. We dont want to leave the audience totally confused either. In reality tho, we must accept that things are not narratively convenient.
For example - Raptor dinosaurs evolved from birds. How narratively inconvenient is this? Peoples brains explode.
But it's true, well, depending on how you define things. But the big, scary, toothy, clawy raptors evolved from tiny, poofy, flying dinosaurs (that are techically "not yet" birds, but that are also the ancestors of birds, as well as troodontid and oviraptorid dinosaurs). This is a very recent idea, and refers to "secondary flightless dinosaurs".
There are more secondary flightless avians during the dinosaur age, such as Argentinean Patagopteryx, which was a bipedal running... dinosaur... that would traditionally be considered a bird, "not" a dinosaur, but since birds are dinosaurs, its a dinosaur - that can't fly! Like most dinosaurs! But one that descends from birds (dinosaurs) that CAN fly! *brainmelt*
Galliformids (chicken) were also allready present at the end of the cretaceous. Meaning you would be able to spot small, feathered dinosaurs, with toothed beaks, and small claws on their wings, run alongside small, feathered dinosaurs, with toothless beaks, and clawless wings. Both are dinosaurs, but one is traditionally not counted as a dinosaur, while the other is. It's all very brain-twisting - unless you just accept that nature goes back and forth like that :D
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I know you have the books, but I want to say something else. The way they sterilized the dinosaurs was to bombard them with radiation. Which doesn't necessarily sterilize and might've induced mutation. Just saying.
Also, you're really talking about the problems that inspired the use of cladistics. Archosaurus is the most recent common ancestor of all dinosaurs, including birds, and of crocodiles, but we consider crocodiles to be reptiles as we do lizards, though the most recent common ancestor of archosaurians and of lizards in much further in the past. Of course, the old line of thought is still current, although I'm sure eventually most of the brain melting will be left to historians of science.
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That is correct, but I am more specifically refering to this:
common perception
dinosaurs -> feathered dinosaurs -> raptor-dinosaurs -> birds
which in reality is more like
dinosaurs -> feathered dinosaurs -> flying dinosaurs (not yet birds) -> raptor-dinosaurs + birds
The latter explanation helped solve the "mystery" of the much more primitive appearing Velociraptor existing long after the much more bird-like Archaeopteryx.
Archaeopteryx-like critters gave rise to both small flying birds, but also heavy-footed non-flying Velociraptor and such.
To most normal people, this looks counter-intuitive: Why would evolution first evolve flight, which is considered advanced, for then to remove flight again, considered a step backwards? (Because evolution doesn't "think" in terms of good or bad, it just reacts)