Animals changed by proximity to humans(bbc.com)
bbc.com
Animals changed by proximity to humans
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20210805-the-animals-changed-by-proximity-to-humans
73 comments
There's a funny section in I think Sapiens (Yuval Noah Harari?) where he quips that that wheat domesticated the naked ape. Got him to plow the fields, get rid of the rocks, sew the seeds...
I’m not sure where the idea came from, but Michael Pollan has also propagated in his books this idea that human beings have been domesticated by plants. See, The Botany of Desire.
Let's also keep in mind that brain size is not a proxy for cognitive ability. Ravens appear to be broadly as smart as chimpanzees despite their brains being 1/20th the size. Likewise neanderthals had larger brains than homo sapiens, which didn't stop them from being outcompeted.
those are just issues in how intelligence is measured. As far as Neanderthals, its my opinion they were smarter than us. we just came from down south (not effected by sudden surge in ice age) and higher birth rates. The intelligence of neanderthals keeps getting revised up every time we learn something about them.
I've heard that there's archeological evidence that ancient sapiens engaged in long-distance trade, objects brought to places they shouldn't have been. Nothing like that was found with neanderthals. Not sure if this is due to having fewer samples of neanderthals, nor whether this reflects intelligence or something else (I think Harari or someone may have argued that it might be about eusocial myths enabling coordinating larger armies) but that's one contraindication.
Do you base your opinion on anything?
I'm no where near a subject matter expert, but I thought there was a mild correlation within humans?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_and_intelligence#...
I take your point on ravens and chimps, but surely whales are more intelligent than shrimps.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_and_intelligence#...
I take your point on ravens and chimps, but surely whales are more intelligent than shrimps.
Are big people smarter than small people?
"I have no doubt that I am very stupid; but I must confess that I am unable to follow you. For example, how did you deduce that this man was intellectual?"
For answer Holmes clapped the hat upon his head. It came right over the forehead and settled upon the bridge of his nose. "It is a question of cubic capacity," said he; "a man with so large a brain must have something in it."
> Some epidemiological research on the subject has shown that there is a small but statistically significant positive correlation between height and intelligence after controlling for socioeconomic class and parental education
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Height_and_intelligence
[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Height_and_intelligence
General health is still a probable shared cause here, they're going to need to control for more than just socioeconomic class and parental education.
What happens, for instance, if they control for stamina (I'd predict the effect goes away)
What happens, for instance, if they control for stamina (I'd predict the effect goes away)
As a rule of thumb, yes.
(children vs adults)
(children vs adults)
AFAIK essentially yes, this is a popular (?) theory. The benefit of neoteny in humans is the retention of learning abilities, the human ability to learn doesn't decrease as much with age as it does in other animals
This idea is approached in an interesting way in the book “Against the Grain” by James C. Scott.
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> Successful escapes by smarter fruit flies may have left scientists breeding from a less intelligent pool of lab subjects.
This line of reasoning has really got a lot of geneticists concerned their findings may not be generalizable.
This line of reasoning has really got a lot of geneticists concerned their findings may not be generalizable.
I work in a fly lab (in the computer support part). I've seen a stray fly from time to time (they have traps set for them... they love vinegar.) but I'm not sure the ability to "escape" is some great intelligence test. The vials are tapped, the flies fall of the sides. insert new vial, flip and tap again..)
There is a lot of sequencing so you'd think they'd be pretty sure what is going on. I think its hard to measure fly intelligence, though the brain has been mapped https://www.hhmi.org/news/unveiling-the-biggest-and-most-det....
You can buy all sort of fly stocks with genetics you might need for your research. https://bdsc.indiana.edu/information/fly-culture.html
There is a lot of sequencing so you'd think they'd be pretty sure what is going on. I think its hard to measure fly intelligence, though the brain has been mapped https://www.hhmi.org/news/unveiling-the-biggest-and-most-det....
You can buy all sort of fly stocks with genetics you might need for your research. https://bdsc.indiana.edu/information/fly-culture.html
This comment feels like a Douglas Adams joke going slightly over my head.
No, it's just the biological analog of those stories you hear about AIs exploiting the rules of the simulation to crash it and score infinite points or whatever. Evolution/natural selection is at work all over the place, it can't be stopped, and it's even less able to be controlled and corralled than in the AI case. When you breed a long line of lab animals, you can't help but start imposing new selection pressures that didn't exist in the wild specimen, while having also removed other selection pressures, and the result will be that fairly quickly you don't quite have fully natural specimens.
How much that matters depends on the nature of your experiments. Many cases it won't matter at all. Some experiments may entirely wrecked.
How much that matters depends on the nature of your experiments. Many cases it won't matter at all. Some experiments may entirely wrecked.
OK... I have to. jerf, are you a mouse?
I believe in this context the correct question is whether I'm a hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional creature whose rodent aspect represents merely a three-dimensional projection of my actual form, to which I can safely say, no comment.
just checkin. I hope the unintelligent fly problem isn't causing you too much nuisance.
Dogs might be so friendly because they have their version of Williams syndrome: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/19/science/dogs-genes-sociab...
> They are also bigger, lay larger eggs and have smaller brains than their wild cousins - differences that are also seen in chickens.
I wonder if something similar is also happening in amongst some humans in some selection process. Breeders with less cognitive material than others, the others being seen as less sexually attractive (like as seen in Idiocracy, and I posit: real life)
I wonder how long it will remain controversial to consider that
I wonder if something similar is also happening in amongst some humans in some selection process. Breeders with less cognitive material than others, the others being seen as less sexually attractive (like as seen in Idiocracy, and I posit: real life)
I wonder how long it will remain controversial to consider that
People who believe in evolution have fewer kids.
Is a belief in natural selection a negative selection pressure?
If you bring this up people who are rational seem to get upset.
Is a belief in natural selection a negative selection pressure?
If you bring this up people who are rational seem to get upset.
I think it is complicated because a lot of our long term fitness depends on the society.
So, in the short term, you have some pressure for high promiscuity/low intelligence, but over time you'd have a very fragile society, and the slower reproducing more intelligent society would be more successful in the long run either because it obliterated the less intelligent ones in war, or just because it was able to overcome things like natural disaster, child mortality, hunger, cold, heat and disease
Natural selection also applies to cultural beliefs and behaviors, albeit in a "selfish gene" sort of way that propagates the beliefs and behaviors rather than the practitioners thereof. For instance, universalist religions like Christianity and Islam have supplanted traditional ethnic religions.
Anyway, there's definitely something about the culture of contemporary developed countries that's not adaptive, but I'm not sure it's belief in evolution itself.
Anyway, there's definitely something about the culture of contemporary developed countries that's not adaptive, but I'm not sure it's belief in evolution itself.
Most likely functioning higher reasoning ability are a negative selection pressure in modern society.
I would take it a step further to say that we - as a society -
sexually select for behaviors we don't like in society.
As well as sexual dimorphism to the point of physical features being debilitating.
As well as sexual dimorphism to the point of physical features being debilitating.
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Of course, tho I would like to stop making ourselves superior from them, and fix the headline with something like "Animals change by proximity with other animals". I think this "human exceptionalism" is changing nature for the wrong.
The article is largely about domestication and as far as I know, animals don’t widely domesticate other animals. So the title here is apt.
Plus your point doesn’t even make sense on a more general level. There’s stacks of evidence that proves humans have changed nature from global deforestation, climate change, mining, farming and war, to even the innocent act of building towns on what used to be green spaces or flood plains full of wildlife.
Plus your point doesn’t even make sense on a more general level. There’s stacks of evidence that proves humans have changed nature from global deforestation, climate change, mining, farming and war, to even the innocent act of building towns on what used to be green spaces or flood plains full of wildlife.
https://modernfarmer.com/2014/04/meet-earths-oldest-farmers-... Some ants do, curiously enough.
Yeah there’s other edge cases with parasites and such like too. all fascinating cases in their own right but not even remotely on the same scale as humanity.
The animals simply don't care. The predators would eat both of us without a care for your highly superiorly developed morals concerning inter-species relations compared to me.
> I would like to stop making ourselves superior from them
Alright then, if humans are not permitted to consider themselves superior to animals, I have one question for you.
What is your view on the veterinarian profession ?
Alright then, if humans are not permitted to consider themselves superior to animals, I have one question for you.
What is your view on the veterinarian profession ?
Using our unique traits of complex language and education to help other animals. Done. Did I included any sort of "supremacy"? No, just different capabilities.
I get your point, but no, I refuse to "feel" superior to any other life form. We´re just different. I´ll like to rephrase my statement, I want to respect other life forms as I respect my fellow human animals. I believe changing such little things like the headlines of articles could permeate in a new kind of consciousness involving every living form as part of the world, not "us and them".
I get your point, but no, I refuse to "feel" superior to any other life form. We´re just different. I´ll like to rephrase my statement, I want to respect other life forms as I respect my fellow human animals. I believe changing such little things like the headlines of articles could permeate in a new kind of consciousness involving every living form as part of the world, not "us and them".
Humans changed by proximity to animals
;)
When some other animal species starts building libraries and exploring space, I'll consider them exceptional, too. Humans, a kind of animal, are quite distinct from other animal species. We can't fly by nature, but we can build machines where not only we can fly, but we can fly to space. Most all other animals live today in the same ways, and with the same capabilities, as their ancestors have for centuries; but, humans have adapted and advanced in ways that hardly a generation lives the same as the one before it -- all from human-driven, intentional advancement. We're a quite distinct species (judgements aside).
I don't see the harm in recognizing our superior differences; in fact, it's as important as recognizing our similarities and common bonds.
I don't see the harm in recognizing our superior differences; in fact, it's as important as recognizing our similarities and common bonds.
IMO this line is reasoning is flawed. You're judging us as exceptional purely because of the technology we have now. For most of the time our species has existed the only exceptional thing about us was our ability to control fire.
Is the influence that the article is talking about happening now, or has happened a long time ago, when humans did not change the environment noticeably?
Certain other animals are very peculiar in their ways of living. I'd say that a headline like "Insects are affected by living next to ants" is more informative than the bland "Insects affect each other when live next to each other".
Certain other animals are very peculiar in their ways of living. I'd say that a headline like "Insects are affected by living next to ants" is more informative than the bland "Insects affect each other when live next to each other".
Australian Fire hawks do it, too.
> our superior differences
Best to get out of this line of thought before our understanding of genetics really takes off. To quote Gattaca "We now have discrimination down to a science."
It's already common to allow the oppression of inferior genes so long as they aren't human. What happens when we can measure human genetic inferiority? Will you be talking about superior differences then? Will you still dismiss the "differences" inferior to yours?
Besides, animal genes might not even be truly inferior anyways. I suspect they have better foundations and potential than we do. It's just not utilized yet. Maybe humans aren't so great, just first to market (and only by ~20k years, which is nothing at all). I personally wouldn't be surprised if humans are actually embarrassingly stupid on the cosmic scale of sentience.
Best to get out of this line of thought before our understanding of genetics really takes off. To quote Gattaca "We now have discrimination down to a science."
It's already common to allow the oppression of inferior genes so long as they aren't human. What happens when we can measure human genetic inferiority? Will you be talking about superior differences then? Will you still dismiss the "differences" inferior to yours?
Besides, animal genes might not even be truly inferior anyways. I suspect they have better foundations and potential than we do. It's just not utilized yet. Maybe humans aren't so great, just first to market (and only by ~20k years, which is nothing at all). I personally wouldn't be surprised if humans are actually embarrassingly stupid on the cosmic scale of sentience.
On the one hand, sure. On the other hand, not so much. Most of us aren't exceptional and live today in the same way as our ancestors have for centuries. Our needs and desires and behaviors across our lifetimes aren't so different from other large mammals. The exceptional things about us are largely provided by our civilization, but even including those things, it's the same song, different day.
The harm in "recognizing our superior differences" is in the unfortunate proclivity of humans to take that as justification for not recognizing any rights of the "inferior".
The harm in "recognizing our superior differences" is in the unfortunate proclivity of humans to take that as justification for not recognizing any rights of the "inferior".
In what part of the world do people live as their ancestors have for centuries? I witnessed that a few decades ago in rural China. I don't think it's true there anymore. I can't imagine there are enough places now to constitute "most of us".
I sleep every night. I wake up and spent most of my energy on maintaining homeostasis (eating/drinking/waste/temperature), provision of resources, being social, raising young, and play. This involves walking, talking, gesturing, squatting, etc. Take someone from a thousand years ago and they engaged in the exact same behaviors. So there weren't living in a stick-framed house and using written forms of communication via personal computing devices and listening to recorded music or watching recorded stories. They still did a lot of the same stuff from day to day. We are more alike than we are different, same as how we're vastly more alike to other apes than different.
Our subjective experience isn't all that different. This is especially true if you consider humanity as a whole, not some 0.1%er who has inordinate access to the fruits of civilization.
Our subjective experience isn't all that different. This is especially true if you consider humanity as a whole, not some 0.1%er who has inordinate access to the fruits of civilization.
Our hands could be the drivers for a lot of this. Dolphins have no practical way to use or create tools, that is a pretty fundamental limitation on how you can advance, irrespective of intelligence. Who knows what kind of cool tools something like an octopus could have created and used with more intelligence though.
Octopuses are probably intelligent enough; it's lifespan and teamwork that are the issues. An octopus works out how to use tools, and then… that knowledge goes away. No future octopuses will ever build upon that.
Why so many headlines of really common-sense "duh" science?
Who would have possibly imagined that creatures on this earth would evolve to endure their surroundings?
Who would have possibly imagined that creatures on this earth would evolve to endure their surroundings?
You need to test ‘duh’ things because sometimes they’re right and sometimes they’re wrong. Doing this is good science.
Flat Earth was ‘duh’ science at one point. Good thing we tested it.
Flat Earth was ‘duh’ science at one point. Good thing we tested it.
> Flat Earth was ‘duh’ science at one point.
This is probably a myth; anywhere you can see water, you can see things going over the horizon. We knew the Earth was round (and its size) well before circumnavigation.
This is probably a myth; anywhere you can see water, you can see things going over the horizon. We knew the Earth was round (and its size) well before circumnavigation.
People didn’t understand the horizon. What do you think went over the horizon until we had ships? Many people would have never seen the sea or other large bodies of water as they didn’t travel far.
Fishers?
Also, a flat stretch of land will do nicely, too. It doesn't take long to notice the discrepancy of hills… and we have the actual calculations of the ancients to prove that they knew; they're fairly accurate, too.
Also, a flat stretch of land will do nicely, too. It doesn't take long to notice the discrepancy of hills… and we have the actual calculations of the ancients to prove that they knew; they're fairly accurate, too.
You’re arguing against widely accepted facts. I don’t know why.
> Many ancient cultures subscribed to a flat Earth cosmography, including Greece until the classical period (323 BC), the Bronze Age and Iron Age civilizations of the Near East until the Hellenistic period (31 BC), and China until the 17th century.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_Earth
> Many ancient cultures subscribed to a flat Earth cosmography, including Greece until the classical period (323 BC), the Bronze Age and Iron Age civilizations of the Near East until the Hellenistic period (31 BC), and China until the 17th century.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_Earth
That’s over stating the case, the Shield of Achilles doesn’t demonstrate a flat earth cosmology, and shields of that time period where generally curved not flat to provide better protection to the arm. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/86/3196_-_A...
Indian philosophy uses a spherical earth in 6th century BC as well as many thinkers in Ancient Greece like Pythagoras.
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Indian philosophy uses a spherical earth in 6th century BC as well as many thinkers in Ancient Greece like Pythagoras.
I don’t know what to say - that article includes countless examples of societies that thought the Earth was flat until they learned otherwise. If you’ve got other theories then great for you but I’m guessing they’re not mainstream.
I am not disagreeing so much as saying there was more nuance.
For a direct quote from that link: “early Muslims tended to also view the Earth as flat” In other words it was a common belief, but not universally accepted fact. So saying that culture believed in a flat earth isn’t true anymore than saying they believed the earth was round.
For a direct quote from that link: “early Muslims tended to also view the Earth as flat” In other words it was a common belief, but not universally accepted fact. So saying that culture believed in a flat earth isn’t true anymore than saying they believed the earth was round.
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I thought the classical period was earlier than that! Thanks for the correction.
FWIW, when I was some 3 to 4 years old I remember I was a flat earther and even had nightmares about that.
My mother had to actually explain to me that the world is an spheroid so I would stop having those terrifying nightmares where I fell off the edge of the world.
My mother had to actually explain to me that the world is an spheroid so I would stop having those terrifying nightmares where I fell off the edge of the world.
Most people lived near water for most of human history. As to seeing stuff across the horizon even static objects along shorelines show the same effect. You can’t see the base of trees across a large lake.
Near water does not necessarily mean near an Ocean or Sea, or lake large enough to have similar properties with regard to the horizon.
There are in fact many benefits to living next to a river or lake instead of the coast. A large one is that the water is mostly potable, instead of largely not. I would hazard a guess that most ancient coastal communities were actually ancient coastal river communities, and that rivers are actually the thing humans lived next to (there's some indication in the abstract here[1] that this is the case). If that's the case, proximity to water is a poor indication of how many people would have seen ships sailing over the horizon. As to how obvious bases of trees would be over large lakes, or how likely large lakes would be compared to the norm, I don't know.
1: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-08366-z
There are in fact many benefits to living next to a river or lake instead of the coast. A large one is that the water is mostly potable, instead of largely not. I would hazard a guess that most ancient coastal communities were actually ancient coastal river communities, and that rivers are actually the thing humans lived next to (there's some indication in the abstract here[1] that this is the case). If that's the case, proximity to water is a poor indication of how many people would have seen ships sailing over the horizon. As to how obvious bases of trees would be over large lakes, or how likely large lakes would be compared to the norm, I don't know.
1: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-08366-z
This is largely about water as a home to food sources. Rising sea levels are believed to have covered the majority of Mesolithic cites. For populations constantly on the move it’s likely a majority of adults saw the ocean or a sufficiently large lake to show this effect.
Realizing it was evidence of a round earth is of course a different story. My guess is most people simply never considered it.
Realizing it was evidence of a round earth is of course a different story. My guess is most people simply never considered it.
Well lol go and tell them all this! I’m not responsible for their beliefs or why they believed it. Telling me that these people were unobservant for thinking the Earth was flat doesn’t change the fact that they did.
To be clear I am not saying nobody believed it, in many areas the majority of people likely believed in a flat earth if they thought of it at all. I am rather saying, belief that earth was round was also quite common in that time period and people had evidence for such beliefs.
Maybe you misread the headline? It specifically talks about which animals and what behaviors they observed that were changed by human<->animal interactions.
It is nonetheless useful to rigorously understand exactly how and why common-sense patterns occur.
Also, I would guess that the speed and type of change being experienced as a result of human activity (that animals are responding to) is relatively rare and thus valuable to understand.
Also, I would guess that the speed and type of change being experienced as a result of human activity (that animals are responding to) is relatively rare and thus valuable to understand.
proving "duh" stuff is generally good as it makes us understand much more about the foundations of any field.
Take for example the mathematical journey of laying our fundamental axioms starting at Peano all the way through ZFC.
Take for example the mathematical journey of laying our fundamental axioms starting at Peano all the way through ZFC.
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I am not being glib, but I wonder if this is what happened to humans. allow me to explain. As short as 5,000 years ago, our brains were 10% bigger, our jaws were bigger, and our size was smaller. The former 2 have been associated with diet, but the shrinking brain is still debated. Maybe its simple though. Maybe humans domesticated humans.