The Hidden Almanac for 2016-09-12

3 Responses to The Hidden Almanac for 2016-09-12

1. 

   On September 12, 2016 at 1:04 pm, Ryan Dawson said:

   I will not dispute the comment that dolphins are “the worst”, but it got me thinking, why do we feel that way about dolphin behaviors when the same behaviors manifest in many social animals, but don’t bother people particularly? Maybe it’s the cognitive version of the uncanny valley.

   Humans have a very negative response to images of things that are too nearly human; it mentally flips from being an adorably human-like other, to a sick or dead human, and we have an instinct that says “stay away, you might catch what they have”. Maybe there’s a version of that which applies here — something that’s very obviously an animal, we excuse for what would be reprehensible behavior in a human (see: cats); but dolphins are smart enough to start to register as ‘people’, and their failure to be human becomes disturbing.

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  On September 14, 2016 at 11:54 am, Lycoris Radiata said:

  You know, that’s an interestingly plausible point. By definition, animals can’t be held morally culpable for their actions, but if you start to think they’re intelligent enough to understand things than you start to wonder if they’re doing it on porpoise.

  …wait, shit, I meant ‘purpose’. Bit of a Freudian slip there, but too funny to remove.

  The part where the specific dolphin misbehavior (that I hear) most frequently referenced is sexual in nature might also be a factor. People do tend to react with more visceral disgust to that sort of thing than, say, misbehavior based on violence, even if one might intellectually view both crimes as equally wrong.

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2. 

   On September 12, 2016 at 4:55 pm, Lucius Appaloosius said:

   I don’t think the mole people are exactly an “untapped market”:
   there seems to be plenty of tapping going on already… 7@=Q

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