Comment on We wouldn't listen, anyway.
Mediocre_Bard@lemmy.world 5 hours agoWhen I crate my dog she will sometimes run away and hide. Her position is that she doesn’t want to go in the crate and my position is that I want her to go in the crate. Other times she agrees and just goes in the crate. This is an example of what an argument with a dog can look like.
LadyAutumn@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 hours ago
Arguments are based on reason. This is an argument for instance. You have produced an example that you feel conflicts with my earlier statement.
Are you able to provide a rationale or argument to your dog that they should get into the crate? Are you capable of reasoning with her logically? How can you communicate those things with her? Could she for instance have this argument that we are having right now? Can she understand the argument I am presently making and provide a rational counter argument? If not, why cant she do that?
Youre essentially arguing for a broad semantic definition of argument. Both of the participants in the exchange you just provided are focused on one individual. The exchange from your dogs perspective never crosses outside of your dogs subjective sensory experience. Your dog dislikes going into the crate. She is incapable of understanding why it is necessary for her to go in the crate. To claim that she has a humanlike awareness of that situation is to anthropomorphize her. From her perspective I doubt there are any explanations that could be presented to her to convince her that going in the crate is a good idea. She could be motivated by fear or by reward or by her own subjective emotional experience (maybe sometimes she just doesnt mind it that much) or even out of a desire to follow your directions as her master. But you couldn’t sit her down and provide a rational argument to her about why she should get in the crate. That’s not something her brain is capable of doing. Humans alone have neurology conducive to that. There is variation in the animal kingdom, but nothing that even approaches abstract referrential language.
Mediocre_Bard@lemmy.world 2 hours ago
Sounds great!
LadyAutumn@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 hour ago
Lol