Soleos

@Soleos@lemmy.world

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I'm literally a thinking lump of fat⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Koko is a great example! I should clarify that when I say evidence, I mean the collected body of scientific evidence, of which Koko would be one data point. I will also clarify that I was talking about weak evidence for sapience in dogs, not animals in general. Different species are different. We have much more evidence for sapience in animals such as simians like gorillas, as well as dolphins. Just because gorillas are sapient doesn’t mean Koalas are likely to be. But heck Cows may well be more intelligent and closer to sapience than dogs.

  None of this is to put a downer on how folks may perceive dogs and it certainly doesn’t shut the door on their possible sapience. I project all of the sapience into my dog. I just think it’s important to understand and acknowledge where scientific knowledge is at as we rely heavily on it for policy, if not individual beliefs.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I'm literally a thinking lump of fat⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  You are right to think through this question, and as you imply, there are different forms of knowledge, i.e. epistemologies. Science geneologically derives from empiricism, the epistemological idea that true knowledge comes from sensory experience and observation–philosophy has moved on from this idea. But accepting empirocism, the default is necessarily no knowledge, as absence of knowledge precedes knowledge from observation. Science applies empirical methods and deductive/inductive reasoning to generate new knowledge; while you may reason a theory, that theory must ultimately be tested against observation. So empirically, we cannot conclude/know sapience exists somewhere without observing it. Now the idea of “null hypothesis” can be thought of as a formalization of this. It comes from statistics in the 1920s when they were trying to determine a relationship between two data sets. As per empiricism, the null hypothesis is always that there is no relationship and therefore observations are due to random chance. And the purpose of the tests are to see if this null hypothesis should be rejected/disproven.

  Another dated, but still helpful approach to thinking of the scientific question is Karl Popper’s falsifiability. It is possible to falsify the theory that “dogs cannot possess sapience by” observing one instance (not due to random chance) of sapience in a dog. However you cannot falsify the theory that “dogs can possess sapience” unless you can observe all dogs throughout space and time and show they don’t possess sapience.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I'm literally a thinking lump of fat⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  You bring up some great points! Indeed it is very difficult to determine scientifically what kinds of reasoning occurs within animals’ experiences and behaviours. My post was more to clarify the classic distinction between sentience and sapience going with the assumption that dogs aren’t sapient. But as you indicate, it’s absolutely an ongoing question we’re actively interrogating. Sure, sapience is a bit of a floppy term, but we can choose more operational definitions around meta-cognition and the like. I leave it to the experts to refine terms and conduct research. We have very strong collective evidence that animals are sentient and very weak evidence (so far) to indicate sapience (however you define it). Epistemologically, we are limited in that we can only ever approach this question from the human perspective.

  Your dog may well ponder their life as a dog, but the evidence for it is nil. So scientifically we cannot conclude it.

  Philosophically we can consider how we approach the possibility of it though. Metaphysically, we can consider whether dogs’ consciousness resemble humans re: perception, free will, or self. Ethically, we can consider if it’s better to treat them as if they are sapient or not, I can imagine arguments either way.

  Emotionally, we can also decide for ourselves what is the appropriately meaningful relationship we have with our pets in how we relate to them.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨I'm literally a thinking lump of fat⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  The distinction being made when we talk about “understanding” and “choices” I about the distinction between sentience and sapience.

  Dogs are sentient, meaning they have a conscious experience involving emotions and works with memory and instincts to determine motivated actions. This is a complex system that results in complex behaviour like preferring one food over another, stubbornly ignoring your commands, or recognizing when you’re upset and coming up to you to comfort you. It’s beautiful.

  Sapience is related to the capacity to be meta/self-aware. This is what is normally meant by “understand” and “choice” when talking about how “special” humans are. As far as we can tell in experiments, dogs do not have the capacity to understand themselves like “I’m a dog who really enjoys walking” or “Good dogs take care of people, so I’m going to choose to take extra care of human because I want to be good.” This is what you might call “wisdom” or “rational” behaviour, and some animals to exhibit sapience to an extent. Both can be involve what we think of as “choices” e.g. selecting one of several options, but they’re distinct behaviours.

  Humans engage in both, making it extra confusing. I’m not being particularly meta-aware and rational when I choose to cut off a piece of my steak and eat it. I am being more meta-aware when I choose to slow down my eating because I want to be respectful of my friend who cooked it for me, and I want to savour the moment, appreciating the flavours, texture, and effort that went into its preparation.

  My dog knows that I prepare her food and she expresses her emotions and desires to me and she responds to my behaviour/communication. But she doesn’t understand that I chose to rescue her or that we are two people living our short and shorter lives together.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Do you have any recommendations for casual games?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  I will always recommend Into The Breach to everyone. Perfect mechanics, easy to jump in and out of, satisfying aesthetics, balanced difficulty

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Iraq War was preceded by the largest worldwide non-violent protests in history and the war happened anyway.⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  Yes, we are in agreement on the outlook. As they’ve been saying in Ukraine, “The situation is grim”. My point was more about continuing to fight on all fronts, including the political/legislative fronts.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Iraq War was preceded by the largest worldwide non-violent protests in history and the war happened anyway.⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  There are people in Congress who want that and are exactly working towards that. It isn’t lost yet, and they are not giving it up without a fight.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Iraq War was preceded by the largest worldwide non-violent protests in history and the war happened anyway.⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago⁩:

  I don’t want to shake the ruling class, I want to take away their power to exploit people. I want insurance companies reigned in. Getting Obamacare passed did more than what a thousand vigilantes could, and that was after the Republicans and lobbyists gutted it.

  If people really want to stick it to the man (conservatives and liberals alike), then they can vote in representatives and Senators who will actually legislate for the people, rather than ones who will enrich themselves off their backs.

  You can revolt, you can eat the rich, it feels great. But what matters is how the system gets changed or doesn’t change. Plenty of revolutions have replaced the system was something worse, with these heros who took down the ruling class in their place. Keep a close eye on Syria, here’s hoping for the best.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Anyone else bounce around from game to game with no clue what to play?⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  Sometimes you’re just craving something specific or need something a bit smaller scale instead of a massive AAA. After finishing Cyberpunk 2077, I bounced around from God of War to Assassin’s Creed Origins to Spiderman, and on and on, all great titles… the game that finally grabbed me was an indie from a few years ago called Crying Suns.

  If you want a small game with killer mechanics and that you won’t feel like you’re abandoning after a few hours, try Into The Breach

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Why are $70 AAA games slashing prices so drastically?⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨weeks⁩ ago⁩:

  There are people willing to pay $80 for your game, $60, $40, $20, $10, and $5. You might be able get someone willing to pay $10 to pay $15 with good marketing, but you will never get them to pay $60. So when you’ve gone through most people willing to pay $60 and $40, you might as well go through the rest of the market. It doesn’t cost you that much more than you’re already spending on servers, so why not make that extra money.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Houses in my area increases 82% in just 4 years⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  I wonder what proportion of it is also due to people fleeing 1 million + average house markets during the pandemic work from home wave. Not saying this about you, but it makes me think it’s funny how the common refrain of “Don’t like it? Just move” is often uttered by NIMBYs.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Eat lead⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩:

  All this has happened before, and all this will happen again.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨💸💸💸⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I’m not sure how much the kingdom was involved in Al Qaeda’s early years, unless you count American-Saudi-British funding of MAK/other Mujahideen during the soviet-afghan war. However, it’s clear Al Qaeda was already declaring against the kingdom a couple years before the USS Cole in '98. But sure I’d see Al Qaeda being a child of SA in a way similar to the KKK being a child of the US

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨💸💸💸⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  You forgot the part where Saudi Arabia started courting American aid and literally expelled Bin Laden for being anti-American. That doesn’t make SA “the good guys” but it makes a huge difference in how your framing paints SA’s position and involvement with Al Qaeda during the 2000s. Their history is long and complicated, but during the war on terror, SA was much more aligned with the US against Al Qaeda and Bin Laden

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨💸💸💸⁩ ⁨⁨2⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  You forgot the part where Saudi Arabia started courting American aid and literally expelled Bin Laden for being anti-American. That doesn’t make SA “the good guys” but it makes a huge difference in how your framing paints SA’s position and involvement with Al Qaeda during the 2000s. During the war on terror, SA was much more aligned with the US against Al Qaeda and Bin Laden

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Nature is blunt.⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  They offer reputation. Career advancement is highly dependent on publication history and impact. Getting into a prestigious publication means your work will more likely be read and cited. Because highly reputable journals can charge high publication fees (because it’s in such high demand), they get to set the industry norm, which other less reputable journals/publishers get to follow. It does cost money to develop and maintain that reputation for rigour and impact (i.e. good science). But yeah it’s exploitative AF. There are attempts for less profit-motivated publications… But making those rigorous while still being democratic is hard

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Blocked 🚫⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Gotta love how the more “Applied” a field is, the more “Impure” it is.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Anon wants American companies to make a good RPG⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Of course, it makes perfect sense to describe Canadian products as North American, but OP asks about “American” RPGs. It would be strange to call Canadian Bacon “American food”.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Anon wants American companies to make a good RPG⁩ ⁨⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  BioWare is Canadian

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Are there any good casual/low-stress mobile games that aren't filled with microtransactions?⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  2048

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨it takes time to start appreciating imperfections instead of beauty⁩ ⁨⁨6⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Don’t you mean appreciating the beauty in imperfections?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The world has become Applefied.⁩ ⁨⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I mean there you go, Toyota’s are appliances. They have to look bland because their style has to remain inoffensive after decades on the road.

  That being said, I’m impressed with how much style they’ve managed to put on the new Prius while still aiming for long-term fleet vehicle role. I also like what they’re trying to do with the BZ4 styling wise, even if it’s a compromised first gen product.

  There’s also always the Supra and LC500 :3

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨The truth about Canada⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  Is this a shitpost because blue actually represents the Quebecois who view themselves as oppressed the way they oppressed Indigenous People, for whom orange/yellow/black/red/white are more representative colours?

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Shrinkflation is out of control⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  Same reason for every animal resource: over exploitation of the resource, habitat destruction/pollution, and climate change. This isn’t a recent thing, salmon stocks have been declining over the last 4 decades. The response to this decline of course has been to continue extracting the same amount year over year.