h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

>>..we, as a species, will have to recognize the
sentience of other species we share this world with. <<

We must begin by deconstructing what we are taught to
believe are the intelligent things that make us superior.

eg:
Dogs know when we are sick and just because they can't
speak Latin or hold a scalpel doesn't mean we should not
be listening to their diagnoses. In New Zealand they are
teaching dogs to drive cars - not necessarily a good idea
or money well spent except that it proves the point that
dogs will do anything for a biscuit. Just like people.

Most animals can be 'trained' to do stuff. Most especially
human beings. But that doesn't make us any smarter than
a rat who figgers out which lever to pull to get food.


~jwf~

Well, that was the point of the examples I gave. They went beyond mere Skinnerian training. They are examples of intelligence and sentience rather than programmed response.

"I hope you're right when you say that all the Jedis realize it's a joke. Even as obviously parodic a "religion" as Flying Spaghetti Monsterism may be taken seriously by some."

...and who knows what other belief systems were founded as allorgories or thought exercise, to exploit the easily led or simply to met the immotional needs of those who can not face the inevitability of death and loss or their own insignificance.
It is worth noting that the fastest growing religions in the world was started by a SciFi writer.

"Most animals can be 'trained' to do stuff. Most especially
human beings. But that doesn't make us any smarter than
a rat who figgers out which lever to pull to get food."

When the rat designs the lever and the experiment then your arguement will have more wieght

When I spoke of "lower" forms not having intelligence or empathy, I was talking about properly "low" things like worms etc.

There's obviously a continuum of sentience with us apparently at the top. Some other creatures demonstrably have a sense of self. Chimps for instance - there's a test, isn't there, to do with a mirror? It's going back a bit so I don't remember clearly. Something like...

... Show a chimp a mirror. Allow it to get used to its reflection. Then surreptitiously put a blob of bright paint on its face, in a position where it can only see the paint in the mirror. The chimp will see the paint in the reflection, and RUB ITS OWN FACE. It recognises itself as a distinct entity in the world, in a way less intelligent creatures do not.

Just because you can train a creature to respond mechanically and repeatably to a given stimulus is no indication it understands the connection between the stimulus and response.

>> When the rat designs the lever <<

My point was to reinforce the Baron's argument
that there is a distinction to be made between
responses conditioned by repetition and reward
or engagement in truly creative thinking.

The example of the rat is a trained behaviour
and you are on the right track by suggesting that
a rat could not design an experimental device.

But neither could 99.9% of our species - so on a
purely scientific basis our supposed intelligence
is statistically insignificant. Just because some
jerk in a white coat likes to tease rodents and
comes up with a device to exploit their hunger so
he can feel superior, doesn't mean we as species
should share his delusionally inflated opinion.

The smart thing to do would be just to avoid rats
altogether. Let them find their own damn food.


~jwf~

"I gather that the mice did arrange for you humans to conduct some primitively staged experiments on them just to check how much you’d really learned, to give you the odd prod in the right direction, you know the sort of thing: suddenly running down the maze the wrong way; eating the wrong bit of cheese; or suddenly dropping dead of myxomatosis." - U42

myxomatosis:

"a highly infectious viral disease of rabbits,
artificially introduced into Great Britain and
Australia to reduce the rabbit population."



~jwf~

Getting back to the original topic of this thread, I think it has been settled that there was not, in fact, a Jedi holocaust. Those who identified themselves as Jedis in the earlier census have new identities, most likely. Those of you who still identify yourselves as Jedis may need help in dealing with feelings of loneliness. Then again, popular culture continues to be a fountain of new possibilities. Maybe there's an even better religion out there ready to be explored.

"Maybe there's an even better religion out there ready to be explored."

Jah Pastafari - has the Flying Spaghetti Monster opened his noodely appendages to you - bless.

"But neither could 99.9% of our species - so on a purely scientific basis our supposed intelligence
is statistically insignificant."

Perhaps any rats that have logged in and are reading this would like to comment, and maybe than can make more sense of the second part of the sentence above than me.

"Just because some jerk in a white coat likes to tease rodents and comes up with a device to exploit their hunger so
he can feel superior, doesn't mean we as species should share his delusionally inflated opinion"

I'm no fan of animal experiments and most humans do have an inflated opinion of their importance, but even so I rather thought the idea of behavioural experiments was an attempt to better understand human behaviour by people who understand we are just another animal rather than some sort of special supernatural entity.

>> more sense of the second part of the sentence <<

I believe the scientific standard for statistical
significance is usually set around 15%.

If 99 percent of a group are incapable of achieving
a task or lack a specific capacity, the remaining 1%
possessing a given quality or aspect cannot be put
forward as being representative of the group.

In the 1960s homosexuality was calculated at about one
in seven or less than 15%. Statistically insignificant.

Blacks were traditionally counted as about 11% of the US
population. Statistically insignificant.

Left handed people represent 30% of a typical population
and yet even they must fight against ignorance and prejudice
in a society where everything is designed for righties.

So why should the 1% of humanity capable of designing
scientific experiments be given much credence or be said
to represent typical human understanding and ability? A
classic egregious example of a tail wagging the Pavlov.


~jwf~

Science is based on imperical evidence and strictly defined terms rather than supposition

Could you define what it is you understand the term intelligence to mean?

Could you also let me know what evidence you have that demostrates 99% of human are not capable of creating simple levers or manipulating the behaviour of others - it is my observation most five year olds are capable of both.

>>..it is my observation most five year olds are capable of both. <<

Well you have me there.
I tend not to observe 5 year olds.


~jwf~

You've never had children, and never had any siblings, cousins or friends who've had children either? How odd.

Never is a long time innit.

Suffice to say my 'exposure' to 5 year olds
has been limited to something less than such
time periods as I understand might be necessary
for any meaningful clinical study.

And even less time with self-feeding rats.


~jwf~

Also your understanding of statistical significance is slightly incorrect.

Statistical significance is the chance that a result occured by chance of less than a pre-determined amount, usually 1 in 20, sometimes in 1 in 1000, depending on how many tests you do.

Here's a thought experiment. Imagine you are a coin dealer, and a person comes in with a coin. They claim that it is double headed, and offer to sell it to you. If this coin is double-headed you know it would be very valuable. BUT for some reason you can't just turn the coin over to check that it is double headed. There is only one way to see if it is double headed or not, and that is for them to toss it a number of times and demonstrate that it always shows heads.

If they just tossed the coin once, and it showed heads, would you believe that it was double headed? Probably not: if they had a normal coin the chances of that happening is 1 in 2.

If they tossed the coin 1000 times and it always showed heads would you believe that it was double headed? Yes, you probably would. The chances of a normal coin showing heads 1000 times is very low.

So how many times would you make them toss the coin before you believed that it was double headed and hand over the money?

That's a person decision for everyone. But in science we usually continue to toss the coin until the chances of it happening by chance were 1 in 20. So that's the same as getting six heads in a row.

Ok, what does statistically significant mean?

So if I'm doing an experiment I and I get a result, I want to know if there really is a difference between the intervention and control group, if there's a difference I reckon that's a significant result. If the chances of the result happening just by chance, are less than 1 in 20 then I can call that a statistically signifcant result.

>> BUT for some reason you can't just turn the
coin over to check that it is double headed. <<

That would make me pretty lousy coin dealer.

Odds are I'd be bankrupt in very short order.

Ripped off by two-headed, 5-year-old, rat-feeding
cointossers proposing impossible circumstances
with zero sum outcomes.

Are paulh and I the only ones using smileys anymore?

Use the Farce, Luke!

~jwf~

Around 25.000 people have petitioned the White House to build the Death Star. I told you, all the cool kids are Sith these days.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2012/12/13/death-star-petition.html

"Are paulh and I the only ones using smileys anymore?" [jwf]

My excuse is that I have a silly side, and I'm proud of it. What's yours?