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Sophie: Where are you?
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2023-04-16 at 6 PM UTC
Originally posted by Meikai You have opposable thumbs which can do ~everything prehensile tails do, but better. We have better evolutionary grasping technology. So tails deprecated and were not maintained. If you absolutely must reduce everything to inherent disadvantages, the energy required to maintain a tail is pointless in the presence of greater grasping technology). 👍
selection isn't about maintenance, that's got nothing to do with it
new traits mutate and go into the pool, selection decides which ones get removed and the ones that don't get passed on
tails have been in the pool for a long time and have no reason to be taken out, because even if they're not as useful as thumbs, they're not thumbs and growing thumbs isn't predicated on the absence of a tail
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2023-04-16 at 6:01 PM UTC
Originally posted by Haxxor Lol, I get it, I thought Kafka was a woman.
FTR I’d take any advice or opinions he/she/it offers with a grain of salt. Those bulbs aren’t screwed in all the way 😉 as I’m sure you’ll see for your self soon enough.
I'm kind of a really, really stubborn person. So no matter how many times someone might tell me something.. if I don't feel the same way then I most likely won't listen haha. It's both a blessing and a curse, much like your photographic memory! -
2023-04-16 at 6:02 PM UTC
Originally posted by Meikai Since you are a huwhite male, you are a good person and a natural born leader who should naturally have authority over all women (as Allah intended).
I'm actually a brown male. Light brown, to be more specific, with yellow undertones. So I guess that means I'm a bad person. :( -
2023-04-16 at 6:03 PM UTC
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2023-04-16 at 6:03 PM UTC
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2023-04-16 at 6:05 PM UTC
Originally posted by aldra selection isn't about maintenance, that's got nothing to do with it
new traits mutate and go into the pool, selection decides which ones get removed and the ones that don't get passed on
tails have been in the pool for a long time and have no reason to be taken out, because even if they're not as useful as thumbs, they're not thumbs and growing thumbs isn't predicated on the absence of a tail
Selection pressure maintains what is necessary for genes to propagate, that is all. It trends towards improvements in capacity, but it will also maintain negligible losses of function so long as the loss of function does not massively impact gene propagation - it is imperfect. Think blind albino cave dwellers - eyes are useful! Melanin is useful! But a genetic mutation that removes your sight or pigmentation in a cave environment in which no selection pressure exists to maintain those useful traits (because there's no light) is maintained. -
2023-04-16 at 6:09 PM UTCno, 'unnecessary' traits like that are removed by sexual selection, usually because after being whittled down by natural selection species tend to self-select for novelty
which is what I was talking about in the first place -
2023-04-16 at 6:10 PM UTC
Originally posted by aldra no, 'unnecessary' traits like that are removed by sexual selection, usually because after being whittled down by natural selection species tend to self-select for novelty
which is what I was talking about in the first place
What sexual selection selects for a lack of eyes whose presence can't be detected because it's pitch black and your eyes are useless? -
2023-04-16 at 6:15 PM UTCDid they smell the lack of pigment, aldra?
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2023-04-16 at 6:16 PM UTCI just said novelty
natural selection is the first pass that removes traits that don't survive long enough to breed in the environment
sexual selection decides which of those surviving traits get passed on
it tends to select for unusual mutations, maybe as a sort of safety switch to prevent continuous inbreeding or maybe because generations of sexual selection actually change the selection criteria as time goes on
I don't knoe -
2023-04-16 at 6:16 PM UTCWhy don't you know, aldra? WHY?!
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2023-04-16 at 6:17 PM UTC
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2023-04-16 at 6:18 PM UTC
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2023-04-16 at 6:18 PM UTCLike I said, if you're completely unwilling to accept that evolution is imperfect, then calories are king. Maintaining eyes when they're useless is wasted energy (especially if you've compensated with sense of smell, or taste, as is the case with snakes - which are presumed to have evolved from a subterranean liserd population). Maintaining UV protective pigments when there's no UV is wasted energy. Maintaining prehensile tails when you have opposable thumbs and a massive brain is wasted energy (so long as 200 calories devoted to a brain confers a great benefit than 200 calories devoted to a tail, why would you expect evolution to maintain the tail?).
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2023-04-16 at 6:20 PM UTCMutations must pay for themselves in calories. Turns out more compute is a fantastic instrumental goal for human evolution and AI agents.
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2023-04-16 at 11:28 PM UTC
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2023-04-16 at 11:39 PM UTC
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2023-04-17 at 12:39 AM UTC
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2023-04-17 at 12:47 AM UTC
Originally posted by Meikai Does not confer a monumental advantage, so there's no mechanism by which it would be maintained. It would be convenient, but evolution is an imperfect master and does not care about convenience, only what is necessary. As long as losing a tail does not negatively impact your survival odds, you can lose it no matter how handy it is.
But like I implied in the previous tweet: if you absolutely must reduce everything to disadvantage, calories are king. 200 calories a day maintaining tail muscles over maintaining brain output or just upper body strength? Not worth it. Tail does not beat spear.
Imagine a lady walking by, dressed to the nines, sporting a blue crocodile Hermès Birkin handbag held aloft by her tail. -
2023-04-17 at 3:08 AM UTC
