4 ms·
> Occam's razor can just as easily be applied here to come to a conclusion that is opposite your conclusion. I don't conclude that fish don't have feelings and
by ycmbntrthrwaway 11y ago
> Occam's razor can just as easily be applied here to come to a conclusion that is opposite your conclusion.
I don't conclude that fish don't have feelings and human have. What I say is that "feelings" and "experiencing" are undefined terms. So, both statements "fish have feelings" and "fish don't have feelings" are meaningless.
> Your assumption (that this response has no relation to the similar response in mammals)requires a new explanation for why the response happens.
I didn't assume that.
"Experiencing fear" is not an explanation for heating. The real explanation requires less abstraction, modelling organism as close to physics as possible, explaining biological processes that happen inside, not just comparing fish to mammals in a way that is more abstract than biology itself.
> Thus, it seems to not be the simplest explanation (to me).
Occam's razor is not about the simplest explanation. The simplest explanation for everything is "god will". Just as inventing "god" is simpler, inventing "fear", "feelings", "mind" and other non-material things is simpler, but unnecessary and does not explain anything really.
- SwellJoe 11y agoSo, humans don't have feelings either, because it's simpler to explain it as a mechanical process?
- ycmbntrthrwaway 11y agoSee, I never said that fish does not have feelings or that fish have feelings. I think it is meaningless. "Feelings" is an abstraction that makes it easier to explain human behaviour. With fish, asking questions like "does it have feelings", "does it have free will", "is it conscious" etc. is just the same as asking the same questions about machines: it does not help you to make any decisions about how to interact with it, so it does not matter.
- SwellJoe 11y agoSo, to extend the question I asked before: Does that mean because we cannot ever really know what goes on in another human's mind, does that mean human "feelings", "free will", or "consciousness", are meaningless and does not help us make decisions about how to interact with other human beings?