7 ms·

Translation: "Oops, sorry we turned up the flame under the pot of frogs too quickly. We will boil them more slowly in the future." (I've also heard it claimed

by KMag 6y ago

Translation: "Oops, sorry we turned up the flame under the pot of frogs too quickly. We will boil them more slowly in the future." (I've also heard it claimed that it's an urban legend that frogs won't jump if you cook them slowly. But, maybe it's an urban legend that it's an urban legend.)

mkl 6y ago
It's a myth, probably, though it was thought to be true for a long time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog
- true_religion 6y ago
  The wikipedia article doesn't really make it clear why it is a myth. Working experiment. Frogs stay in water. > Heinzmann heated the frogs over the course of 90 minutes from about 21 °C to 37.5 °C, a rate of less than 0.2 °C per minute. Failed experiment. Frog jumps. > as the water is heated by about 2 °F (about 1 °C), per minute, the frog becomes increasingly active as it tries to escape, and eventually jumps out if it can. There's a bunch of anecdotes from biologists and veterinarians saying 'ofcourse the frog will try to leave', but no modern experiments to see if a frog will escape if the water is boiled sufficiently slow.
Judgmentality 6y ago
> (I've also heard it claimed that it's an urban legend that frogs won't jump if you cook them slowly. But, maybe it's an urban legend that it's an urban legend.) Come on, it only takes a moment of critical thinking to realize no animal would allow itself to be boiled alive, be it slowly or quickly. If you're in a bath and you increase the heat until you're hot, do you keep increasing the heat or do you jump out when it's too hot?
- blackearl 6y ago
  I've jumped into a hot tub before.
- KMag 6y ago
  The legend is that if they're submerged in hot water and heated slowly enough, the brain starts having problems due to the heat before the skin gets too uncomfortable. > no animal would allow itself to be boiled alive You're surely not suggesting frogs have a theory of self, and while there's evolutionary pressure against walking into forest fires or too hot sun-baked rocks, there are very few environments where animals would be subjected to slowly increasing water temperatures that eventually reach fatal temperatures. If it's not obvious that there's evolutionary pressure for this situation, and we don't think frogs have a conscious self-preservation, I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss the legend out-of-hand.
  - Judgmentality 6y ago
    > You're surely not suggesting frogs have a theory of self https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog You don't need a theory of self to explain this. Frogs are living creatures with an instinct to live, and heat stroke is bad for survival. It's no different from wandering into the desert sun - you cannot thermoregulate your body past a certain point. > The legend is that if they're submerged in hot water and heated slowly enough, the brain starts having problems due to the heat before the skin gets too uncomfortable. By that logic people will stay outside and freeze to death from hypothermia which eventually causes people to believe they're hot while literally freezing to death, even though long before that happens any functioning human being would say "I'm cold and need to warm up now!" before suffering any significant health problems. It's a fucking dumb legend and regurgitating it does humanity a disservice. I am aware it is a common saying and what it means. I just wish people would think more before repeating everything they hear.
    - KMag 6y ago
      > no animal would allow itself to be boiled alive The most plain reading of this statement implies both understanding of the situation, and consent, which implies an understanding of self and the implications for the self. I'm saying you clearly don't mean that... so you must be anthropomorphizing some evolved environmental response as "not allowing". I'm arguing that very few frogs and their ancestors have been in situations where the best response to slowly rising heat is to move frantically. So, maybe the have some other evolved response that will get them out of the pot, but it's almost certainly not an evolved response to an evolutionary pressure of slowly rising water temperatures. The best response to a hot desert is to move slowly and surely to some place to hide, which is the opposite optimal strategy for a boiling pot of water (jump rapidly, try as many times as possible in a short time). An evolved response to survive in a hot desert would work against the boiling pot situation. > By that logic people will stay outside and freeze to death from hypothermia This analogy makes no sense unless you think frogs have a human-like ability to understand situations and plan. Humans' response to extreme cold is dominated by their understanding of the self and their situation. Even some humans will die of hypothermia in their own homes before seeking help[0]. Humans starting to get hypothermia don't run around frantically, which is what heated frogs need to do in order to survive a hot pot. The analogy is just badly broken. This is your second response that seems to be anthropomorphizing frogs. Frogs aren't just small slow thinking humans without opposable thumbs. Their response to situation is different in kind, not just degree, from that of humans. Reasoning by analogy with human behavior is downright misleading. [0] https://duckduckgo.com/?q=hide+and+die+syndrome https://duckduckgo.com/?q=hide+and+die+syndrome
- stabbles 6y ago
  It's a common expression. I think I heard it first in An Unconvenient Truth about climate change.
  - edgarvaldes 6y ago
    "My 9th grade science teacher always said that if you put a frog in boiling hot water, it would jump out. But put it in cold water, and heat it up gradually, it would slowly boil to death." Harry Dalton (Pierce Brosnan) in Dante's Peak (1997)
- idlewords 6y ago
  Cats have been known to sleep on radiators until they get heatstroke.
- mekoka 6y ago
  Why would critical thinking exclude the possibility? There are situations where death comes before the threshold of discomfort.
  - Judgmentality 6y ago
    > There are situations where death comes before the threshold of discomfort. Not for anything we can actually sense. Volume, temperature, pressure - you will feel wildly uncomfortable long before any of these are extreme enough to seriously impact your health. Is there any example of something we can feel, but we don't feel uncomfortable before it kills us? All I can think of are drugs.
    - gbrown 6y ago
      Oxygen deprivation
      - KMag 6y ago
        Yes. Search YouTube for high-altitude simulation chambers and hypoxia. I seem to think Derek from Veritasium has a very good demonstration where he gets euhporic and seems unaware that he's severely mentally compromised. Also, I once helped a friend set up and tear down an art project that was a flying remote-controlled statue, held up partially by a weather balloon full of helium. In tearing down, I didn't want to let the helium go to waste. My first breath of pure helium went fine. My second full breath of pure helium in a row, I barely had enough time to sit down, say "whoah" and cough the helium out before falling down and twitching on the gymnasium floor. A woke up right at the same time my artist friend realized I wasn't joking around. Had I died, I would have felt no pain, not even the slightest discomfort. Breathing pure helium, I learned you have about 1-2 seconds of warning that you're hypoxic before you pass out. I figured it was more like 15-30 seconds. Luckily, I didn't die, partially because, as a low molecular weight gas, helium has a high rate of effusion, and on my back, it being lighter than air helped it escape my lungs. Argon may very well have killed me because it has a much lower rate of effusion, and (also related to its higher molar mass) it's also heavier than air.
    - 6y ago
- krzrak 6y ago
  > Come on, it only takes a moment of critical thinking to realize no animal would allow itself to be boiled alive, be it slowly or quickly. It's funny to read that, until you realize, that it is exactly what humans are doing in regards to global warming.
  - encom 6y ago
    I'm sure global warming isn't that bad. We have a long way to go before we reach Venus levels.
- nitrogen 6y ago
  Here's an experiment you can try at home. It doesn't prove that humans or frogs won't notice extreme temperatures, but it does show that it would be reasonable to believe that it's conceivable that some animal can only detect relative temperature. 1. Prepare three bowls of water, one cold (but bearable), one hot (but bearable), and one lukewarm. 2. Place one hand in the cold water, and the other hand in the hot water. 3. Wait a minute or two. 4. Place both hands in the lukewarm water at the same time. 5. WTF, is this hot or is it cold?
suyash 6y ago
best interpretation right here!

by KMag 6y ago

mkl 6y ago

It's a myth, probably, though it was thought to be true for a long time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog

true_religion 6y ago
The wikipedia article doesn't really make it clear why it is a myth. Working experiment. Frogs stay in water. > Heinzmann heated the frogs over the course of 90 minutes from about 21 °C to 37.5 °C, a rate of less than 0.2 °C per minute. Failed experiment. Frog jumps. > as the water is heated by about 2 °F (about 1 °C), per minute, the frog becomes increasingly active as it tries to escape, and eventually jumps out if it can. There's a bunch of anecdotes from biologists and veterinarians saying 'ofcourse the frog will try to leave', but no modern experiments to see if a frog will escape if the water is boiled sufficiently slow.

Judgmentality 6y ago

> (I've also heard it claimed that it's an urban legend that frogs won't jump if you cook them slowly. But, maybe it's an urban legend that it's an urban legend.) Come on, it only takes a moment of critical thinking to realize no animal would allow itself to be boiled alive, be it slowly or quickly. If you're in a bath and you increase the heat until you're hot, do you keep increasing the heat or do you jump out when it's too hot?

blackearl 6y ago
I've jumped into a hot tub before.
KMag 6y ago
The legend is that if they're submerged in hot water and heated slowly enough, the brain starts having problems due to the heat before the skin gets too uncomfortable. > no animal would allow itself to be boiled alive You're surely not suggesting frogs have a theory of self, and while there's evolutionary pressure against walking into forest fires or too hot sun-baked rocks, there are very few environments where animals would be subjected to slowly increasing water temperatures that eventually reach fatal temperatures. If it's not obvious that there's evolutionary pressure for this situation, and we don't think frogs have a conscious self-preservation, I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss the legend out-of-hand.
- Judgmentality 6y ago
  > You're surely not suggesting frogs have a theory of self https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog You don't need a theory of self to explain this. Frogs are living creatures with an instinct to live, and heat stroke is bad for survival. It's no different from wandering into the desert sun - you cannot thermoregulate your body past a certain point. > The legend is that if they're submerged in hot water and heated slowly enough, the brain starts having problems due to the heat before the skin gets too uncomfortable. By that logic people will stay outside and freeze to death from hypothermia which eventually causes people to believe they're hot while literally freezing to death, even though long before that happens any functioning human being would say "I'm cold and need to warm up now!" before suffering any significant health problems. It's a fucking dumb legend and regurgitating it does humanity a disservice. I am aware it is a common saying and what it means. I just wish people would think more before repeating everything they hear.
  - KMag 6y ago
    > no animal would allow itself to be boiled alive The most plain reading of this statement implies both understanding of the situation, and consent, which implies an understanding of self and the implications for the self. I'm saying you clearly don't mean that... so you must be anthropomorphizing some evolved environmental response as "not allowing". I'm arguing that very few frogs and their ancestors have been in situations where the best response to slowly rising heat is to move frantically. So, maybe the have some other evolved response that will get them out of the pot, but it's almost certainly not an evolved response to an evolutionary pressure of slowly rising water temperatures. The best response to a hot desert is to move slowly and surely to some place to hide, which is the opposite optimal strategy for a boiling pot of water (jump rapidly, try as many times as possible in a short time). An evolved response to survive in a hot desert would work against the boiling pot situation. > By that logic people will stay outside and freeze to death from hypothermia This analogy makes no sense unless you think frogs have a human-like ability to understand situations and plan. Humans' response to extreme cold is dominated by their understanding of the self and their situation. Even some humans will die of hypothermia in their own homes before seeking help[0]. Humans starting to get hypothermia don't run around frantically, which is what heated frogs need to do in order to survive a hot pot. The analogy is just badly broken. This is your second response that seems to be anthropomorphizing frogs. Frogs aren't just small slow thinking humans without opposable thumbs. Their response to situation is different in kind, not just degree, from that of humans. Reasoning by analogy with human behavior is downright misleading. [0] https://duckduckgo.com/?q=hide+and+die+syndrome https://duckduckgo.com/?q=hide+and+die+syndrome
stabbles 6y ago
It's a common expression. I think I heard it first in An Unconvenient Truth about climate change.
- edgarvaldes 6y ago
  "My 9th grade science teacher always said that if you put a frog in boiling hot water, it would jump out. But put it in cold water, and heat it up gradually, it would slowly boil to death." Harry Dalton (Pierce Brosnan) in Dante's Peak (1997)
idlewords 6y ago
Cats have been known to sleep on radiators until they get heatstroke.
mekoka 6y ago
Why would critical thinking exclude the possibility? There are situations where death comes before the threshold of discomfort.
- Judgmentality 6y ago
  > There are situations where death comes before the threshold of discomfort. Not for anything we can actually sense. Volume, temperature, pressure - you will feel wildly uncomfortable long before any of these are extreme enough to seriously impact your health. Is there any example of something we can feel, but we don't feel uncomfortable before it kills us? All I can think of are drugs.
  - gbrown 6y ago
    Oxygen deprivation
    - KMag 6y ago
      Yes. Search YouTube for high-altitude simulation chambers and hypoxia. I seem to think Derek from Veritasium has a very good demonstration where he gets euhporic and seems unaware that he's severely mentally compromised. Also, I once helped a friend set up and tear down an art project that was a flying remote-controlled statue, held up partially by a weather balloon full of helium. In tearing down, I didn't want to let the helium go to waste. My first breath of pure helium went fine. My second full breath of pure helium in a row, I barely had enough time to sit down, say "whoah" and cough the helium out before falling down and twitching on the gymnasium floor. A woke up right at the same time my artist friend realized I wasn't joking around. Had I died, I would have felt no pain, not even the slightest discomfort. Breathing pure helium, I learned you have about 1-2 seconds of warning that you're hypoxic before you pass out. I figured it was more like 15-30 seconds. Luckily, I didn't die, partially because, as a low molecular weight gas, helium has a high rate of effusion, and on my back, it being lighter than air helped it escape my lungs. Argon may very well have killed me because it has a much lower rate of effusion, and (also related to its higher molar mass) it's also heavier than air.
  - 6y ago
krzrak 6y ago
> Come on, it only takes a moment of critical thinking to realize no animal would allow itself to be boiled alive, be it slowly or quickly. It's funny to read that, until you realize, that it is exactly what humans are doing in regards to global warming.
- encom 6y ago
  I'm sure global warming isn't that bad. We have a long way to go before we reach Venus levels.
nitrogen 6y ago
Here's an experiment you can try at home. It doesn't prove that humans or frogs won't notice extreme temperatures, but it does show that it would be reasonable to believe that it's conceivable that some animal can only detect relative temperature. 1. Prepare three bowls of water, one cold (but bearable), one hot (but bearable), and one lukewarm. 2. Place one hand in the cold water, and the other hand in the hot water. 3. Wait a minute or two. 4. Place both hands in the lukewarm water at the same time. 5. WTF, is this hot or is it cold?

suyash 6y ago

best interpretation right here!