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Doesn't this also imply a level of conscious decision making that a fern is probably not capable of making? Occam's razor would suggest that exposure to light,
by chadlavi 5y ago
Doesn't this also imply a level of conscious decision making that a fern is probably not capable of making?
Occam's razor would suggest that exposure to light, orientation relative to gravity, etc are more likely causes for the divergent characteristics of ferns at different positions, not any kind of purposeful social organization.
- mellavora 5y agowell, that would depend on how one defines conscious, and also on the assumption that eusociality depends on conscious decisions. Occam's razor could equally well be used to cut out the dependence on consciousness for the development of eusocial behavior. do we ascribe the eusocial organization of ants to conscious decisions made by individual ants?
- mcherm 5y agoEusocial behavior does not imply conscious decisions. Ants do not apply their conscious intelligence to choose whether to become a worker drone or soldier drone; it is controlled by chemical signals. Bee hives feed royal honey to form a new queen when the colony lacks a queen or is so large it may be able to split... but none of that is "conscious". Exposure to light, orientation relative to gravity, and such likely ARE the direct causes of the ferns' different growth patterns. But the end effect of a property that says "if you get light from above, grow waxy leaves that help filter water into the clump" is (maybe) that the clump consists of "cooperating" individuals and does better than individual fronds would.
- otabdeveloper4 5y ago> Ants do not apply their conscious intelligence to choose whether to become a worker drone or soldier drone; it is controlled by chemical signals. From what I know of antkeeping, this isn't true and they actually do make a conscious decision. (Based on things like food availability, perceived threat, etc.)
- mcherm 5y agoMost people do not consider ants to be conscious. But, on reflection, I'm not going to disagree with you. I'm not sure that the word "conscious" actually has a clear meaning other than human exceptionalism.
- fredgrott 5y agobe careful with that bad assumption Conscious behavior emerges from a set of cell signaling subsystems borrowed from plants and re-purposed... Those subsystems are known as the nervous system, hormones, neurotransmitters We as of yet in the continuum of emergent behavior yet to have properly deined where conscious lies
- rnhmjoj 5y agoWell, when worker bees communicate[1] the direction and distance of a foraging ground to each other, that seems pretty conscious to me. Saying everything boils down to chemical signals is true but it's probably too reductive. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waggle_dance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waggle_dance
- 7952 5y agoA lot of behaviour is in response to stimuli (like light) The "purpose" of that behaviour is that it helps certain genes reproduce. This behaviour could be complex and unexpected or much simpler. Animals may be able to exhibit more complex behaviour, but it is still mostly just a response to stimuli. An ant doesn't know why it cooperates, it does not have a purpose in a human sense. It has genes that have survived because they encourage social behaviour. It behaves socially in response to stimuli and helps the genes to spread.
- strogonoff 5y ago> Animals may be able to exhibit more complex behaviour, but it is still mostly just a response to stimuli. An ant doesn't know why it cooperates, it does not have a purpose in a human sense. It has genes that have survived because they encourage social behaviour. It behaves socially in response to stimuli and helps the genes to spread. Fun thought experiment: what if humans are the same? When was the last time you did something that didn’t help genes to spread, or wasn’t part of a longer strategy with that as eventual purpose?
- redeux 5y agoProbably when I got a vasectomy.
- strogonoff 5y agoIsn’t it said that genes’ spread doesn’t necessarily imply individual gene carrier’s survival or having more children? Like a thumping bunny that makes itself noticeable to a predator but helps relatives survive.
- cratermoon 5y agoIt's more than that. Most eusocial insects have only one reproductive member per unit - the queen. All of the rest of the members are children of the queen and work to ensure her ability to reproduce, thus maintaining their own gene line. The future queens will be sisters of the non-reproducing insects. Very vague recollection of mine, but I believe there was a study about the role of homosexuality in propagating the species. In very complex social animals likes humans, we can also ask about the reproductive "utility" of such things as art and music, which don't directly contribute to the basic needs of survival.
- ordu 5y ago> Occam's razor would suggest that exposure to light, orientation relative to gravity, etc are more likely causes for the divergent characteristics of ferns at different positions... It is not Occam's razor but a reduction. We do not need to talk about macroparameters in thermodynamics because they can be explained by microparameters. So there are no pressure and temperature, only positions and kinetic energies of individual particles. "Eusociality" here is not an explanation of a phenomenon, it is not a cause of a phenomenon but a classification. Eusociality doesn't explain (at least in this particular case), it just a mark for the phenomenon to be a member of the wider class of phenomena. At the same time exposure to light, orientation relative to gravity, etc might explain observed eusociality, so they might be targets for Occam's razor.