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good read. thanks. > "This [lack of movement] indicates there might be some kind of competitive exclusion going on: Perhaps more energetic, younger deer with

good read. thanks. > "This [lack of movement] indicates there might be some kind of competitive exclusion going on: Perhaps more energetic, younger deer with offspring to feed are colonizing the best grazing patches." sounds like ageism in the job market (joking). i think there is always a simple thing behind motivation. hunger, violence, greed...humans just good at hiding the naked truth.

HPsquared 2y ago
We're good at focusing on our long-term greed and hunger over short-term greed and hunger.
- xnavra50 2y ago
  Some of us aren't. Eating junk food, drinking alcohol, taking drugs and loans for new shiny things.
  - HPsquared 2y ago
    That's another thing with humans: massive diversity. Some are 10x stronger than others for example, or 10x better memory. There's such a wide variety. I wonder if any other species is as varied. I think this variation, combined with the ability to socially cooperate (language) makes us naturally evolved for the efficient division of labour. A group with diverse abilities has a few superstar specialists in each field who can lift the whole group via cooperation. The ability to cooperate shifts the risk:reward ratio of the species for this kind of risk-taking.
    - drewcoo 2y ago
      Disagree. We are much less diverse than many other species. We are a social species so we pay more attention to one another. We are also pattern-seekers. Combine these traits and we have humans seeing magnified differences in other humans.
      - jhedwards 2y ago
        Recently I was struck by the fact that some people have an internal monologue and others don't, and some people can see vivid images in their mind and some can't see anything at all. These seem like very dramatic differences to me. I'm skeptical that we are less diverse than other species. In a herd in nature, exposed to the wild, exposed to predators and food scarcity, there is not much room for diversity: you must be able to survive. In human society, on the other hand, we live in an artificial environment insulated from those risks, and where any number of skills are sufficient for survival: you can be funny, musical, logical, artistic, patient and caring, mathematical, strong, good at fighting etc.
        jajko 2y ago
        Yeah but selective evolution lags behind right now by what, 10,000 years if not more? What I mean our selected traits are stil mostly from hunters/gatherers/early farming era. Those survival risk were and in some places still are present, stronger would simply have higher survival chances compared to weaker. Those skills you list wouldnt matter that much 4000 years ago in most cases, not on survival level.
        taneq 2y ago
        Physiologically we seem to be fairly consistent (especially given our relative complexity to a lot of other animals). Mentally? There's an incredible variety of aptitudes both in direction and magnitude. I suspect part of this might just be that we're a relatively 'new' species, and neurologically we've evolved so fast that the results are still a little random.
        ahartmetz 2y ago
        Regarding relative physiological complexity, I would argue that we are physiologically as complex as any other large, omnivorous mammal. There is nothing special about humans in that regard. Our randomness might actually be adaptive given the complexity of our societies. There is nothing close among other animals.
        ds_opseeker 2y ago
    - keybored 2y ago
      > That's another thing with humans: massive diversity. Some are 10x stronger than others for example, or 10x better memory. The sentiment variety on HN is, however, not so diverse.
    - SoftTalker 2y ago
      In most other species the weaker, less able individuals are brutally weeded out by predation or starvation. Humans don't do that anymore so you see a lot wider variation in strength, beauty, ability, etc.
- bumby 2y ago
  There's definitely some research around "hyperbolic discounting" and "dynamic/time inconsistency" that would disagree with this conclusion. There are many examples where we prefer a lesser short term payoff.
- linearrust 2y ago
  > We're good at focusing on our long-term greed and hunger over short-term greed and hunger. If that were true, the modern world centered around consumerism wouldn't exist. We wouldn't have the obesity epidemic, environmental degradation or the genocide of dozens of native nations. Feels like short-term thinking where it's at.
  - amanaplanacanal 2y ago
    I think in this case “good” simply means better than other animals.
exe34 2y ago
> think there is always a simple thing behind motivation. hunger, violence, greed...humans just good at hiding the naked truth our very emotions, instead of being some ineffable magical thing, can be described as monomaniacal neural nets trained via a genetic algorithm to optimise for survival and reproduction based on a dataset from the palaeolithic and earlier. greed, jealousy, lust, even the beatified versions like love and grief, are explainable this way. people don't like it when you explain that sort of thing though. they prefer to believe it's all magical.
- meroes 2y ago
  If we’re neural nets, shouldn’t 12,000 years of post paleolithic experience be enough to have more modern emotions? All you’re doing is forcing people to choose something other than magic. You could name almost anything and they’d have to choose it over magic since magic doesn’t exist. This is not convincing at all.
  - exe34 2y ago
    > If we’re neural nets, shouldn’t 12,000 years of post paleolithic experience be enough to have more modern emotions does that mean you believe the Coelacanths should have evolved feet by now? evolution does not work that way. usually new structures are laid out on top, new behaviours come about that can override older ones at certain times and at other times, "instinct" takes over, and an old program is running again.
    - meroes 2y ago
      That’s sounding much more biological than a neural net now. Neural nets are much quicker to adapt to new parameters. Coelacanths and humans aren’t. Which was my point if 12,000 years isn’t enough whereas neural nets are rapidly changeable, maybe we can’t do this equivalence in calling humans neural nets.
      - exe34 2y ago
        are you maybe mentally inserting "artificial" in front of "neural network"? if so, do you also see GPUs in biology?

HPsquared 2y ago

We're good at focusing on our long-term greed and hunger over short-term greed and hunger.

xnavra50 2y ago
Some of us aren't. Eating junk food, drinking alcohol, taking drugs and loans for new shiny things.
- HPsquared 2y ago
  That's another thing with humans: massive diversity. Some are 10x stronger than others for example, or 10x better memory. There's such a wide variety. I wonder if any other species is as varied. I think this variation, combined with the ability to socially cooperate (language) makes us naturally evolved for the efficient division of labour. A group with diverse abilities has a few superstar specialists in each field who can lift the whole group via cooperation. The ability to cooperate shifts the risk:reward ratio of the species for this kind of risk-taking.
  - drewcoo 2y ago
    Disagree. We are much less diverse than many other species. We are a social species so we pay more attention to one another. We are also pattern-seekers. Combine these traits and we have humans seeing magnified differences in other humans.
    - jhedwards 2y ago
      Recently I was struck by the fact that some people have an internal monologue and others don't, and some people can see vivid images in their mind and some can't see anything at all. These seem like very dramatic differences to me. I'm skeptical that we are less diverse than other species. In a herd in nature, exposed to the wild, exposed to predators and food scarcity, there is not much room for diversity: you must be able to survive. In human society, on the other hand, we live in an artificial environment insulated from those risks, and where any number of skills are sufficient for survival: you can be funny, musical, logical, artistic, patient and caring, mathematical, strong, good at fighting etc.
      - jajko 2y ago
        Yeah but selective evolution lags behind right now by what, 10,000 years if not more? What I mean our selected traits are stil mostly from hunters/gatherers/early farming era. Those survival risk were and in some places still are present, stronger would simply have higher survival chances compared to weaker. Those skills you list wouldnt matter that much 4000 years ago in most cases, not on survival level.
      - taneq 2y ago
        Physiologically we seem to be fairly consistent (especially given our relative complexity to a lot of other animals). Mentally? There's an incredible variety of aptitudes both in direction and magnitude. I suspect part of this might just be that we're a relatively 'new' species, and neurologically we've evolved so fast that the results are still a little random.
        ahartmetz 2y ago
        Regarding relative physiological complexity, I would argue that we are physiologically as complex as any other large, omnivorous mammal. There is nothing special about humans in that regard. Our randomness might actually be adaptive given the complexity of our societies. There is nothing close among other animals.
      - ds_opseeker 2y ago
  - keybored 2y ago
    > That's another thing with humans: massive diversity. Some are 10x stronger than others for example, or 10x better memory. The sentiment variety on HN is, however, not so diverse.
  - SoftTalker 2y ago
    In most other species the weaker, less able individuals are brutally weeded out by predation or starvation. Humans don't do that anymore so you see a lot wider variation in strength, beauty, ability, etc.
bumby 2y ago
There's definitely some research around "hyperbolic discounting" and "dynamic/time inconsistency" that would disagree with this conclusion. There are many examples where we prefer a lesser short term payoff.
linearrust 2y ago
> We're good at focusing on our long-term greed and hunger over short-term greed and hunger. If that were true, the modern world centered around consumerism wouldn't exist. We wouldn't have the obesity epidemic, environmental degradation or the genocide of dozens of native nations. Feels like short-term thinking where it's at.
- amanaplanacanal 2y ago
  I think in this case “good” simply means better than other animals.

exe34 2y ago

> think there is always a simple thing behind motivation. hunger, violence, greed...humans just good at hiding the naked truth our very emotions, instead of being some ineffable magical thing, can be described as monomaniacal neural nets trained via a genetic algorithm to optimise for survival and reproduction based on a dataset from the palaeolithic and earlier. greed, jealousy, lust, even the beatified versions like love and grief, are explainable this way. people don't like it when you explain that sort of thing though. they prefer to believe it's all magical.

meroes 2y ago
If we’re neural nets, shouldn’t 12,000 years of post paleolithic experience be enough to have more modern emotions? All you’re doing is forcing people to choose something other than magic. You could name almost anything and they’d have to choose it over magic since magic doesn’t exist. This is not convincing at all.
- exe34 2y ago
  > If we’re neural nets, shouldn’t 12,000 years of post paleolithic experience be enough to have more modern emotions does that mean you believe the Coelacanths should have evolved feet by now? evolution does not work that way. usually new structures are laid out on top, new behaviours come about that can override older ones at certain times and at other times, "instinct" takes over, and an old program is running again.
  - meroes 2y ago
    That’s sounding much more biological than a neural net now. Neural nets are much quicker to adapt to new parameters. Coelacanths and humans aren’t. Which was my point if 12,000 years isn’t enough whereas neural nets are rapidly changeable, maybe we can’t do this equivalence in calling humans neural nets.
    - exe34 2y ago
      are you maybe mentally inserting "artificial" in front of "neural network"? if so, do you also see GPUs in biology?