Apr 16, 2026 05:23 PM
Jun 4, 2026 12:50 AM
"What draws the moth to the flame
Nocturnal insects appear drawn to artificial lights because they instinctively twist their backs towards bright objects. The instinct to tilt their backs towards the brightest thing available at night — the sky — allows insects to quickly figure out which way is up. Researchers who tracked insects’ flight patterns with motion-capture cameras found that this even leads the animals to flip upside down and crash into the ground when the light source is underneath them. The researchers suggest reducing upward-facing lights and ground reflections to avoid confusing flying insects at night."--Nature Magazine
Nocturnal insects appear drawn to artificial lights because they instinctively twist their backs towards bright objects. The instinct to tilt their backs towards the brightest thing available at night — the sky — allows insects to quickly figure out which way is up. Researchers who tracked insects’ flight patterns with motion-capture cameras found that this even leads the animals to flip upside down and crash into the ground when the light source is underneath them. The researchers suggest reducing upward-facing lights and ground reflections to avoid confusing flying insects at night."--Nature Magazine
Jun 4, 2026 07:30 PM
Do not despise nor fear the lowly opossum should you stumble upon one. They only have a lifespan of 1-2 years. Think about that. That's incredibly short! Have compassion therefore for this unfortunate beast of the wild.
![[Image: CK4s7VI.jpg]](https://iili.io/CK4s7VI.jpg)
Jun 4, 2026 11:40 PM
They say that all birds and mammals dream. They just found a spider that dreams too. I believe everything that dreams has a soul.
"Do spiders dream? A new study looking at infrared footage of 34 juvenile jumping spiders suggests that perhaps they do. The team of former Harvard researchers analyzed videos of the sleeping arachnids and found they exhibited a rapid-eye movement (REM) dream-like state, which they could directly observe because juvenile spiders have translucent exoskeletons. The researchers also documented limb movements characteristic of dreaming, including leg twitching and curling. The study is believed to be the first time REM sleep-like behavior has been documented in a terrestrial invertebrate.."----- https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2...g-spiders/
"Do spiders dream? A new study looking at infrared footage of 34 juvenile jumping spiders suggests that perhaps they do. The team of former Harvard researchers analyzed videos of the sleeping arachnids and found they exhibited a rapid-eye movement (REM) dream-like state, which they could directly observe because juvenile spiders have translucent exoskeletons. The researchers also documented limb movements characteristic of dreaming, including leg twitching and curling. The study is believed to be the first time REM sleep-like behavior has been documented in a terrestrial invertebrate.."----- https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2...g-spiders/
Jun 5, 2026 12:29 AM
Dreams, the subconscious processing daily experiences, are more closely related to instinct than a soul.
...
Note that non-verbal animals that likely have no capacity to interpret anything may nonetheless have dreams and instincts. This is because while both dreams and instincts can manifest themselves as signals to be decoded, they can also act on us directly, as blind causal forces. That is why pre-verbal toddlers can be moved to scratch when they have an itch. They don't know what an itch is or that scratching is a suitable response, but they are moved to scratch directly and reflexively. Cats and dogs are probably propelled to action in the way toddlers are. And if they dream, then their dreams act on them as causal forces too, making them frightened or calming them down but not sending them any kind of message, not telling them anything.
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- https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/...-instincts
Jun 5, 2026 01:03 AM
Makes you wonder how profoundly deaf people grow up (as far as I know) pretty 'normal' despite having no verbs to verbalise with.
I tend to dislike spiders but (small) jumping spiders are the exception.
I tend to dislike spiders but (small) jumping spiders are the exception.
Jun 5, 2026 01:13 AM
Quote:And if they dream, then their dreams act on them as causal forces too, making them frightened or calming them down but not sending them any kind of message, not telling them anything.
What would be the point of a dog dreaming it is running after a squirrel and so triggering his excitement and leg movements while totally asleep? Exercise? lol
From every dream I have ever had there is a conscious experience of being in some situation that I am moving about in and reacting to. To dismiss animals as not having this immersive conscious experience and only being machines that react to non-conscious dreams (whatever that would be!) seems to deny that they are dreaming at all.
Jun 5, 2026 02:09 AM
(Jun 5, 2026 01:13 AM)Magical Realist Wrote: [ -> ]Quote:And if they dream, then their dreams act on them as causal forces too, making them frightened or calming them down but not sending them any kind of message, not telling them anything.
What would be the point of a dog dreaming it is running after a squirrel and so triggering his excitement and leg movements while totally asleep? Exercise? lol
(Jun 5, 2026 12:29 AM)Syne Wrote: [ -> ]...the subconscious processing daily experiences,...
Quote:From every dream I have ever had there is a conscious experience of being in some situation that I am moving about in and reacting to. To dismiss animals as not having this immersive conscious experience and only being machines that react to non-conscious dreams (whatever that would be!) seems to deny that they are dreaming at all.Who said animals don't have experiences while dreaming? Dogs, for example, obviously try to chase and bark at dream squirrels, just like they would awake. It's just a mimicry of waking life, which for animals doesn't include human-like contemplation.
Many neuroscientists suggest that dreaming helps the brain "unlearn" or purge the clutter of useless daily memories and emotional baggage.
The primary theories on what dreams accomplish include:
Memory Purging (Reverse Learning): The theory pioneered by Nobel laureate Francis Crick suggests that REM sleep is the brain's way of doing "neural housecleaning". Dreams are the conscious byproducts of the brain deleting unneeded connections and random daily data to prevent overload.
Emotional Processing: Another school of thought views dreams as a psychological safety valve. Your brain simulates stressful situations to process complex emotions and help you regulate your mood.
Consolidation: Contrary to the purging theory, other researchers believe dreams help solidify important memories, moving them from short-term to long-term storage.
- gemini
Jun 5, 2026 02:32 AM
Quote:Who said animals don't have experiences while dreaming?
You did..or at least your mindless LLM cherry-picked that they do.
Quote:This is because while both dreams and instincts can manifest themselves as signals to be decoded, they can also act on us directly, as blind causal forces. That is why pre-verbal toddlers can be moved to scratch when they have an itch. They don't know what an itch is or that scratching is a suitable response, but they are moved to scratch directly and reflexively. Cats and dogs are probably propelled to action in the way toddlers are. And if they dream, then their dreams act on them as causal forces too, making them frightened or calming them down but not sending them any kind of message, not telling them anything.
I'm familiar with the "sending to trash" theory of dreams, like what we do when we clear our emails. Basic housekeeping iow. But it fails to explain why we have repeated dreams with repeating themes and also dreams of events that happened years ago that we weren't even thinking about. Thus there is a strong suggestion of some sort of semantic messaging going in dreams that relays information to us. What that information is varies from psychologist to psychologist. My particular take is Jungian--that many, but not all, dreams are a manifestation of unconscious patterns in ourselves that balance out our all too unbalanced ego-based consciousness. The fact that many dreams employ metaphors and symbols and mythological tropes and even puns support this approach.
Jun 5, 2026 02:59 AM
(Jun 5, 2026 02:32 AM)Magical Realist Wrote: [ -> ]You mean the Psychology Today article? @_@Quote:Who said animals don't have experiences while dreaming?
You did..or at least your mindless LLM cherry-picked that they do.
Who's reacting mindlessly now? 9_9
Quote:We have repeated dreams because we have repeated thoughts and experiences in waking life. And current experiences can and do often remind us of the past or trigger a subconscious correlation to past experience. Nothing mystical about any of that. In animals, it could even just come down to similar neural pathways being activated.Quote:This is because while both dreams and instincts can manifest themselves as signals to be decoded, they can also act on us directly, as blind causal forces. That is why pre-verbal toddlers can be moved to scratch when they have an itch. They don't know what an itch is or that scratching is a suitable response, but they are moved to scratch directly and reflexively. Cats and dogs are probably propelled to action in the way toddlers are. And if they dream, then their dreams act on them as causal forces too, making them frightened or calming them down but not sending them any kind of message, not telling them anything.
I'm familiar with the "sending to trash" theory of dreams, like what we do when we clear our emails. Basic housekeeping iow. But it fails to explain why we have repeated dreams with repeating themes and also dreams of events that happened years ago that we weren't even thinking about. Thus there is a strong suggestion of some sort of semantic messaging going in dreams that relays information to us. What that information is varies from psychologist to psychologist. My particular take is Jungian--that many, but not all, dreams are a manifestation of unconscious patterns in ourselves that balance out our all too unbalanced ego-based consciousness. The fact that many dreams employ metaphors and symbols and mythological tropes and even puns support this approach.
Whatever you may wish to believe about human dreams is a far cry from presuming it's similar in animals.
Carl Jung is largely sidelined and criticized in modern academic and clinical psychology, mainly because his core theories (such as the collective unconscious and archetypes) are philosophical and lack empirical, testable evidence.
- gemini