when your baby can float you gotta develop alternative means to keep an eye on it
(via lathori)
I have had this on my mind for days, someone please help:
Why are dogs dogs?
I mean, how do we see a pug and then a husky and understand that both are dogs? I’m pretty sure I’ve never seen a picture of a breed of dog I hadn’t seen before and wondered what animal it was.
Do you want the Big Answer or the Small Answers cos I have a feeling this is about to get Intense
Oooh okay are YOU gonna answer this, hang on I need to get some snacks and make sure the phone is off.
The short answer is “because they’re statistically unlikely to be anything else.”
The long question is “given the extreme diversity of morphology in dogs, with many subsets of ‘dogs’ bearing no visual resemblance to each other, how am I able to intuit that they belong to the ‘dog’ set just by looking?”
The reason that this is a Good Big Question is because we are broadly used to categorising Things as related based on resemblances. Then everyone realized about genes and evolution and so on, and so now we have Fun Facts like “elephants are ACTUALLY closely related to rock hyraxes!! Even though they look nothing alike!!”
These Fun Facts are appealing because they’re not intuitive.
So why is dog-sorting intuitive?Well, because if you eliminate all the other possibilities, most dogs are dogs.
To process Things - whether animals, words, situations or experiences - our brains categorise the most important things about them, and then compare these to our memory banks. If we’ve experienced the same thing before - whether first-hand or through a story - then we know what’s happening, and we proceed accordingly.
If the New Thing is completely New, then the brain pings up a bunch of question marks, shunts into a different track, counts up all the Similar Traits, and assigns it a provisional category based on its similarity to other Things. We then experience the Thing, exploring it further, and gaining new knowledge. Our brain then categorises the New Thing based on the knowledge and traits. That is how humans experience the universe. We do our best, and we generally do it well.
This is the basis of stereotyping. It underlies some of our worst behaviours (racism), some of our most challenging problems (trauma), helps us survive (stories) and sharing the ability with things that don’t have it leads to some of our most whimsical creations (artificial intelligence.)
In fact, one reason that humans are so wonderfully successful is that we can effectively gain knowledge from experiences without having experienced them personally! You don’t have to eat all the berries to find the poisonous ones. You can just remember stories and descriptions of berries, and compare those to the ones you’ve just discovered. You can benefit from memories that aren’t your own!
On the other hand, if you had a terribly traumatic experience involving, say, an eagle, then your brain will try to protect you in every way possible from a similar experience. If you collect too many traumatic experiences with eagles, then your brain will not enjoy eagle-shaped New Things. In fact, if New Things match up to too many eagle-like categories, such as
* pointy
* Specific!! Squawking noise!!
* The hot Glare of the Yellow Eye
* Patriotism?!?
* CLAWS VERY BAD VERY BADThen the brain may shunt the train of thought back into trauma, and the person will actually experience the New Thing as trauma. Even if the New Thing was something apparently unrelated, like being generally pointy, or having a hot glare. (This is an overly simplistic explanation of how triggers work, but it’s the one most accessible to people.)
So the answer rests in how we categorise dogs, and what “dog” means to humans. Human brains associate dogs with universal categories, such as
* four legs
* Meat Eater
* Soft friend
* Doggo-ness????
* Walkies
* An Snout,
* BORK BORKAnything we have previously experienced and learned as A Dog gets added to the memory bank. Sometimes it brings new categories along with it. So a lifetime’s experience results in excellent dog-intuition.
And anything we experience with, say, a 90% match is officially a Dog.
Brains are super-good at eliminating things, too. So while the concept of physical doggo-ness is pretty nebulous, and has to include greyhounds and Pekingese and mastiffs, we know that even if an animal LOOKS like a bear, if the other categories don’t match up in context (bears are not usually soft friends, they don’t Bork Bork, they don’t have long tails to wag) then it is statistically more likely to be a Doggo. If it occupies a dog-shaped space then it is usually a dog.
So if you see someone dragging a fluffy whatnot along on a string, you will go,
* Mop?? (Unlikely - seems to be self-propelled.)
* Alien? (Unlikely - no real alien ever experienced.)
* Threat? (Vastly unlikely in context.)
* Rabbit? (No. Rabbits hop, and this appears to scurry.) (Brains are very keen on categorising movement patterns. This is why lurching zombies and bad CGI are so uncomfortable to experience, brains just go “INCORRECT!! That is WRONG!” Without consciously knowing why. Anyway, very few animals move like domestic dogs!)
* Very fluffy cat? (Maybe - but not quite. Shares many characteristics, though!)
* Eldritch horror? (No, it is obviously a soft friend of unknown type)
* Robotic toy? (Unlikely - too complex and convincing.)
* alert: amusing animal detected!!! This is a good animal!! This is pleasing!! It may be appropriate to laugh at this animal, because we have just realized that it is probably a …
* DOG!!!! Soft friend, alive, walks on leash. It had a low doggo-ness quotient! and a confusing Snout, but it is NOT those other Known Things, and it occupies a dog-shaped space!
* Hahahaha!!! It is extra funny and appealing, because it made us guess!!!! We love playing that game.
* Best doggo.
* PING! NEW CATEGORIES ADDED TO “Doggo” set: mopness, floof, confusing Snout.And that’s why most dogs are dogs. You’re so good at identifying dog-shaped spaces that they can’t be anything else!
(via elodieunderglass)
Can we normalize the idea that women can have deep voices? please??
Especially for trans women who feel gross or out of place for their deep voice.Please, break the standard that all women have high pitched, perfect, feminine voices.
My car got towed on NYE, so after unsuccessfully trying every number programmed into my phone, I called my dad’s ass up at 2 AM to pick up myself and my friends to go get my vehicle out of impound (my dad is awesome. More on that later.)
Included in my group of friends was my friend Anna who had recently come forward as trans. She had very recently started presenting as a woman, and was pretty insecure in it, and had never met my father previously, so it wasn’t as though I had time to brief him on the situation. Anna was pretty shy during the whole ride, tucked in the back and letting her friends talk over her. She only spoke up after I had gotten my car back, thanking him for helping out.
The next day, I called to thank him for that night, and he asked me who was the girl with the deep voice. At first my heart sink in my guts, but without missing a beat, he started raving about how he LOVED her voice. He listed off a few actresses from his day who had had very deep voices, and how he adored it, and that kind of slow sultry speaking had been fading more and more as pop culture pushed for childish voices in women.
Your deep voice is gorgeous trans friends (and cis friends too.) it is warm and low and smooth like honey and perfect in every way. It is smoldering and evocative and absolutely beautiful.
(Source: lethargiclesbian, via cthulhu-with-a-fez)
Heartbreaking scene from the film
Schindler’s List (1993)
OK LEMME TELL YOU STRAIGHT UP ABOUT OSKAR SCHINDLER.
Everyone knows the story, right? His protected workers? How none of his ammo worked? The full story is a lot more complex and a hell of a lot more breathtaking.He wasn’t a saint. in fact, he was a bit of a douche, all things considered. Whored around on his wife, worked for the Abwehr, he was a member of the nazi party - not a particularly devout follower, but because he was a big fat remora fish who realised this particular shark could give him business opportunities, and if he wined and dined the upper crust that scored him even better ones. He realised very quickly he could make an absolute killing on the black market and dove in headfirst with the profiteering. Hell, he initially hired Jews in his factory because nazi strictures made them much much cheaper labour than hiring normal Polish labourers.
But the thing is, once you start surrounding yourself with a particular, persecuted demographic, you begin to notice things. You hear things, things you aren’t insulated from. You begin to realise something.
And Oskar Schindler began to dimly grasp what was happening and he realised that it was not something he could countenance. And his whole gameplay changed.
He no longer wined and dined for business opportunities, but to protect his workers. He went flat out fucking balls to the wall to rescue a group of his workers from the jaws of Auschwitz, and built them a “camp” that offered at least the barest of human comforts, right under SS supervision. He moved his entire fucking factory to save his workers, he realised an SS-provided list of names was left with blank spaces and just started filling in more. He blew everything he had made profiteering and scheming to protect 1200 people because he found that there was a fucking line and it had to be drawn. He arranged for three thousand Jewish women to be moved to textile factories in the Sudetenland to give them a chance of surviving the war. He blew all his money, resources and time on feeding, caring for and trying to protect as many Jews as he could.After the war he failed every business venture he tried. He became a raging alcoholic, surviving on donations sent by Schindlerjuden. According to some, he traded the ring gifted to him by his workers for Schnapps. He died in relative obscurity, almost penniless.
He wasn’t a great man, or a saint. He was an average schmuck, and spent most of his time fucking around until he abruptly found himself in a situation where he couldn’t. He almost stumbled into his decency. But once he had, he absolutely took hold of it, and directly because of him 8,500 people are alive today.
Never, ever doubt the ability of a single human to RISE.
(via lupinatic)
NO BUT LIKE FOR REAL PAUL REVERE HAD SOME OF THE SHITTIEST HANDWRITING I HAVE EVER HAD TO READ. I KNOW HE PROBABLY DIDN’T EXPECT PEOPLE TO BE JUDGING HIM ON THAT DAMN NEAR 250 YEARS LATER BUT HE PROBABLY SHOULD HAVE BECAUSE IT IS SOME CHICKENSCRATCH
LIKE THE ONLY REASON “PAUL REVERE BECAUSE OF HIS SHITTY HANDWRITING” ISN’T MY ANSWER TO “WHICH FOUNDING FATHER WOULD YOU USE A TIME MACHINE TO SMACK UPSIDE THE MOUTH” IS BECAUSE THOMAS JEFFERSON IS A PERSON WHO EXISTS
SOME OF YOU MIGHT BE ASKING YOURSELF, “WHAT ABOUT GEORGE WASHINGTON? WHY NOT SMACK HIM IN THE MOUTH?” AND I WILL TELL YOU WHY. I DO NOT HAVE A DEATH WISH AND THAT FUCKER WOULD KILL ME. I CAN TAKE NERDY WIMP T.J. IN A FIGHT BUT I AM NOT PUTTING MY HAND ANYWHERE NEAR THE MOUTH OF SOMEONE WHO WORE DENTURES MADE OF IVORY FROM A HIPPOPOTAMUS, THE WORLD’S DEADLIEST PREDATOR. ALSO MY MAN WAS LIKE SIX-FOOT-TWENTY AND I AM NOT VERY TALL SO I PROBABLY COULDN’T REACH HIS MOUTH ANYWAY.
WHY WOULD YOU NOT SLAP ANDREW JACKSON I KNOW HE ISNT A FOUNDING FATHER BUT SOME PEOPLE CONSIDER HIM TO BE
LOOK IF YOU WANT TO BE BLUDGEONED TO DEATH BY AN OLD MAN’S CANE, BE MY GUEST, BUT I DON’T WANT MY LAST MOMENTS TO BE TERRIFYING SO I’M GONNA AVOID A PHYSICAL CONFRONTATION WITH A GUY WHO, BLEEDING FROM A BULLET TO THE HEART, LITERALLY SHOT A MAN DEAD JUST BECAUSE THE DUDE CALLED HIM CHICKEN
ALSO HE IS NOT A FOUNDING FATHER SO HE IS NOT INCLUDED IN THIS
(via skymurdock)
no offense but yall gotta stop acting like its the end of the world if a bi girl ends up with a guy
but then there’s no cute lesbian-ness and that’s what makes it so gr8
honestly shut up
do these ppl realize that bi girls are actual people who aren’t getting into relationships for the sole purpose of performing good politics / cuteness / adequate proof of their same gender attraction / whatever else you’re judging them on 2day.. bi women’s relationships are Not For You, bi women shouldn’t have to wake up daily and think “how do I make my personal interactions with other people good and pure in the eyes of others.”
one of the most damaging things about biphobia is that girls attracted to multiple genders end up constantly and guiltily analyzing their personal (and I’m gonna repeat, personal) relationships for ideological purity, whether or not they’re performing LGBT-ness hard enough, etc etc, and that’s not at all conducive to a healthy relationship. when u have bi girls spending more time thinking of whether or not their relationship is good enough for others than, idk, if their relationships are healthy and loving and fulfilling or not, that’s an issue.
lesbians / bi women who primarily or only date women are going to perceive w/w relationships as more relatable, cute, or refreshing to see. that’s a reality and a personal set of feelings/reactions. but why would you think it’s even remotely ok to take that and hurl it at bi women in the form of over-scrutinizing their (once again personal) relationships to the point where it’s dehumanizing, why would you think it would be ok to tell bi women things like “aw but now u don’t have the cuteness of a w/w relationship” which directly imply that you see bi women’s relationships as yours for consumption and judgement??
besides, saying u approve of bi women in w/w relationships more because “it’s cuter” is such a fetishy way of looking at w/w relationships and lesbian/bi women in general, I can’t tell if the commenter is a lesbian/bi woman or not but if not that makes it even creepier, especially the way they talked about “lesbian relationships” being cuter like.. that shit harms and fetishizes both lesbians and bi women, knock it off.
while we’re on the topic of “inappropriate ways people approach bi women about their relationships”: bi women partnered with men do receive some conditional benefits from that which women partnered with women do not, it is ok to talk about this. it is NOT ok to pick apart bi women’s personal relationships to the point where their personhood is impossible to see in it all.
also, to address another common one, yes there are higher statistical likelihoods of bi women being hurt in certain ways in m/w relationships due to misogyny. it is ok to talk about this (especially when the discussion is led by bi women). it is absolutely NOT appropriate however to tell bi women how disappointing and a bad choice it is that they got into a personal relationship with a man (seriously guys, that rhetoric implies that it’s the bi woman’s fault if she’s hurt because “oh, well she went there, she chose 2 date a man” which is.. frankly a horrible way to respond to a woman being mistreated)
This post means a lot to me. It’s become difficult for me to not look at my relationships in a political way, I’ve been with people who made me feel like my personal life is political and it’s such an awful feeling.
BI COUPLES AREN’T FOR YOU!!!!
(via lupinatic)
