u/Pure_Option_1733

One reason I say this is that I think oftentimes if people do criticize other members of their own demographic it might not always be super obvious. I mean if someone criticizes other members of their demographic it may not always be super obvious that they are a member of the same demographic as the people they’re criticizing, especially on the internet. A member of group A who criticizes other members of group A may not necessarily announce that they are a member of group A when criticizing other members of group A, and I think that’s especially the case when people tend to be prejudice against members of group A. Also if someone wants to address the behavior of another member of their demographic then the way they would address such behavior may not always be the same as how to call someone out in the most obvious way. A member of group A trying to address the behavior of another member of group A may do so by privately talking to the other member instead of publicly calling them out on their behavior for instance.

Another reason I say this is even when people actually don’t call out problematic members of their demographic that could oftentimes be out of fear whether than because of being ok with what other members of their demographic are doing. I mean it can often be reasonable to think that calling out the problematic members of ones own demographic could result in retaliation enough to not want to take the risk.

I think it can also be unreasonable to expect a person to always know what some other members of their demographic are doing. I mean if one member of a given demographic is engaging in harmful behavior it might always be out in public where it’s easily visible, but if it’s in person it might be behind closed doors or a secluded area or if it’s online it might be in private messages where it’s not easy for other members of their own demographic to see.

I think having people call out members of their own demographic as a condition to not be prejudice towards the demographic also tends to lead more to performative calling out of other members whether than calling others out in ways that would actually be useful. I mean I think if being prejudice against group A unless the members of group A call out the problematic members of group A can lead members of group A to decide whether to call out other members of group A based on what they think will impress others from outside their group whether than based on whether they think another member of group A is actually engaging in harmful behavior.

I think the other issue with saying that members of a group are bad unless they call out the bad members of their group is that it makes prejudice the default as it makes it so that you’re prejudice against members of the group until they prove you have a good reason not to be whether than not being prejudice towards members of a group until they give you a reason to be.

Basically in the past when someone has been mean based on some negative assumption, if I tried to correct their assumption, at best it often wouldn’t work and in some cases the person would be more hostile after I tried to correct their assumption. I think that’s caused me to be more jaded about trying to defend myself and to think that even if someone has wrong ideas about me trying to defend myself wouldn’t do anything and would just drain me. Also I think sometimes seeing others try to defend themselves and their defenses not be believed further contributes to my jaded feeling.

I think one thing that’s frustrating is that it seems like often people assume that not disputing an accusation implies that the accusation is true whether than that the one being accused is pessimistic about how likely disputing it would be believed. Sometimes if it’s online and someone is mean based on a negative assumption I block them in order to try to prevent them from influencing what others think of what I say, but that feels somewhat wrong and like a move done in desperation whether than an ideal solution.

You just rubbed a magic lamp and the genie is filled with blind rage from spending 10,000 years in the lamp. Because of its blind rage it has decided that instead of granting you the usual 3 wishes it will force you to choose between being placed next to the Nile river while very thirsty, to drink from the Nile in a way that puts you at risk of being eaten by a crocodile or being sent to a world where crocodiles are land predators.

If you choose the latter you would be initially sent to a place in this world far enough away from any land crocodiles to not be in immediate danger, but in the same general region where they exist. This world may or may not have civilization, but even if it does you would be placed in an area where you wouldn’t know how to find civilization, in a forest. The crocodiles would not only live on land but walk and run on two legs and be warm blooded meaning they would have a faster metabolism than the crocodiles of our world. They would also tend to roam around the forests in search of prey meaning you couldn’t just avoid them by avoiding places where you think they might ambush from.

Which option do you choose?

For instance if someone sees in black and white they do not need to have their life seriously impacted to be color blind, and I know color blindness is more varied than just seeing in black and white, and most color blind people don’t see in black and white, but I think the extreme example of someone seeing in black and white without having their life significantly impacted helps illustrate the issue with defining a disability by how much it impacts someone’s quality of life. I know a lot of us who are autistic do have our lives significantly affected but I still think using that as part of a definition of autism is problematic. I going back to the colorblind analogy mean colorblindness can significantly impact ones quality of life, but that’s not what defines colorblindness and I feel the same should apply to autism. Also a colorblind person could learn to compensate some for colorblindness in some situations, by say finding alternative ways of telling if a fruit is ripe, or choosing games that rely less on distinguishing colors, and I think a similar thing can sometimes apply with autism, at least for people who are lower support needs for at least some situations. For instance I would wear shoes with Velcro to compensate for difficulty with tying my shoes. This isn’t to say that all autistic people could learn to compensate for autistic qualities, but I think if autism is defined in terms of how much it impacts ones life that could still cause a decent fraction of autistic people to get missed because they learned to compensate too much for autistic qualities. I think if it was to cause some autistic people to get missed that could also lead to a gap in understanding of how to best accomodate autistic people as the ones who would be missed from not having their lives significantly impacted might also be the ones who are the most accomodated without a diagnosis.

The study still says that smoking an entire cigarette at least once a day shortens your life expectancy but it claims that if you cut the cigarette into 10ths and then smoke one of those 10ths each day it increases your life expectancy. The study isn’t conclusive about why this would be the case, but the authors suggest that 1/10 of a cigarette per day might exercise your lungs without damaging them. So far this is the only study suggesting that smoking 1/10 of a cigarette per day increases your life expectancy. If you read this study you can’t find any flaw in its methodology and you don’t know of any bias from the authors. This study is all over news outlets and social media.

Do you trust this study or assume there must be some flaw in the study? Does this study make you more likely to smoke 1/10th of a cigarette if you don’t already smoke?

It seems like most bilaterians, that have something analogous to tentacles, such as fins or legs, have them all along their bodies. For instance arthropods tend to have legs going all along their bodies, with some legs closer to their head and some legs closer to their other end. Similarly tetrapods tend to legs going along their torsos with some closer to their head and some legs closer to their tail, for tetrapods that have tails. Fish tend to have fins along their torso as opposed to being next to their mouths. Even some of the more obscure bilaterians, such as velvet worms, have their legs going along their bodies, as opposed to having their legs clustered around their mouths.

Cephalopods seem to be the odd ones out as they tend to have their tentacles clustered around where they eat, which from what I understand is a beak.

Why do cephalopods have their tentacles clustered near their beak instead of going along their bodies?

You have the opportunity to travel to an alien world to learn about some of the life forms but you can only study life forms that take on the role of animals or life forms that take on the role of plants on this world but not both. In either case you would be given a special pair of goggles, and if you choose the former these goggles would magically mostly filter out any alien plants from your view and if you choose the latter the goggles would magically mostly filter out alien animals from your field view of view. I say mostly as if you choose the former the goggles would allow you to still see the outlines of alien plants well enough to avoid bumping into them, and if you choose the latter the goggles would also allow you to see alien animals well enough to avoid bumping into them and to see if an alien animal was moving towards you. If you choose the latter you would also wear a set of headphones that would allow you to hear if there was sound but not the type of sound of alien animals. You would get to choose whether to explore this planet in a group or as an individual, and your goggles and headphones wouldn’t filter out any of the sights or sounds of any Earth life either way so if you were in a group you would be able to see all your group mates. You would also be able to teleport back to Earth at any time. In either case there would be no catch beyond being unable to study some of the alien life forms.

Do you choose to study the alien animals or the alien plants?

Double empathy basically says that autistic people and neurotypicals have different ways of communicating, interacting, and experiencing the world and this causes a mismatch between how neurotypicals and autistic people communicate and interact, leading to social difficulties on either side. It also suggests that at least some autistic people may be better able to interact with each other than with neurotypicals. On the face of it it seems like double empathy would suggest that social struggles related to autism could to some extent be partially caused by the social environment. I mean if social struggles are caused by things like differences in communication styles and interacting then a social environment with the right kinds of social environments or communication styles could at least reduce the social struggles of an autistic person. If autistic people are as good at interacting with each other as neurotypicals are at interacting with each other then in a place with mainly autistic people most people would experience no more social difficulties than in any other place.

From what I understand the general consensus is that the social environment of a person does not cause autism. Autism is also defined in terms of social difficulties and repetitive behaviors.

To me the three concepts individually make sense, but on the face of it, it seems like the 3 concepts would mutually contradict each other when combined.

I’m wondering what might be the resolution to how the three concepts might on the face of it seem to contradict each other.

With the treatment the patient is guaranteed to survive, and without it the patient might still survive as you might be able to find an alternative treatment that wasn’t found out through experimenting on a marginalized group without their consent or the patient might recover on their own but there’s a decent chance the patient won’t survive without this treatment. You estimate that with no treatment the patient has a 4/9 chance of survival and you also estimate that the chances of finding an alternative treatment to be about 1/3. If the patient does survive without this treatment there’s a decent chance they will have a profound disability from the brain damage but if they get this treatment they will make a full recovery. You know that using this treatment now won’t cause further harm to anyone but a lot of people were hurt in this process of finding this treatment. The treatment was found by systematically experimenting on a particular marginalized group and a lot of that experimentation involved tying people up in cages and experimenting on them against their will. More than half of the people who were being experimented on died in the process.

The patient is unconscious so you can’t just ask the patient whether they would want you to give them this treatment. Also you are either unable to figure out any of the patients emergency contacts or all the patients emergency contacts are unreachable.

You would face no consequences for either decision.

What decision do you make?

You have a major crush on this person and they are extremely attractive and have an amazing personality. They say yes but inform you that they are in a poly relationship, and say that you can be one of the people in their poly relationship.

How do you react to your crush telling you this?

When I think about it I think sometimes when I’ve been in a place with lots of people I may have enjoyed the sound of the crowd while other times I felt overstimulated, which I think is more what would tend to be expected for an autistic person like myself.

When I think about it I think when I may have enjoyed the sound of a crowd it’s been when the sound of people talking has sounded somewhat distant. I think when I’ve been in places that are very spacious and with relatively low densities of people, with the amount of people being mainly from the crowd covering a lot of space whether than from a high density. I think when there’s a high density of people I’m more likely to be overstimulated by the sound of a crowd. I think I might also tend to prefer the sound of a lot of people talking in the distance when combined with other sounds like footsteps or fountains than by itself. I mean I think when a crowd is dense enough that most people would agree it’s crowded then it’s overwhelming while when a crowd has a low enough density that many people might question whether it’s even proper to call it a crowd then it’s sound is more likely to sound more like ambience to me if that makes sense.

This is because for times before 10:00 you can tell that it’s a 24 hour clock by noticing that the first digit of the time is a 0, while on a 12 hour clock the first digit of the time is never a 0. For instance if you see 09:00 you know you’re looking at a 24 hour clock and if you see 9:00 you know you’re looking at a 12 hour clock. For times after 12:59 you can tell that you’re looking at a 24 hour clock by noticing that the hour is a number greater than 12.

For times between 10:00 and 12:59 the first digit of the time is not a 0 and the number for the hour is not greater than 12 so you can’t tell if you’re looking at a 24 hour clock just by looking at the time. Noticing an absence of an AM or PM in the time doesn’t tell you that the clock you’re looking at is a 24 hour clock as not all 12 hour clocks explicitly specify AM or PM.

From what I know it seems like brown in animals tends to be used mainly as a color for camouflage. I was wondering though if any animals use brown as a display color for something like attracting mates whether than for camouflage. If so do any animals have brown body parts that are for display on an otherwise green body, with the green in the rest of the body being used for camouflage?

You have just died and you learn that you have the choice between being reincarnated on Earth or you can be reincarnated on a mystery planet with life forms that have a brain. In either case you would be reincarnated as an organism with a brain and central nervous system, although what you get reincarnated as could have a brain the size of the brain of a small insect or it could have a brain as big as a human brain or bigger. The mystery planet you are reincarnated on could have a civilization more advanced than the current one on Earth or it could be one where there’s no sapient life when you get reincarnated. You don’t get to pick what life form you get reincarnated as or even how intelligent it is, just whether to get reincarnated on Earth or a mystery planet.

Which option are you choosing?

https://preview.redd.it/ae75lqi5l99h1.jpg?width=975&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ff8202d6742c91921d7b3097f7fd48d4b0c912eb

It seems like within the autistic community people are deeply divided on whether a cure for autism would be good or bad. I think a major reason for the divide is that some autistic people would want a cure to cure things like social difficulties and other disabling aspects of autism, such as hypersensitivity, meltdowns, etc, while a lot of autistic people who wouldn’t want a cure would see it as getting ride of positive qualities that might be associated with autism, such as special interests or better pattern recognition.

Let’s say there’s was something that would only change qualities about you that are disabling, such as say making it so that you would have the same social skills as most people, and so that you wouldn’t experience sensory overload anymore than an NT but things like your special interests or other things you would like about your autism unaffected. I was wondering if fitting this type of description would make a lot of autistic people more likely to take a cure if one with this description existed.

I think some people act like because in certain situations it’s safer to assume that someone is acting in bad faith and be wrong than to assume someone is acting in good faith and be wrong that therefore it’s always better to assume people are acting in bad faith until proven otherwise. I know when it comes to something like deciding whether to meet up with someone or go to a persons house assuming that they are acting in good faith and being wrong can be fatal. When deciding whether to send a picture to someone assuming that they are acting in good faith and being wrong can also put ones safety at risk, as can assuming someone is acting in good faith and being wrong when deciding whether to give personal information to someone.

I think in a lot of cases assuming someone is acting in bad faith and being wrong can be the worse mistake to make. As one extreme example if you assume that someone who mentions having a food allergy is acting in bad faith that could mean not believing them about their allergy, which could cause them to die from being fed the food they’re allergic to. As another example assuming bad faith and being wrong when deciding whether to call someone out on lying about a disability can lead to punishing the person for their disability or refusing to accommodate a disabled person. Assuming bad faith from another person and being wrong when deciding whether to make personal attacks or otherwise be mean to someone could negatively impact their mental health and if you’re thinking they should change their position it could lead to doing things that make it harder to change their position. This isn’t to say that one should never assume bad faith in these types of situations, but I think in these types of situations it would be best to assume good faith from the other person until proven otherwise whether than the other way around.

Well I’m not sure if I’m phrasing this right or if I might be phrasing it in the opposite way from the correct phrasing, but seeing as how most people have probably seen fish as well as squid I think my audience should understand what I mean.

Stem arthropods would be some of the Cambrian animals more closely related to modern arthropods than other modern animals, but not necessarily descended from the most recent common ancestor of modern arthropods. It seems like at least some were free swimmers and had tail fins as well as fins or at least fin looking parts along their sides. They included animals like anomalocaris and opabinia if I’m not mistaken.

It seems like stem arthropods and modern squid would both have tail fins flattened in the same direction as each other while fish have tail fins flattened in the opposite direction from squid and stem arthropods.

Why do fish have tail fins flattened in the opposite direction from squid and stem arthropods? Well I know that fish move their tail fins side to side while squid move theirs up and down and presumably stem arthropods would have also moved their tail fins up and down, but that still leaves the question as to why fish move their tail fins side to side while squid move their tail fins up and down and why stem arthropods would have moved their tail fins up and down.

You are at the point where you think you’re about to die of old age but then learn from a vision that you’re going to shape shift into a 3 year old toddler. You know that what you learned in this vision is true and this information totally isn’t just an effect of cognitive decline. In this vision you learn that at the time you would otherwise die you will shape shift into a three year old over the course of a few hours.

You learn that once your transformation is complete the evidence of your transformation will be erased both from the outside world and your brain and body. It will be as if you were already a 3 year old. You also learn that whoever is the last person you interact with before this transformation will become one of your parents after this transformation and if they have a spouse or significant other their spouse or significant other will become your other parent. You know you have enough time to affect the last person to interact with yo before the transformation.

You also learn that some of your memories may survive the transformation but they will be altered so much as to be unreliable. You also learn that after your transformation your understanding of the world will be like that of a typical 3 year old.

How do you react to this information?

It seems like when looking at mammals and reptiles it seems like even mammals with long tails seem to still tend to have proportionally thinner or skinnier tails at the base than reptiles. It also seems that reptiles tend to have more pointy tails at the tip than mammals. It seems like the tails of reptiles tend to end more gradually going from base to tip than the tails of mammals as the tails of reptiles tend to slowly thin out before ending, while it seems like the end of the tail for mammals tends to happen more abruptly. I’m wondering if this difference in shape of tails between mammals and reptiles would be because mammals tend to be more endothermic than reptiles or if there might be a different explanation for this difference.

Why are the tails of mammals and reptiles generally different in terms of shape in the way I described?