You ever see a dog that’s got its leash tangled the long way round a table leg, and it just cannot grasp what the problem is or how to fix it? It can see all the components laid out in front of it, but it’s never going to make the connection.

Obviously some dog breeds are smarter than others, ditto individual dogs - but you get the concept.

Is there an equivalent for humans? What ridiculously simple concept would have aliens facetentacling as they see us stumble around and utterly fail to reason about it?

  • HubertManne
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    fedilink
    101 year ago

    first. my current dog learned to deal with this as a puppy. I was astonished. My last dog I was trying to train the concept her whole life. Never saw a dog be able to handle it before but at this point if my current dog starts to go on the other side of an obstruction I say this way and she immediately corrects. For some reason for all other dogs I find they instinctively want to go the wrong way. So its not even random, they think wrapping more is the way to go. As for humans:

    “The Greatest Shortcoming of the Human Race Is Man’s Inability To Understand the Exponential Function”

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O133ppiVnWY&t=97s

    • @garibaldi_biscuit
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      21 year ago

      Amazing video, now thirty years old. By now, you would expect this analysis of population, economic & consumption growth would be essential learning in schools. My feeling is that the world today caries on with even greater ignorance of the consequences of this exponential growth than it did back then.