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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   4327 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for April 23, 2023

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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For a trivial example, human infant behavior in the first hour after birth seems pretty strongly genetically determined. Pretty much all healthy infants do the same things in the same order (see table 1 here).

See also the field of evolutionary aesthetics:

When young human children from different nations are asked to select which landscape they prefer, from a selection of standardized landscape photographs, there is a strong preference for savannas with trees [...] There is also a preference for landscapes with water, with both open and wooded areas, with trees with branches at a suitable height for climbing and taking foods, with features encouraging exploration such as a path or river curving out of view, with seen or implied game animals, and with some clouds.

That's a very specific type of landscape, and it does in fact seem to be pretty tied to our genetics.

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