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noonemustknowmysecre t1_j7cxy7d wrote

Reply to comment by Gondoulf in What makes humans unique is not reducible to our brains or biology, but how we make sense of experience | Raymond Tallis by IAI_Admin

> So the question is why any other animal's DNA (except the hydra) doesn't do the same when it's cut.

Because that's not part of the design in the DNA, except for hydras. (And some lizards tails, salamander legs, starfish... Here we go

>why hasn't this particular regenerating factor been selected [in other animals, like humans. I want to regrow a limb!]

Evolution. It's not selecting what's best or what's coolest, it's just whatever works. Like how it's be really nice we didn't get cancer as often, like whales. But the species gets on just fine without that. Or polarized vision of the mantis shrimp. Or the echolocation of bats. Just on and on and on and on. Species envy is real. For every neat trait though, there's typically some drawback. Did you know cat vision is blurry? They sent the light through their sensors twice, and have great lowlight vision, but it makes things blurry. Humans having to work out for their muscles is actually a FEATURE to survive lean times. Ugh.

No, this is only interesting to people who don't know how evolution works. Which, admittedly, is a depressingly high number even among "educated" people. If talking about it helps people get some learning in them, then all the better. But posing it as "haha, humans are magical creatures with souls and special purposes instilled by God because we're so special" is just plain bollocks. The post is literally anti-science. It's questioning the well known and obvious answers that science hass provided. Hey, this is r/philosophy, the place for question. But it's like questioning if the Holocaust happened. Some people are going to take offense. Please mind your lane and keep the philosophical drivel out of the science's territory. Or you will be told how wrong you are.

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Gondoulf t1_j7ev63y wrote

Indeed, but sissiparity definitely works better than reproduction with a partner, so why has it not been selected. The primary factor ; natural selection, selects the traits that are most likely to get you reproduced ; so to say it's just what works doesn't quite satisfy the definition. I ask you again the question about sissiparity. Whales don't have less cancer, but more, their large bodies making their cancer having cancer a probability to why they don't die as much as we do for it. I'm not saying there should be perfect animals because it's always selecting the best trait, there's always the intraspecific and interspecific relations that results in much of what we see. I agree with what you say but keep the arguments with the traits of animals, and not the cancer one because that would relate only to mutations and genome errors unlike the selected mutations of the traits. I don't know if that's clear.

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noonemustknowmysecre t1_j7exc5n wrote

> but sissiparity definitely works better than reproduction with a partner

Bollocks. Asexual reproduction depends on mutation to bring in new genetic material. Sexual reproduction reaps a geometrically increasing history of tests. You really need to read up on this more.

>their large bodies making their cancer having cancer a probability to why they don't die as much as we do for it.

. . . what?

>but keep the arguments with the traits of animals, and not the cancer one because that would relate only to mutations and genome errors unlike the selected mutations of the traits.

oooooooh. Dude. Whales (and all larger animals) have a better system of screening and checking for "mutations and genome errors". This is literally one of their "selected traits". They don't suffer from cancer as much as they ought given they have so many cells.

You REALLY have to learn more about these things before you start trying to stir up philosophical questions about the nature of man.

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Gondoulf t1_j7go4o9 wrote

Here's the second phrase of the Wikipedia page you sent : "Currently the adaptive advantage of sexual reproduction is widely regarded as a major unsolved problem in biology". Please don't say it's "bollocks" when it's clearly not clear, and stop with the passive-agressive statements. Now that we know that question of sissiparity is not solved ; the philosophical question can take place. About the whales and the other argument, I was referring to that kurzgesagt video on cancer and whales ; where they do posit the screening system argument and the other which was "more cells, more cancer, but cancerous cells can also get cancer" but now that the research has been made clear on that recently, I understand my lack of knowledge in the whale's cancer departement.

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