Posts by timtfj@mastodon.social
(DIR) Post #B1Y1x0TL6TUbdZPzcG by timtfj@mastodon.social
2025-12-23T18:07:04Z
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@futurebird I feel this would be easier to test if you yourself had movable ears, or maybe a cat trained to swivel its own ears in . . . Oh hang on. "Cat". "Trained". Hmmm.Robotic cat? Video cat?
(DIR) Post #B1Y60S4DMYhTuFZ3tA by timtfj@mastodon.social
2025-12-23T18:52:30Z
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@futurebird Cat earbuds. First test whether playing a sound apparently coming from a particular direction causes them to swivel their ears towards it.If it does, now play the sound to only some of the cats. Do the ones who can't hear it also swivel their ears? And does this stop if the ones hearing the sound are wearing little hats to hide their ears?
(DIR) Post #B1Y7tqCLRffEd3LK08 by timtfj@mastodon.social
2025-12-23T19:12:04Z
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@futurebird Well, you'd need suitable protective clothing I suppose. And a plan for getting to the nearest emergency department if the bleeding was too bad . . . Maybe disinfect the cats' claws beforehand as an extra precaution.
(DIR) Post #B1j1hUvoE6GAD5tmqm by timtfj@mastodon.social
2025-12-29T01:26:06Z
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@futurebird @thestrangelet Do you think there's also an element of beginning to retrieve the memory of how and where you lost it? (I'm thinking that drawing the object entails remembering the object, which might include remembering it in its recent context.)
(DIR) Post #B1r57kga828ZjBfMwK by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-01T22:42:09Z
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@futurebird Nothing that requires any extra work unless you're a cooking enthusiast and keen to do some! Whatever you fancy, maybe including something nice left from Christmas.
(DIR) Post #B1teMHIlXtPfeN6mgK by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-03T04:26:17Z
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@futurebird @kristinHenry This reminds me of the Zoids (wind-up animal robot-like things) that were popular in the 80s. I remember an insect one, that had each 3-leg group made out of a single piece of rigid plastic. It walked using a very simple mechanism to lift one group then the other (possibly just a circular motion, I forget), but the result was startlingly realistic and looked far more complicated than it really was.
(DIR) Post #B1vFVsAJkOuS37YT2G by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-03T22:57:25Z
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@futurebird I like the eyes :-)
(DIR) Post #B1x8xT8w3vqFBo2YbI by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-04T20:53:23Z
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@futurebird The copy doesn't have continuity with the original. What's important with many of these things isn't the physical detail, but the history which connects you with something special. For example the knowledge that you're holding something that was made by someone important to you, or your memories of all the ways you've used it.Even if the replacement is physically identical, I'll know that it isn't the one they made or that I used. That knowledge is what makes it different.
(DIR) Post #B1x9ZBpes9DMVM0gmu by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-04T21:00:11Z
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@futurebird Who is the "everyone" here? To me (UK Methodist background) that obsession is quite alien—for a start, it puts Christ firmly in the past, and focuses on physical objects rather than a spiritual encounter in the present moment.
(DIR) Post #B2216MIJkHeJlUGvzM by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-07T05:18:53Z
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@futurebird I think the demon should probably also be having a crisis in his commitment to evil. So the priest and the demon can compare notes about how they deal with their similar but opposite crises.
(DIR) Post #B25eWgGWayMkv5r6zQ by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-08T23:24:46Z
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@futurebird Thicker, so there's room for a battery that (i) holds a sensible amount of charge, (ii) doesn't need overcharging to do so, and (iii) isn't quickly worn out by over-frequent charge cycles.
(DIR) Post #B25fcExv6pVxwSMu4O by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-08T23:37:01Z
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@futurebird Agree totally, especially the e-ink! Everything these days has a huge backlight to drain the battery. Sometimes reducing the battery life from a few months or more to less than a day.
(DIR) Post #B2Bdz5WtK8joNSFi7s by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-11T20:47:01Z
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@futurebird The input side doesn't seem too bad in principle, but how would ant-friendly output work? Everything would have to be converted to chemical signals, wouldn't it?
(DIR) Post #B2C7yInrU5K7sdjPhg by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-12T02:23:01Z
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@futurebird How well can they see? I did read a research paper years ago which determined that they could tell the difference between a triangle standing on its base and an inverted one, at least. (It was to do with their use of vision for navigation, IIRC.)
(DIR) Post #B2CA8PZVNFT1fzxrEm by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-12T02:47:13Z
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@futurebird I don't kniw, but could theoretically find out—I took out a subscription to Nature one year, and it'll be somewhere in my pile of them . . .As I remember, they concluded that the ants seemed to remember navigation information as a sequence of visual "snapshots" at specific locations (I think they mentioned the ants periodically turning round to look back at a landmark they'd recently left). I found it fascinating.
(DIR) Post #B2CAnftpZXe2Bn9D3g by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-12T02:54:42Z
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@futurebird I ended up trying to count the eye elements. It looks as though there might be about 80 around the perimeter . . . And they might be able to interpolate between "pixels" by moving their heads, maybe?
(DIR) Post #B2DDoCnRkvaNEp49S4 by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-12T15:03:08Z
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@futurebird If I had to say them, as a non-biologist and not knowing the convention if any, I'd stress them differently: mur-MISin-eye and mur-miSEEin-eye (Oo, possible mnemonic, too: "my seeing eye").
(DIR) Post #B2DW1s3PTHIq8SCMgS by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-12T18:27:17Z
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@futurebird I've not properly looked at the paper yet (thanks!) but I looked in the OED and they think "beeline" refers to a bee that's finished foraging ("has collected a full load of nectar") and is going back to the hive. Their earliest quote is from 1820 . . .
(DIR) Post #B2FxAobQl5MR7GWLS4 by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-13T22:40:50Z
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@futurebird I definitely can't imagine anyone doing that, or that if they did, they'd grow up to love ants ;-)(The ones in my compost bin a couple of years ago were interesting. They had lots of pupae(?) on top of the latest layer of leaves, but immediately started moving them out of sight underneath when I took the lid off.
(DIR) Post #B2FyZJQXuCFrcXfsYa by timtfj@mastodon.social
2026-01-13T22:52:46Z
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@Jestbill @futurebird Teaching them Braille certainly sounds like an interesting challenge, at least!