Lying To Escape Predators
symphony
but an animal will often lie low and still in order to prevent
itself from becoming prey.
But if a lie is excusable to prevent certain harm
it should not be re-usable as an enchanting charm
by the greedy to bring more excess his own way.
Ed
But Mother Nature does just that. The trap door spider, the mantis
that looks like a leaf are using their lies to capture more prey just
as the disguised prey animals use their lies to deceive a predator.
Immortalist
That makes sense, the lie may actually be an act of kindness and a
form of defense against the predation by some against one's family or
social network. A kindness that preserves family and social function.
But I think the overriding impulse to fairness in humans, as a hard
instinct helps us fight even against abuses of these basic cruel
seeming acts of kindness.
Altruism
Altruistic behaviour is common throughout the animal kingdom,
particularly in species with complex social structures. For example,
vampire bats regularly regurgitate blood and donate it to other
members of their group who have failed to feed that night, ensuring
they do not starve. In numerous bird species, a breeding pair receives
help in raising its young from other ‘helper’ birds, who protect the
nest from predators and help to feed the fledglings. Vervet monkeys
give alarm calls to warn fellow monkeys of the presence of predators,
even though in doing so they attract attention to themselves,
increasing their personal chance of being attacked. In social insect
colonies (ants, wasps, bees and termites), sterile workers devote
their whole lives to caring for the queen, constructing and protecting
the nest, foraging for food, and tending the larvae. Such behaviour is
maximally altruistic: sterile workers obviously do not leave any
offspring of their own -- so have personal fitness of zero -- but
their actions greatly assist the reproductive efforts of the queen.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/altruism-biological/
Reciprocal altruism
In evolutionary biology, reciprocal altruism is a form of altruism in
which one organism provides a benefit to another in the expectation of
future reciprocation. This is equivalent to the Tit for tat strategy
in game theory. It would only be expected to evolve in the presence of
a mechanism to identify and punish "cheaters". An example of
reciprocal altruism is blood-sharing in the vampire bat, in which bats
feed regurgitated blood to those who have not collected much blood
themselves knowing that they themselves may someday benefit from this
same donation; cheaters are remembered by the colony and ousted from
this collaboration.
In a series of ground-breaking contributions to biology in the early
1970s Robert Trivers introduced the theories of reciprocal altruism
(1971), parental investment (1972), and parent-offspring conflict
(1974). Trivers' paper "The Evolution of Reciprocal Altruism" (1971)
elaborates the mathematics of reciprocal altruism and includes human
reciprocal altruism as one of the three examples used to illustrate
the model, arguing that "it can be shown that the details of the
psychological system that regulates this altruism can be explained by
this model." In particular, Trivers argues for the following
characteristics as functional processes subserving reciprocal
altruism:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reciprocal_altruism
Free rider problem
In economics, collective bargaining, and political science, free
riders are actors who consume more than their fair share of a
resource, or shoulder less than a fair share of the costs of its
production. The free rider problem is the question of how to prevent
free riding from taking place, or at least limit its negative effects.
Because the notion of 'fairness' is controversial, free riding is
usually only considered to be an economic "problem" when it leads to
the non-production or under-production of a public good, and thus to
Pareto inefficiency, or when it leads to the excessive use of a common
property resource.
A common example of a free rider problem is defense spending: no
person can be excluded from being defended by a state's military
forces, and thus free riders may refuse or avoid paying for being
defended, even though they are still as well guarded as those who
contribute to the state's efforts. Therefore, it is usual for the
government to avoid relying on volunteer donations, using taxes and
conscription instead.
In the labor union context, a free rider is an employee who pays no
union dues or agency shop fees, but nonetheless receives the same
benefits of union representation as dues-payers. Under U.S. law,
unions owe a duty of fair representation to all workers they
represent, regardless of whether they pay dues. Some jurists,
including Antonin Scalia have questioned the fairness, if not the
legality, of this practice.
Sir Frederick
So, is a blind person lying?
And, is this animal lying?! :
(Don't you feel blind after reading about this animal?)
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http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/05/080513210456.htm
Weird Shrimp Has Astounding Vision
ScienceDaily (May 15, 2008) — A Swiss marine biologist and an Australian quantum physicist have found that a species of shrimp from
the Great Barrier Reef, Australia, can see a world invisible to all other animals.
Dr Sonja Kleinlogel and Professor Andrew White have shown that mantis shrimp not only have the ability to see colours from the
ultraviolet through to the infrared, but have optimal polarisation vision -- a first for any animal and a capability that humanity
has only achieved in the last decade using fast computer technology.
"The mantis shrimp is a delightfully weird beastie," said Professor White, of the University of Queensland. "They're multi-coloured,
their genus and species names mean 'mouth-feet' and 'genital-fingers'; they can move each eye independently, they see the world in
11 or 12 primary colours as opposed to our humble three, and now we find that this species can see a world invisible to the rest of
us."
Dr Kleinlogel, is based at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysics in Frankfurt, and collected the shrimp from the reef. She notes
that, "...scuba divers know them as 'thumb-splitters', they've got wickedly strong claws and are very aggressive!"
Most animals can tell how fast the electric field in a light wave is oscillating, which is perceived as colour. (Blue light
oscillates faster than green, which is faster than red). The direction of the oscillation is known as polarisation: many animals,
from budgerigars to ants have some form of polarisation vision. Since the 1950s, animals have been shown to use linear polarisation
vision for navigation, for finding food, for evading hunters, and for sex, or as Professor White says, "...for the four fs: feeding,
fighting, fleeing and...flirting."
Commonly, polarisation vision is quite restricted: in its simplest form, different directions of polarisation show up as lighter or
darker patches -- you can see this yourself by looking at clear blue sky with polarising sunglasses. But polarisation is more subtle
than this: the electric field of the light can oscillate back and forth in a line or around and around in a circle, or anywhere in
between.
The two scientists have shown that shrimp of the species Gonodactylus smithii have eyes that simultaneously measure four linear and
two circular polarisations, enabling them to determine both the direction of the oscillation, as well as how polarised the light is.
"This is very useful because natural light can vary from strongly polarised, like the glare off snow or water, to unpolarised, like
the sun," Professor White said.
"Any changes to the amount of polarisation instantly tells the animal that something is going on."
Colleagues at The University of Queensland have recently found a related species where the males reflect circular polarisation from
their bodies, and hypothesized that circular polarisation vision is used for sexual signalling. Professor White smiles and says, "I
think of that as the 'prawnographic' hypothesis."
He continues, "It can't be the whole story in our case, though. We found the same structures in the eyes of both boy and girl mantis
shrimps, and yet neither have circularly polarised markings on their bodies. Each eye measures the six polarisation components that
are precisely required for optimal polarisation vision. In fact, the physics we used to understand what was going on is the same
physics that we use in quantum computing for optimal storage of information."
"It is this unique talent -- to measure linear and circular polarisation simultaneously -- which presents a completely new concept
of polarisation vision," Dr Kleinlogel continues. "There wouldn't be much point in only being able to see circular polarisation as
it is extremely rare in nature. Even the polarized light reflected from some shrimp's bodies is only weakly circular polarised and
often contains more linear polarisation."
"We doubt that circular polarisation is used exclusively as a secret shrimp sex signal! It makes more sense that mantis shrimp
evolved both circular and linear polarisation receptors to work together so they can detect tiniest changes in any polarisation."
Prof. White notes, "Some of the animals they like to eat are transparent, and quite hard to see in sea-water - except they're packed
full of polarising sugars - I suspect they light up like Christmas trees as far as these shrimp are concerned." "And of course," Dr
Kleinlogel concludes, "they can still flirt with each other using fancy polarisation cues!"
symphony
That is an interesting observation. But evidently following the
guidelines
of Mother Nature most predators will "lie" only to the extent that
they
will capture sufficient prey for survival. Correct me if I am wrong,
but most
predators don't act in an excessively greedy fashion, with respect to
their prey. On the other hand humans, such as the perpetrators of the
sub - prime loan, Enron and the Global Crossing scandals, will lie in
order to take much more (of financial and other assets) than they need.
Ed
Perhaps because "need" is instinctual for the predators and socially
conditioned for the humans. The predators don't feel a "need" for
computers, cars and loud music.
Humans "need" indoor plumbing, heated schools and modern medicine.