why is it that when you want a scrambled egg the yolk is so strong it doesn’t want to break but when you want a fried egg the yolk is a delicate young maiden who’s never seen the outside world... why is there war and fighting. why isn’t there world peace </3

in case you haven’t heard it today, or don’t fully realise it yet: i promise you that most people in this world are kind, loving and understanding. the people around you want you to succeed, they do not want you to fail. your friends don’t hate you, they love you, and they want to see you grow and prosper. 

the world is not as bad as it seems. don’t forget that.

Sounds fake but ok

good news: it’s not fake. everything i said is true. being dismissive towards good things is a damaging mindset to have. you’ll feel a lot better if you have some trust and if you’re willing to consider optimistic viewpoints.

Is this what non depressed people feel like ? Damn. You’re so lucky

i’m extremely mentally ill and extremely depressed at that. deflecting good advice that encourages you to think positively about life by claiming that the person who said it is not depressed (when i very much am) is also a very damaging mindset to have.

OP is the opposite of the “Then Perish” meme. All of OP’s replies read as “Then Prosper”.

Hey all y'all, it turns out that saying positive things and encouraging others with them even when you don’t quite believe them yourself is an excellent coping strategy for clinical depression. I know it’s hard to understand when you’re in the pit, and if I’m honest it’s still hard for me to grok, but the more you say positive things, the more they start being true. If that means lying to yourself, lie! Your brain chemistry is already lying to you about bad things, you may as well lie right back about good ones.

“Your brain chemistry is already lying to you about bad things, you may as well lie right back about good ones.“ 

Wow. That is a really fucking good point. 

THEN PROSPER

THEN PROSPER!!

Billi speaks. (via billispeaks)

billi want food

billi get food later?

billi want food!

billi mad.

billi want drugs.

okay but this method of teaching dogs and cats a way of communication is frankly astounding. Watch more of billie’s videos and Hunger4Words (the creator of this sytem) and it’s pretty stunning. yes, there’s a lot of wishful thinking because cats and dogs don’t have quite as complex brains when it comes to language, but the fact remains these animals are a rudimentary form of bilingual. they have their own language (body/scents/vocal) and now they’ve learned to use a very basic form of our language. i’ve seen so many people, linguists even, dismiss that this is just more complex reward association but i mean. dogs have been with us for about 32 thousand years. they’ve evolved alongside us for that long. they are honed in on us. hell, even cats have been our close companions for at least 8 thousand years. that is more than enough time for either one of them to grasp the very basic concepts of our words (especially considering cats literally talk/meow because we talk. that is not a normal thing they do when wild/feral).

so yeah. this is fucking cool.

Once you’ve seen their videos (and Bunny’s as well) it becomes impossible to call it a complex reward association thing. They stop rewarding the animals at a certain point. It just becomes a means of communication. Unless answering a dog’s question qualifies as a reward but then at that point I think we’ve stopped dismissing this system and instead revealed that human language is just a complex reward association system.

YES THANK YOU. I’ve been obsessing over animals participating in this experiment for months and none of my friends are as interested in it as me, or they want to dismiss it as wishful thinking.

But even if you want to think of it as an action-reward system, I feel like there are enough videos that evidence that it’s not just about that to the animals involved, which — yeah, okay, wishful thinking, BUT! Billi’s owner posted a TikTok recently where she asks Billi what she wants — a question Billi comprehends — and Billi just responds “Happy Billi”.

Also, I’m fascinated with the fact that three of the dogs who are using AAC to communicate have demonstrated an understanding of water in the abstract. Typically, a handler will model the word “water” with water in the bowl. I remember the first time I saw that Christina Hunger video where Stella accidentally broke her “beach” button — it wasn’t immediately able to be fixed, so the spot on the board remained vacant. Stella strung together the words “help water outside” after looking at the place where the “beach” button should be. Up until then, for me, it was just kind of a neat thing.

A post shared by Christina Hunger, MA, CCC-SLP (@hunger4words) on Nov 11, 2019 at 12:47pm PST

Then Bunny displayed several uses water in the abstract. When her owner declined to take her to the beach, Bunny tried to get around the no by asking instead “please water walk”. (Can’t find this video right now though I promise I tried.)

She also responded to high tide flowing beneath their house by saying “water sound”, and later the same night when it rained, “water outside”.

There’s also Polly on TikTok, who has used “water” and “play” while outside, presumably to get some hose or pool time in. She also strung together the words “water treat,” resulting in a homemade pupsicle.

It’s just neat to me that they recognize water as water in different states (ice, the ocean, in a bowl, rain) enough to use it to indicate things they want or hear or see! I think Bunny also called a baby seal a “water hippo” at one point (because she has a button for her squeaky gray hippo toy). Like, Bunny has pretty much figured out times of day and is now trying to figure out “yesterday” in relation to “today” and “tomorrow”. How do you model “yesterday” to a dog??? She’s also self-reported injuries to her paw three times — two of those were barbed foxtails embedded between her toes that her owner didn’t know about!

Definitely check out the other participants if you’re interested! Bunny has learned the most words so far, probably, but Billi has a lot, too.

They have also done experiments with horses, who generally do not understand verbal language as well as dogs and cats, due perhaps to their relatively limited vocalizations. (Horses communicate primarily through body language).

They were able to train horses to ask for a blanket when they were too cold and ask for their blanket to be removed when they were too hot.

Now, in this case there is a direct reward (temperature correction), but they were given the choice between blanket on, blanket off, and no change, and chose what an outside observer would consider to be the correct option. (And furthermore, it demonstrated the basic understanding that blankets are, indeed, warm).

So even in animals that struggle to understand more than a handful of words, symbolic communication still works, which demonstrates that rather than being “stupid,” horses are merely non-verbal/non-talking and perfectly capable of communicating when given an alternative means to do so.

Not to take away anything from the amazing things we’re learning about nonhuman communication and intelligence, but:

I’d love to see the same level of respect, and recognition of all A.A.C. for human beings who don’t communicate with their own vocal speech.

Absolutely agreed. We used to think nonverbal/nonspeaking autistic people were stupid, but it turns out many communicate just fine if you give them a keyboard, ya know.

man i don't wanna derail a post but i just saw a post that was showing different megafauna of different areas, like moose in colder climates like canada and russia, camels in the middle east area/deserts, kangaroos in australia. and someone commented "all we have in america is squirrels!!! 🤣"

but like. bison. bison were america's megafauna. i don't want people forgetting about bison and what happened to them.

I don’t know how to tell you this - but Moose are native to upper Midwestern states like MN, WI and MI as well as mountainous areas as far south as CO. Also Alaska.

this post was about american colonizers trying to kill off bison to starve native americans of one of their primary food sources.

Map of the historical range change of bison

I couldn’t find a map of total populations today, but there’s around 500,000 today - compare that to the millions before the colonization of the western US.

Just a reminder that it was once considered “fun sport” to shoot bison from passing trains, leaving the corpses to rot in the sun.  And don’t forget this lovely photo--those are bison skulls.  Imagine how many animals were slaughtered to make a pile this big.

This wasn’t for sport.  This wasn’t for meat.  This was for genocide.

Just to follow up, and to make this abundantly clear - the mass slaughter of the bison was to cause genocide of Native Americans. It was a deliberate destruction of their most valuable food source. 

the fact that we’re apes is SO funny… i can calculate how many parsecs away a nebula is based upon its apparent magnitude for a fun little brain exercise. i also feel depression and existential ennui if my curtains are shut for too long because my brain has a 45000 year old creature in it who feels that darkness holds too many unknown threats 

this has gotten 500x more true this year

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I made 30 Nerd and Jock episodes in 2018. Here’s few of my favorites!

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this series is pure and wholesome and i love it so much

The spiritual successor to Miette

Might I also add

May i add the piece from artist Verbal Vomit

Glad to see we’re all in agreement that cats talk like disparaged victorian children

I am so incredibly glad we finally moved on from "i can has". Cats are clearly smart enough for advanced sentence structure and dumb enough to draw entirely incorrect conclusions about what they're talking about.

My cat, banging the cabnet door over and over and over: bang bang bang

Me: you will not earn what you desire by banging the cabinet door.

My cat: This is a test of wills, is it not? We shall see if your ability to put up with my incessant banging outlasts my eternal lust for snackie treats. Years of conditioning have hardened me for this purpose. bang bang bang

Me: ksst!

My cat, throwing herself to the ground like she's been shot: Oh! Oh I have been assailed in my own home! Have mercy, have pity! Surely in the cruel darkness of your heart there is some mote of goodness that might stay your hand! Do not strike me, I pray you!

Me: ok

My cat, after waiting about 3 minutes: bang bang bang

Can haz snackytreat

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This post is the most reblogged post of the year! Congratulations!

world heritage post

Can we please shift the conversation from whether labels are "valid" and start asking substanial questions such as are they useful? Are they useful politically or for building communities and movements? Do they make sense? How are they materially different from other labels? What kind of message do they send about people who don't subscribe to that label? Why would we need them? What are they based on? What is their history, origin and purpose? Are they useful irl? Why do they make use feel different than older, more stigmatised labels?

Let's move beyond individual feelings and immediate gratification and start asking what's useful and helpful for us as a movement if we want to achieve material change

All I ever get as a response when criticising certain labels is "you're wrong, xyz is valid!!!"

Okay but is it useful? Is it harmful? Does it make sense? Why do we need it? Let's have a real conversation bitch, I'm past this "everything is valid" kindergarten nonsense

i realized this was also lost in the fall of the CH website so

since it’s That Time of Year again, i’m just gonna bring back my Every Christmas TV Rom-Com comic

# grown siblings fighting over tamagotchis

A show where you can tell the creator has actual siblings

I started searching for the Hogwarts/Foucalt connection after seeing this tweet btw

wow how has no parent committed homicide yet after seeing their child penalised for going to the bathroom

must be some fucked up scheme by Big Diaper

I mean the subtext is that they’re training your child to be a factory worker and the assembly line can’t stop just because they need to piss so they have to learn to hold it, but that doesn’t sound so great when spelled out explicitly, just like how “not following instructions” sounds gentler than “not following orders”.

True story:

I once asked a university professor for permission to go to the bathroom.

I cringe to admit this, but it was all I knew. I was just out of secondary school; it was deeply ingrained. How was I supposed to just know the exact point in life when asking that becomes inappropriate and strange?

School really sets kids up for some fucked-up shit in the name of “discipline”. Add colonial history on top of that and it becomes so much worse.

That picture of Elliot Page looking up at Lavern Cox at the GLAAD awards is so much better now

Two trans icons

Santa is on strike due to global warming.  All presents this year will be delivered by Sasha the Christmas Tiger.  Milk and cookies may not be sufficient.

“MUST BRING PRESENTS TO GOOD CHILDREN”

“Yes good”

“AND EAT THE BAD ONES”

“Wait no”

“EAT THEM”

“sasha no”

@burstofhope the Christmas tiger is watching

She is making a list

It is not easy with her paws but she is making it

shes almost here

Okay fine this is the ONE Christmas thing I will reblog before Thanksgiving BUT THAT’S IT

SASHA’S BACK ON MY DASH!

Y’all better behave, you have two months

You better watch out

You better watch out

You better watch out