Glider

There isn't enough information in somebody's avatar or nickname to enable anybody (even a Psychologist) to make any reliable predictions. Nicknames and avatars are not reliable personality traits.

Well, if you don't use the standard definitions, how can you expect people to participate in your discussions? However, that's not really the point. The point is that you lecture. For example, from your second paragraph onwards, again you provide a thesis on 'Sensory Expectation', which boils down to a lecture stating "This is how it is". There is no question of 'could it be this way?' or '[/i]Could this hypohtesis explain certain behaviours?[/i]'. It brooks no discussion. If you wish to assert this mechanism as an explanation of a behaviour, then cite your sources. If you are speculating, post in the Speculations forum. If you wish to discuss the possibility that 'Sensory expectaion' may explain caertain behaviours, then ask for discussion. Make it clear that this is your opinion/hypothesis and you are posting it for testing. As it is, your hunting dog example contains flaws. Hunger in predators triggers hunting behaviours. There is no a priori expectation of 'rabbit' or any specific animal/item. Just 'prey', i.e. anything that moves and is small enough to tackle. Specific 'expectations' would be maladaptive as they would increase the chances that any possible prey that was not a rabbit would be overlooked as it would not trigger the attack phase. As it is, a hungry predator (e.g. a fox) will go for anything that triggers the attack phase of the hunting behaviour: rabbits, mice, birds, voles, lizards etc.. Essentially, anything that falls into the category 'potential prey' and presents certain characteristics, i.e. 'Moving', 'smaller than me' and does not trigger an avoidance response (i.e. is not in itself dangerous).

Then post them in the Speculations forum. Do not simply make baseless statements. Yeah, a couple of hours at least. An instinctive behaviour is an unlearned yet complex behavioural response to an external stimulus that is automatic and universal to the species. An instinct is the hard-wired mechanism underlying the behavioural drive. Breathing and hunger are not responses to external stimuli. Breathing is a vegatative brainstem function that occurs regardless of stimuli. Changes in blood pH only modulate respiratory rate. Hunger is a sensation resulting from physiological changes (e.g. hypoglycaemia) resulting from alterations in blood chemistry. This triggers a negative affect and the behavioural motivation to seek food. Neither breathing nor hunger are complex behaviours, nor are they responses to external stimuli. Nor are they unique to any species. They are both homeostatic functions common to all animals (that have the mechanisms for respiration and feeding). However, feeding behaviours in many cases are instictive (e.g. hunting, browsing, seeking fruits etc.). Withdrawing your hand from something hot is a reflex. This is neither an instinct nor a conscious behaviour. It relies on a reflex arc (basically an interneuron between the afferent and efferent pathways in the spinal cord). The reflex arc is a functional unit in itself and works at the spinal level requiring no input from higher levels (i.e. the brain).

No, hunger is not an instinct. Nor is there any 'buffer zone' (beyond what a person can store). If you don't get what you need, you will suffer. This can be no food at all, or it can be a single element missing from an unbalanced diet (e.g. Iron, Iodine, selenium, boron etc.). The same as flowers, humans will and do 'wilt' if they do not get what they need to survive. Happily, unlike flowers, humans can obtain what they need from a variety of different sources, but that we react badly to being deprived of a single necessary element makes us the same as any other organism. So, is it a discussion on dietary requirements that you want? The optimum is not theoretical and there are many sources that can tell you the prognoses for deficiencies in all the necessary elements and compounds (and their treatments). If you really want a discussion (rather than simply to lecture), then you need to start with a question or some proposition, such as the possible existence of these 'buffer zones'. If you simply post a lecture that is based on the inherent assumption that such buffer zones exist, then, given that nobody else will have heard of them you can't really expect a discussion. You can't expect other people to know the words to your made up song and you can't be disppointed if they don't sing along. By all means post questions or propose topics for discussion, but please stop posting conjectural and rhetorical lectures.

The desire to breathe is caused by a reduction in blood pH (i.e. a buldup of carbon dioxide). Hunger is not an instinct either. This is controlled largely by blood glucose levels. I'm not really sure of the purpose of your posts, they seem largely rhetorical and not conducive to discussion (bearing in mind this is a discussion forum), moreover, they are based on flawed assumptions.

I never had it myself, but when I was in the King's Troop, the horses sometimes used to come down with it. Ringworm is quite common in horses. One year they came down with a particularly virulent strain, and many of the guys working with them caught it. I was lucky, I escaped it. It is highly contagious, but it's not a severe problem. It's treatable and won't do any long term damage.

Breathing is not an instinct.

What about the wishes of the patient? Don't they count for anything?

Good idea.

Sunspot, what are you doing? This is a discussion and debate forum and you are not providing a subject for discussion or debate, you are presenting a lecture. Apart from the fact that much of what you present is conjecture, it is generally bad form to enter multiple posts.

Yay for you guys! Congratualations. Well deserved!

True, and if I may add, this condition (synaesthesia) only results in the cross-perception of the physical senses: Touch, sound, smell and vision. You could never 'see' happiness.

Psychology is trying to understand human behaviour. Psychiatry is trying to fix it when it's broken.

Yeah, let us know what happens. I've got my bet on a manual reduction under anaesthesia with possibly anti inflammatory drugs and maybe some ABs (if there's any infection).

Iv'e never had experience of SSRIs, but from your description, winter (January, February and some of March) does exactly the same to me as SSRIs do to you. These are my 'concrete days'. Grey, cold and very hard.

The radius is necessary for rotation. If that heals poorly, it may well result in limited wrist rotation on that side. There is a chance, if it heals very poorly (i.e. abnormal bone growth around the fracture) of losing rotation altogether.

I was born in Kisumu (Kenya). My dad was working there as a member of British special branch attached to the Kenya police during the Mau Mau troubles. One of his last duties before returning to Britain was to act as bodyguard to Jomo Kenyatta, who (apparently) I called 'Uncle Jomo' and would talk to in Swahili.

It depends largely on the type of bone, but generally, if it's prevented from healing, for example due to constant movement, then osteoclasts will eat away at the broken ends, misshaping them and osteoblasts will be trying to build up new bone to heal it, so you will end up (if it's a small bone, e.g. metacarpal or metatarsal) with a misshapen, unhealed fracture and pain. In nost cases, the bones ends will be held together by surrounding tissue, so a degree of healing will take place, but it will be out of place. Occasionally in small bines that are less well fed with blood supply, the bone can die off. This is a particular risk in the scaphoid. Then you have a whole set of new problems. If it's a long bone, more or less the same applies, but the bone, if it does heal, will be out of line and that's no good if it's a supporting bone. If it fails to heal, then sometimes the ends can begin to necrose and you have a whole bunch of other problems. Due to the nature of bone healing, it's rare that two ends of a broken long bone can heal separately to leave two separate parts. generally, if a long bone is badly set, it will simply heal out of line and ramain misshapen. If it's not allowed to heal, then osteoblasts will continue to lay down new bone until either it does join (in whatever configuration) or you need surgery to remove the lumps of calcification around the fracture.

Apparently, it's been the coldest winter in the UK since 1995-6.

I don't think homosexuality is either hereditory or environmental. I think it's congenital and attributable to the teratogenic effects of hormone imbalances during gestation.

You're right, it isn't. The eye's response to intensity is logarithmic. A stimulus luminance needs to be 10 times as intense to appear twice as bright. This is what gives us the massive functional range of light intensity.

The question is "Which of the following is not true about animals?". Insects are animals, not for the purposes of the question, nor in spite of the question, but because they are animals rather than vegetables or minerals. Well basically when it is a vegetable or a mineral. It's too basic to be esoteric.

Insects are animals.

As far as the rest of it goes' date=' I think we're approaching concensus, but I think this is the crux of the matter. In a nutshell I think it's the quality of the stimulus [i']medium[/i] that makes the difference (and is the 'bone' of our contention) rather than the stimuli themselves. For example, light is always light. When light (the stimulus medium) reflects from an image (the stimulus), we detect exactly and only the pattern of light reflected from the image. So, when discussing illusions, and particularly those based upon ambiguity (e.g. the Necker cube and the figure-ground illusions), we know the ambiguity is imposed by top down processes and is not a function of the stimulus medium (light). However, the same cannot be said of smell because this relies on chemicals as a stimulus medium, and many of them (i.e. different types). So, in this case, the stimulus medium can be messed with. Therefore to create a mix of aromatic chemicals that smell like a rose, even if these chemicals are not related to those produced by a rose, would be the same as taking a figure ground image (say vase/faces) and manipulating the light in such a way that it evoked mainly the image of faces rather than a vase (i.e. to suppress the vase schema). In other words, to knock out the ambiguity. Without that ambiguity, could it still be called an illusion? I suppose in one sense it could. To evoke the sense of a rose through a scent relies on top down processes insofar as the subject would need prior experience of the object and the stimulus medium would have to trigger the association between the stimulus medium (scent) and the schema of the stimulus object (rose). However, could it be said to have 'fooled' the sense? I don't think so. Relying (as it does) on mainly bottom up processes, the 'artificial' scent would still have to smell like a rose to evoke the schema of a rose. This is the same as saying that a drawing (or even a 3-D hologram) of a vase is fooling the sense because it evokes the schema of a vase. Thus it cannot be said that the rose schema evoked by the 'artificial' scent of a rose was imposed on an ambiguous stimulus through top down processes because there was no ambiguity. Artificial or not, the scent smells of rose. If the scent was ambiguous, it would not evoke the schema of a rose. I'm not laughing. It's an interesting read. As you said above, smells can be influenced by context and psychological state (e.g. when hungry, food smells are detected much more quickly and are rated as much stronger than when not hungry). Expectancies also influence smell, but overall this is to a much lesser degree than with vision due to the large difference in direction of processing. Smell is mainly bottom up (although there must still be top down processes in order to make sense of the input), whilst vision is clearly hugely influenced by top down processes and so can be made to impose percepts that do not exist.

It wouldn't really matter whether or not dogs only had monochromatic vision. The laser point would still appear as a very bright (and moving) point of contrast against the background. If you have a digital camera, take a black & white photo of a laser point on a wall, you'll see what I mean.