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  • 4 weeks later...
Posted

Not exactly on topic, but couldn't decide on a more fitting one. 

I found this Lace Monitor eating my eggs this morning (Goanna)

I tried to scare it off, since its been hanging around persistently since it was a hatchling even after run ins with my terrier. Its now big enough to eat him and the chickens, toxic enough to cause pretty bad illness from a bite for the dog and got there on my eggs.

I pushed him away from his perch near the shed roof before he could get through to my other dog who was waiting to tear him apart and he ran along the beams to the cupboard in the 2nd photo, dug himself in the gap between it and the roof. He left after we gave him time and space. I doubt hes going to stay away long. we have too much history now for this scare to work I think.

I've found an old cage that I should be able to modify with a trap door pretty easily so its moved on site close to the eggs. I'll give him a week to be back, plenty of time to set up and bait. I can release him elsewhere.

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Posted (edited)
  On 10/26/2022 at 11:56 AM, naitche said:

I found this Lace Monitor eating my eggs this morning

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Cool!

 

"Nagel uses the metaphor of bats to clarify the distinction between subjective and objective concepts. Because bats are mammals, they are assumed to have conscious experience." wiki

One difficulty with assessing the sentience of animals is that they're irrational for often polar opposite reasons. For example we could say a lion isn't fully self-aware because they're dazed after all the carnivorous violence. Yet we could also say a herbivore isn't as conscious simply because it spends an inordinate amount of time in a tranquil state. Likewise we can't always tell immediately why spiders and snakes are non-conscious simply because they're completely different from one another. You'd need to philosphically analyse a species to determine the exact source of its insentience. Maybe it has a trait to such a high extent it becomes ad absurdum. How could a random spider that cannibalizes its own youth have any modicum of awareness? As such you'd almost have to rely on faith that such creatures aren't sentient even if they appear to be more than a mere robot. 

"Spider cannibalism is the act of a spider consuming all or part of another individual of the same species as food. In the majority of cases a female spider kills and eats a male before, during, or after copulation."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spider_cannibalism

Edited by Michael McMahon
  • 5 months later...
Posted

One of our Orb spiders.

We get these making webs every night between the fruit trees. If we walk through the web, they rebuild the next night leaving a space for us pass through with out breaking the web. 

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  • 3 weeks later...
Posted
  On 4/6/2023 at 11:56 AM, naitche said:

One of our Orb spiders.

We get these making webs every night between the fruit trees. If we walk through the web, they rebuild the next night leaving a space for us pass through with out breaking the web. 

Expand  

 

A spider can symbolise the limitations of someone's metaphysical viewpoint. Spiders display an evil persona. A materialist could not deal with a spider without a vast perception of the natural environment in the background. That is to say even the biggest spider is very small compared to rocks and so forth. Likewise a theist might have to view a spider as belonging to the physical world and not the creation of a human God. The various levels of transcendence in a person's spirituality might relate to some people finding certain creatures creepier than others. So the illusion of evil in snakes might be of a different kind than spiders. Even if we attribute a trace level of sensory awareness to such creatures from a distance we can still objectify such creatures if they're too close as a lesser evil. It might be too complicated to weigh up their minimal sentience if we're ambushed by them where amoral creatures don't deserve our spiritual respect!

  • 2 weeks later...
Posted (edited)

The Passion of the Christ 2004 - Snake

 

We kill flies effortlessly but perhaps we’re scared of spiders and snakes because we’re reluctant to kill them ourselves. So maybe we respect them so much that we’re actually afraid of them! Maybe a violent way to think of creepy creatures is that you’re able to kill them but it’s bad for the environment if you do so. Spiders and snakes evolved millions of years before humans. So maybe a panpsychist way to view these creatures is that their exotic perception of light is so megalomaniacal as to be evil because they ground the lowest threshold possible for awareness of the physical world.

 

Killing a snake is like killing 4 rats seeing as they are what they eat! Likewise holding a spider would be like holding 10 of their prey flies. It’s like those soldiers who relieve the guilt  of killing by claiming they statistically saved 2 of the enemy’s would-be victims!

 

 

Edited by Michael McMahon
  • 2 weeks later...
  • 2 weeks later...
Posted (edited)

Beetlephobia (Skathariphobia) - Gun Control Michael 

 

Passive-aggression can be a way to tolerate insects without killing or injuring them.

 

Staring at insects from up very close is good way to reduce panic. Light is non-tactile after all! You can just about see a grey spider on the mid-right:

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Edited by Michael McMahon
Posted (edited)

I’ve just moments ago picked up a thin, small spider in the bathroom with a tissue and through it out the window. I’d to grab all around the spider and tried to be gentle so as not to squish the belly or break a leg. This is an indirect way to become accustomed to their strange appearance. Wearing gloves might be an alternative option for catching bigger spiders.

Edited by Michael McMahon
Posted (edited)

I like to place a jar over them , then slide a piece of cardboard under.

About the same time I called my dog in to find her bloody. Checked the yard to find this. If squeamish, don't look. Keeping an eye on her, but this her her 3rd now. This is about 3 1/2 foot. Toxic and had taken up residence outside my back door.

I would have preferred to remove it safely to another location, they are not particularly aggressive, but too easy to step on in the dark or if you haven't got your wits about you.

I have had dogs that show only curiosity with no snake instincts. Those that have it most often react the same as this dog, grab and shake the cr*p out of it. Had one only who would run the other way. but even she came back to pull one off the old dog who tried to kill it but was too slow in his reactions so that it had hold of him. She grabbed it and pulled it away, then ran again.

Seems to me nurture often plays a large role in fear of spiders and snakes, but there is often an instinct to view either a threat too. 

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Edited by naitche
Posted (edited)

Spider Slap

There’s a saying of how a sore thumb will feel less painful if you stab your ankle. Likewise flying bats can detract from your fear of spiders! There were rocks underneath and the water was merely shallow so I hope the spider didn’t fall to its doom!

 

Edited by Michael McMahon
Posted (edited)

Birdphobia

Birds have such an alien psyche that they can desensitise you to insects. After all they eat worms and they aren’t one bit afraid of them! Ornithophobia is the technical version of birdphobia!

Likewise if you personified frogs then you’d have no fear of their spider prey! As such a lot of arachnophobes might inadvertently have a little fear of frogs without them realising it!

Edited by Michael McMahon
Posted

Scary Dragonfly

You don’t need to go too close to a dragonfly to observe them because they’ll fly very fast around you. Anything named after a fiery dragon is deserving of a phobia!

No spider will ever dart as fast as a dragonfly. You can gradually build up resistance against your fearful insects by simply spending more time admiring the insects you’re not too afraid of.

Posted

I might be able to look at a tarantula or an anaconda from a large distance away but somehow I don’t think any amount of desensitisation from small creatures would prepare me for touching tarantulas or anacondas. Perhaps tarantulas have so little awareness that they aggravate anyone’s belief in oblivion after death. Unfortunately people don’t take orders of magnitude in the natural environment seriously where oblivion is potentially endless. Hence a tarantula might be a deterrent to ever contemplating more than a temporary period of oblivion after your death. Likewise who knows if an anaconda has such a repetitive perception that they’ll disturb anyone who believes in a literal eternal afterlife rather than just a long one. The harsh reality is that humans are finite creatures where we can’t visualise time from the perspective of God when mountain ranges can take millions of years to form. 

Posted

Petite Spider

I’m forever trying to justify my temptation to watch erotic movies! Failed playful attempts to catch a spider can desensitise you for when you finally have the teeny creature on your finger.

Posted (edited)

Fox Sighting

Carnivorous foxes are objectively more dangerous to humans where our fear of spiders is a form of mammalian discrimination! The dilemma is that we tend to admire foxes in spite of their slightly evil vibe! Our only common ancestor with spiders are fishes 100s of millions of years ago! However we simply don’t fear fishes enough to relate their minimalist psyche to spiders or snakes. Perhaps the reptile and arachnid collection should be at an aquarium rather than a zoo to tame our fears! Maybe we just need to psychoanalyse more fish to prevent spider and snake phobias!

 

The fact that creatures can die of natural causes means that we need not kill them to prove that they’re not a supernatural threat. The fact that people can look charitable to those who fear snakes by wearing snakeskin shoes is a sign that the ethics of a phobia can be manipulable. In other words you shouldn’t view yourself as redeemable as a criminal just by hating scary creatures! As such we need to tame phobias to prevent amorality. 
Random dead mouse I found on footpath to exonerate me from terrorism charges(!):

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Edited by Michael McMahon
Posted
!

Moderator Note

Are we done with the topic of Arachnophobia? We prefer to keep discussions focused, and this thread appears to be broadening its scope.

 
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