Athena

I came home from Hawaii early because my sister with a timeshare in Hawaii was stressed to the breaking point and could no more be rational with me th...

Thank you so much for working with me on this effort to understand rational thinking and human/animal differences. I am not done looking for informati...

I just had an experience that makes me question just how much free will we have. I went to Hawaii with my sister and two other women. We stayed in her...

I do not believe we are thinking rationally unless we are using higher-order critical thinking skills. Each critical thinking skill is important but m...

I must argue against that statement. Knowing truth is essential because things go very wrong when people act on incorrect ideas and bad information. P...

And that thought is a very big consideration for researchers. From college lectures to books based on research, I am amazed by the scrutiny of the res...

If it is not language it is not rational. If we do not agree on the definitions of words, we are doing no better the competing groups of chimps screec...

Wow, what a depressing view of reality. I just got back from a trip to hell and I am so happy to be here. All my ideas may be wrong, but at the moment...

Ran out of time. My ride to the airport has arrived. I will be in Hawaii for a week.

I might throw in here something I just read in a math book. It has been proven a 4 month old child recognizes the difference between one thing, two th...

There is a problem with inductive reasoning. Scholasticism used Aristotle and the Bible as the foundation of education. We did not come to the modern ...

If the reasoning isn't correct, things can go very wrong. That is why it is important to have the correct facts and think things through carefully. De...

@Manuel said "I suppose a bare minimum has to be symbolic representation akin to something that arises with language use. Animals do not have language...

Yes. I don't think anyone here is arguing humans have not evolved from an ancestor that would be classified as an animal. The transition from prehuman...

That point seems to be what is being argued in the Rational thinking: animals and humans thread, @Vera Mont is making strong arguments in favor of ani...

:lol: Who is they? How many of them are there?

No animals don't already have a language. Language is next to culture, it has to be learned. The ability to learn a language varies across species and...

I will use a link to explain why intuitive thinking is not rational thinking. As @Manuel explains rational thinking begins with a proposition. I am le...

I am excited because you have gotten to the core of the subject. Baboons to not have the attention span of great apes. Baboons are monkeys not apes. T...

That is the intuitive question. As @Manuel warns, when we know something intuitively, it is important to check and double-check that intuitive thought...

You made me ask the question, can a chimp recognize a picture of himself in a line up of chimp pictures? That is different from a mirror image. In the...

By definition of "rational," I would say no, the crow's behavior is not the result of rational thinking. I like @Manuel's used to Propositional Knowle...

Very nicely said and so the debate goes on. I had to look for an explanation of propositional knowledge because that is a new term for me. Having the ...

Is it rational to believe illnesses are caused by the gods? Is it rational to believe a god created man from mud?

The argument about chimpanzees and their ability to communicate is more complex than whether they learn a language or they can not. As a matter of lea...

I think Baden gave a good explanation of why all thinking is not equal to rational thinking. We could get into what emotions have to do with our think...

I know all that but hell will freeze over before I can explain it as well as you did. :heart: :lol: My arguments are based on my own struggle with lan...

I remember when there was a lot of excitement about chimps recognizing their image in a mirror. Of course much more research has been done since then.

We really need a thread for that discussion. I started a thread but left it in the logic and philosophy of math category. That might not be the right ...

I agree with you and would gladly discuss it in another thread.

Monkey see monkey do. I think we need a different thread for discussing animals. I have been watching and re-watching lectures about arthropods and wa...

What do you mean by rational thinking? I have no doubt that animals are good at problem-solving. Math is not a knee jerk reaction to someone walking a...

Wow! that is a wonderful post! You made me order a book The German Polity. I can not trust my brain to remember what you said of a week from now, find...

I am not sure if there should be a separate thread for communication because we are getting far from the identity of numbers and information and when ...

:heart: I absolutely love that example. :rofl: That makes as much sense as spell-check programs that obviously don't have a clue about the intended me...

Oh my goodness! What an awful horror story! That was not fair.

Ah, want kind of wine goes best with chocolate? I would love the popcorn and a movie, but must void it because it put me in the hospital twice. Divert...

I started watching movies I don't normally watch and kicking up feelings I was not aware of having, and crying to cleanse my soul. With nothing to dis...

I can work with that. I actually love walking along the river and communing with nature. Some days I am overwhelmed by appreciation of the beauty of n...

Never give up hope! I am quite sure I would write with the hope that someday my written record would be found by another earthline or maybe a being fr...

:lol: No thank you! I am having a very visceral reaction to what you said. I am also thinking of a professor's lectures about philosophy and the Intel...

Thank you for the interesting story. That was a lot of work putting in all those words so I feel sincerely cared for. You relayed a sense of comprehen...

I appreciate the distinction you made between the candidates. They are both stupid promises! Can I please have another choice? :lol: However, saying t...

What a delicious question. :nerd: Also what does the US Constitution have to do with the power of a president? US presidents gained a lot of power dur...

:lol:

Thank you. We have the problem of one candidate getting the popular vote and the other one winning because of the Electoral College which gives some s...

What exactly is a president supposed to do for the economy? Isn't that fascist? The government running the economy? Is that what we want? How about th...

I just order a book that explains math and animals. If I could get to understanding math at least as well as a dog I will have achieved something whil...

Thank you so much for your concern about my feelings. That is something lacking in forums and yet science is making us aware of how important our emot...

That really bites! I usually avoid threads that are too long. I really don't care what all the important people here have to say about anything. If I ...