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submitted 4 months ago by fossilesque@mander.xyz to c/science_memes@mander.xyz

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[-] taulover@sopuli.xyz 147 points 4 months ago

The way mantis shrimp see is nonetheless super cool and interesting. They likely have no conception of 2D color at all, and can only sense the 12 different colors in general. Furthermore, only the midband of their eyes see color, when the eyes are moving and scanning for prey, they don't see color at all, which probably helps offload mental load for their small brains. Once they do see something, they then stop moving their eyes to determine the color of what they're looking at.

Also, mantis shrimp have 6 more photoreceptors in addition to the 12 colored ones, to detect polarized light. They likely see them the same way that they see color, so they probably don't consider them anything different than wavelength which is what we interpret as color.

Ed Yong's An Immense World has a section on this and I'd highly recommend it. The ways animals sense and perceive the world are often so different for ours and it's so fascinating.

[-] stray@pawb.social 39 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

"Spiders can detect danger coming their way with an early-warning system called eyes."

Really fantastic book. I did have some notes though. Firstly, if honeybees have such low dpi vision, how can they see each other dance? I assume it's because they're experiencing the dance some other way, but how? (Also it's hella dark in there, isn't it?)

He says many times that humanity's umwelt is dominated by sight, but I very much disagree. To lose my hearing or sense of touch would make me feel quite blind, as I use them to perceive things outside my cone of vision constantly. Being in deep water is unnerving for this reason, because I can't "see" what's around me, and I have this whole new area below that I can't hear either. So I have to wonder whether other people feel the way he does or whether my usage is more unique.

He really blew my mind when describing exafference and reafference because these things are reliant on a sense of self in the first place, which means that even the worm in his example must have some form of ego.

[-] lvxferre@mander.xyz 7 points 4 months ago

how can they see each other dance? I assume it’s because they’re experiencing the dance some other way, but how? (Also it’s hella dark in there, isn’t it?)

By touch. This 50s video shows it well.

[-] stray@pawb.social 2 points 4 months ago

Oh, I see. I thought they communicated much more complex information than that, but it's very practical for simple directions with no further details.

[-] lvxferre@mander.xyz 3 points 4 months ago

Yup - as far as we know the dance conveys three pieces of info, about a food source:

direction - by the direction of the waggling
distance - by the duration of the waggling
benefit - by how frequently they do it (based on the resources and potential predators)

They also release some pheromones while dancing, but I think that's just to warn other bees "hey, someone is dancing in the hive".