• starman2112@sh.itjust.works
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    11 days ago

    My favorite theory is that it’s about corpses. You know what looks similar to a person but isn’t one? A dead person. People who don’t like being around human corpses tend to live longer because you know, something killed that guy and it might kill you too

  • Dr. Bob@lemmy.ca
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    11 days ago

    I think it’s a pattern recognition issue. We have brain areas specialized for facial recognition. There is a cognitive dissonance where something is almost but not quite a face. This is distinct from pareidolia where the pattern system recognizes that something resembles, but is definitely not a face.

  • Skyrmir@lemmy.world
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    11 days ago

    More likely deep code from prior evolution. Similar, but not right, is the difference between life and death for a lot of species. That’d get built in long before anything resembling ‘human’ existed.

  • CarbonIceDragon@pawb.social
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    11 days ago

    It also can apply to humans that have something wrong with them, like visible signs of severse contagious illness, or just dead people, where being around can risk disease for oneself

  • Elting@piefed.social
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    11 days ago

    It wasn’t very long ago we lived with australopithecus and neanderthals and other hominins that looked like us.

  • I think it’s less likely to be an evolutionary advantage and just a side effect of having really good pattern recognition. Because the uncanny valley does not only trigger with humans. Anything that is close to something recognizable but not quite right can trigger it. It’s what makes liminal spaces feel creepy.

    • Modern_medicine_isnt@lemmy.world
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      11 days ago

      Well, think about walking through the forest. That large branch just doesn’t look right. Oh shit, theres a predator on that branch. Seems reason enough for the trait to exist.

      • otacon239@lemmy.world
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        11 days ago

        Definitely enhanced when in person. I get the strongest sensation being anywhere staff-only after hours (usually when I’m tagging along with a friend who works somewhere). There’s normally an implied force pushing you out of those places, but when left empty, it’s like a weird energy vacuum.

        That’s my take, anyway.

  • esc@piefed.social
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    11 days ago

    Or it can mean that our mind is flawed. Unless cats fearing cucumbers mean that they once had to fight cat-hunting cucumbers.

    • Fluke@feddit.uk
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      11 days ago

      Cucumbers could easily be triggering feline responses to snakes, which are most certainly a danger to them.

      • esc@piefed.social
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        11 days ago

        Yeah, that’s a perfect example of mind being wrong because of faulty pattern recognition triggering unconscious responce.

        Personal anecdote: I’ve experienced uncanny valley once with perfectly human human, just some guy that had unfortunate experience of being meat crayon on a motrocycle some time in the recent past, i was absolutely terrified until he came really close and I understood what exactly was wrong.

    • WhiteOakBayou@lemmy.world
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      11 days ago

      Are you some kind of carnivorous cucumber truther? The evidence is incontrovertible. Trust the science. This isn’t the kind of thing you can meaningfully do your own research about. Watching YouTube videos where weirdos rehash the same three articles about how carnivorous cucumbers were not an apex predator for a million years isn’t a personality. Touch grass. Get a fucking hobby.