Eukaryote Writes Blog

It's best to think of it as "tree-ing" or "to tree" A really, really fantastic article: https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t…

It's worth it. Goes straight at the philosophical underpinnings of software, maybe even knowledge, with a hacksaw. It's not much longer than its own Wikipedia page: https://www.alamut.com/subj/artiface/language/johnWilkins.html Foucault wrote: "This book first arose out of a passage in Borges, out of the laughter that shattered, as I read the passage, all the familiar landmarks of my thought [...] breaking up all the ordered surfaces and all the planes with which we are accustomed to tame the wild profusion of existing things, and continuing long afterwards to disturb and threaten with collapse our age-old distinction between the Same and the Other." This is good too: https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/ But it all sums to "the map is not the territory". Broadly agree with the thrust of what you're saying, disagree with some of the fine detail.

Elsewhere: https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2022/08/04/fiber-arts-mysterious-dodec… disagrees on the glove hypothesis

For an excellent example of how this can work, check out "Barriers to Bioweapons": https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2017/06/30/book-review-barriers/

My favorite example of this is that trees aren’t really a phylogenetic group all their own. They’re just plants and plants can become tall and woody with a few genetic tweaks. You can’t trace trees to a common ancestor because the ancestors of many types of trees are just ordinary plants. https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t…

Related: There’s no such thing as a tree (phylogenetically) https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t…

Another one is, believe it or not, trees: https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t…

Not OP, but: https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t…

It's more that, as I understand it, "fish" isn't a coherent phylogenetic category so much as a convention-based descriptive grouping of certain characteristics. I don't think of whales as fish, no. But an exclusion based on eg tail fin orientation or lack of gills is based on convention rather than strict taxonomic practices. So if someone wants to weigh the characteristics differently and include whales in the term fish I would at least hear them out. Different category but well explained here https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t…

Trees are also too many things to be one thing. https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t… crops up on HN periodically. “Trees” are not a coherent phylogenetic category. On the evolutionary tree of plants, trees are regularly interspersed with things that are absolutely, 100% not trees. This means that, for instance, either: - The common ancestor of a maple and a mulberry tree was not a tree. - The common ancestor of a stinging nettle and a strawberry plant was a tree. - And this is true for most trees or non-trees that you can think of.

https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2024/10/21/i-got-dysentery-so-you-dont… is a writeup of a similar trial that hit HN recently. That person got $4000 for 10 days.

Here's an article I like about that: https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t…

The "there's no such thing as tree" concept is expanded here: <https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/> This was discussed on HN a few years ago: <https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29621646> I think it's fair to argue that the palm forests noted in TFA filled a similar niche to that of current tree-like forests. All taxonomical groupings are ultimately grounded in practical organisational utility for humans.

But there is a surprising counter claim that the dodecahedrons predate the invention of knitting: https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2022/08/04/fiber-arts-mysterious-dodec…

Well it depends how deep you wanna go in the history, there is no such thing as a tree. https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t…

Well, this clearly references this wonderful article: https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t… The idea is that our taxonomy selects a group named "trees", but there's little internal coherence in that group, which probably results in more online hilly wars in the plant-loving communities than we the laypeople can think of. See also: is Pluto a planet?

The same is true of trees! They've independently evolved many times [1]. Any solar-powered biome will probably have trees. [1] https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t…

https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t… What is and isn't a tree is not as well defined as one would think.

And, assuming that the energy system on the new system is driven by a photosynthesis of some sort, trees [0]. [0] https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t…

Amusingly trees are like human races. They aren’t a meaningful biological category[1]. [1] https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t…

Engine-rich exhaust can still provide thrust. People like their idealised models of the world, but they're fundamentally still just idealised and models. It's somewhat illuminating to learn that all abstractions are leaky. For example, you can't reliably represent "sex" using a "bit" type in a database. It's not just "M" or "F". You can have "unknown" (of course), "known but not willing to say" (whatever), intersex of all sorts, transexuals, genetically XY but physiologically female, etc... The world is complicated and messy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XY_gonadal_dysgenesis Similarly, there's no clear demarcation between species in many cases. There's no such thing as a "tree" either: https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t… I could go on and on.

Sure. Another post on the front page now is about trees[1]. Where's the line between a short tree and a bush? We humans see the difference, but biology (a hard science) shows that using their classification rules there is no difference between a tall bush and a short tree. [1]: https://eukaryotewritesblog.com/2021/05/02/theres-no-such-thing-as-a-t…

I don't think it's a real problem. It's a way that one group of humans agreed to label things, and that way is the currently dominant way. Even the agreed rules (whoever publishes first gets dibs on the name) are just an incentive for academics to publish. If there were another labelling system, it would have the same problems and would only serve to split the humans into multiple ways of doing the same thing. But, ultimately, the naming is just for us humans. We care, the trees don't! To quote Richard Feynman: > The next Monday, when the fathers were all back at work, we kids were playing in a field. One kid says to me, “See that bird? What kind of bird is that?” I said, “I haven’t the slightest idea what kind of a bird it is.” He says, “It’s a brown-throated thrush. Your father doesn’t teach you anything!” But it was the opposite. He had already taught me: “See that bird?” he says. “It’s a Spencer’s warbler.” (I knew he didn’t know the real name.) “Well, in Italian, it’s a Chutto Lapittida. In Portuguese, it’s a Bom da Peida. In Chinese, it’s a Chung-long-tah, and in Japanese, it’s a Katano Tekeda. You can know the name of that bird in all the languages of the world, but when you’re finished, you’ll know absolutely nothing whatever about the bird. You’ll only know about humans in different places, and what they call the bird. So let’s look at the bird and see what it’s doing—that’s what counts.” (I learned very early the difference between knowing the name of something…