this post was submitted on 16 Jan 2025
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Showerthoughts

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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. A showerthought should offer a unique perspective on an ordinary part of life.

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For example, why do we say "Your pupils are dilated". They aren't. It's the iris aperture that is dilated.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 12 hours ago

Well yes, but also no.

The term pupil is used to describe an area that exists inside a three dimensional space, the eye, and while that space may not have anything that reflects light, it_does_contain something. The surface of the eye, known as the lens, and the liquid or 'jelly' that is contained inside the eye. So that area that is light reflective material would include the whites and the iris, but the inside of the eye is not just empty space. If it was, your eye would collapse like an uninflated beach ball, and you wouldn't see very much at all. Arguably the term pupil is used to refer to the non-reflective area of the eye bordered by the iris and containing the lens.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 14 hours ago (2 children)

Eye sphincter sounds weird though.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 hours ago

Well shoot. My regular eye doctor is a cute little thing that I kind of have a crush on, and now all I can picture is her talking about my eye sphincter...

[–] [email protected] 1 points 13 hours ago

It's a sphincter that lets a lot of shit enter your body

[–] Majorllama 45 points 1 day ago (3 children)

I mean we have lots of words for varying degrees and styles of "nothing".

A chasm is the empty space between two chunks of the earths crust.

A void is just an empty space well... Void of all things.

An interval is just the time between two events. Technically it's nothing.

Still a good shower thought. There aren't a ton of words dedicated to the same phenomenon, but we have a handful.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 13 hours ago

Well, well, well, indeed.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

Also just

“Space” as a place to go

[–] Majorllama 3 points 22 hours ago

Good ol fashion space.

[–] AFKBRBChocolate 6 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

Pretty good number of them if you count things like intermission. Slit, slot, crack, aperture, interlude, gap, breach, etc. Others, too.

[–] Majorllama 3 points 22 hours ago

When I said "handful" I more so meant in all of language yeah there are probably hundreds of words for the empty space between certain things, but in all of human language that's probably a pretty small number.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

Oh boy. Don’t look too deep into philosophy of language, or you might become convinced that “the iris” is just as nonexistent — or that all nouns are really about a symbolic existence as a relationship, for which measurable physical matter is inconsequential.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 hours ago

I too enjoy peyote on occasion.

[–] [email protected] 23 points 1 day ago (1 children)

This is a great point! Humans can put names on things that aren't there, such as holes!

This 'naming of hole-like concepts' may sound trivial, but there have been entire cultures that didn't have 'hole-like' concepts and this stunted their ability to make certain discoveries. For example, the ancient Greeks could not have developed calculus; they did not have a concept of zero that they could use for mathematical manipulation. This shows an unfortunate reality: you can't mentally manipulate ideas that you don't have.

However, once you do have those ideas, they may seem obvious. This is a well documented human bias: the curse of knowledge. Once you understand something, it is very difficult to imagine not knowing that. For us, knowers of pupils, holes, zeros, and chasms, it may seem absurd to not have names for pupils, holes, zeros, and chasms. We take them for granted, when in reality it was not an easy road to arrive at them.

[–] FooBarrington 12 points 1 day ago

Really makes ya think what obvious things we might be missing. Maybe all you need to make FTL travel possible is to dinglepop all your schleem using a household plumbus?

[–] SpaceNoodle 9 points 1 day ago

A hole is a thing.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 22 hours ago (2 children)

Could it not be said that "nothing" is actually a thing? 🤔

[–] Agent641 6 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 18 hours ago)
  • Me, trying to persuade my philosophy prof that by not turning in my assignment, I have actually turned in an assignment.
[–] [email protected] 2 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

Null and zero are two different things.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 12 hours ago

In programming, for sure. But that's just the semantics of the language you're using.

[–] Rhynoplaz 5 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Same situation with assholes and anal sphincters.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 21 hours ago

I think both the hole and sphincter are included in "asshole". It's a packaged deal

[–] AFKBRBChocolate 1 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

Except don't we usually mean the sphincter itself when we say asshole?

[–] Rhynoplaz 2 points 23 hours ago (1 children)

Isn't that the same as iris and pupil?

[–] AFKBRBChocolate 2 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

I didn't think so? When I say Iris, I mean the colored ring. When I say pupil, I mean the hole. When I say asshole, I mean the ring, not the hole. I can't remember ever wanting to refer to the actual hole. Maybe "gape?"

[–] [email protected] 2 points 14 hours ago

When I say asshole I usually mean someone with whom I'm currently dissatisfied

[–] A_A 3 points 1 day ago

Never call someone a massive asshole, call them massless.

[–] dustyData 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Wait until I tell you about this weird concept, the zero…

[–] [email protected] 6 points 23 hours ago

I'll have none of your witchcraft here, thank-you-very-much.

[–] rockSlayer 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I'd say it's more than just a hole. I had an eye injury when I was a teenager that caused a detached iris. I didn't have a massive pupil, I had 2 small, irregularly shaped pupils. After surgery, I now have a permanently dilated pupil shaped like a teardrop

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Out of curiosity, does a different shaped pupil change your vision? I equate a pupil to a camera lens aperture; the smaller it gets, the less light gets through. Have you noticed a difference?

[–] rockSlayer 2 points 1 day ago

Well after all these years I've gotten used to it, but my vision is very blurry in that eye. There's also injury to the macula so there's a giant gray spot in my near vision. It's kinda like a giant peripheral vision, but I'm also more sensitive to big changes in brightness