prokopetz:

toastedtoadstool:

prokopetz:

prokopetz:

You know that post that’s going around about how sometimes it doesn’t seem like housecats know they’re small?

I strongly suspect that a lot of the weirder impulses people get are at least partly attributable to the fact that the dumb monkey part of our brains doesn’t realise that humans are big.

Impulses of this type include:

• The impulse to enter and explore vents, drains, and other apertures a human clearly cannot fit into
   
  
• The impulse to climb on objects and surfaces that will not support a human’s weight
   
  
• The impulse to leap from high places in a manner that would be perfectly survivable if you were a ten-pound arboreal primate, but as it stands, not so much!
  

What, so the voice telling me to jump off that tall thing if I get too close to the edge isn’t suicidal intrusive thoughts, it’s just monkey mind massively miscalculation our capabilities?

Weirdly, yes. In cognitive science that’s known – somewhat unimaginatively – as the “high place phenomenon”, and though it’s popularly miscategorised as a symptom of intrusive thoughts, some studies estimate that up to 50% of all people experience it, most of whom have no particular tendency toward suicidal ideation, nor toward intrusive thoughts of any other type.