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PaperclipPerfector  18hr ago (text post)   780 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for June 26, 2026

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Do I wake up when I need to number 2 or do I need to number 2 when I wake up? This important philosophical question hit me this morning. Does waking up turn on a lot of biological systems that leads me to the bathroom approximately 10 minutes after getting out of bed?

The latter. You have a semi-separate nervous system of sorts in your gut, called the enteric nervous system, which orchestrates the entire digestive process (including peristalsis) and has a sleep-wake cycle of its own regulated by your circadian rhythm. It's a large collection of neurons that's about as sizeable as a cat's brain, and can operate by itself if disconnected from the rest of your nervous system.

The real philosophical question is whether such a thing is independently conscious to some degree, but that line of questioning leads nowhere good.

If it’s conscious then it’s probably happy. Evolution seems to evolve organisms to be happy when they are doing their job well.

I believe the latter. Physiological arousal triggers a bunch of stuff, as does the first drinking/eating of the day.

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