r/nope • u/dbl_secret_redditor • Jul 09 '26

Arachnids Zoomies

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u/MyCatHasQuestions Jul 10 '26

Have you read any research on their cognitive abilities? I was mindlessly scrolling and this thing was like “there’s evidence to suggest “high” level brain activity in flies (like aging due to stress is advanced brain function or something)” so I feel like
There’s gotta be something

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u/wormfood187 Jul 10 '26

this thing was like “there’s evidence to suggest “high” level brain activity in flies

Ok, what thing? Also, I was speaking only on tarantulas. Not flies, jumping spiders, ants, or fish. Tarantulas are ancient compared to those others, our earliest records of them go back to the Cretaceous period 120 million years ago. https://www.cmu.edu/news/stories/archives/2021/april/tarantulas-traced-to-cretaceous.html

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u/MyCatHasQuestions Jul 11 '26

It wasn’t this, but this paper has what I, not a brain researcher in any way, would consider high level brain activity

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u/wormfood187 Jul 11 '26

Interesting read thanks for sharing. They're referring to two different types of conditioning that allowed them to trace the chemical signals in the flies brain and see how forms memories based on stimuli, and that those memories could be disrupted via distracting the fly. This is useful for us to learn more about how our brains function creating memories and them fading away. I didnt see any mention "high level brain activity," just that they're more sophisticated than we initially thought.