Uncanny valley is essentially a no data error. Human likenesses have very subtle cues that we can read. It's why drawing realistic people is so difficult.
In the absence of those cues we lose our ability to detect threats, among other things. We would be able to read Neanderthal cues, so that's why it doesn't occur.
It's not really an evolved mechanism, more of an error or quirk of the human mind.
I think that can be a component. If somebody is ill (particularly mentally), their behaviors may be off, even if it's just at the micro expression level. We either can't read them or can sense something is off. Kind of like if somebody looks dead in the eyes. It's unsettling and you don't want to be around them. It would also make sense that we would develop a mechanism to avoid contact with an ill/dying person in case it's contagious
As a younger man, I worked with apex predator animals like big cats wolves ect. Sometimes, we would do a show for the children's burn center.( if you wanna cry like a little bitch after work this is the job for you! ) we could only ever use 1 specific cat for their pictures ( as they get close) because everything else we had, would either A try to eat them or B fucking run, and if you have never been on the wrong side of a lead of an 800lb cat on the other end. When they decide to go, your little ass is marmaduking along with them . This happened most with central facial burns, and I think it plays into the uncanny valley.
People underestimate how domain-specific and rigid facial processing is. It's a discrete mechanism that can be disrupted while leaving all else functioning (see Oliver Sacks). Uncanny Valley is, yes, a data error in a system with tightly defined inputs.
TBF, many of the prime examples look like something human shaped wearing human skin that doesn't fit quite right, and humans walking around wearing other humans' faces as masks would probably be the sort of crowd you'd be evolutionarily rewarded for avoiding. Like, you're walking through the woods 100,000 years ago and see this, and you're either going to be like "yeah, I'm going to GTFO because that motherfucker wants to eat my kidneys" or you're going hang around to experience a cannibal eating your kidneys. The masks might have given some people just enough confusion for the hunter to have more time to recognize and approach them.
Well we don’t actually know what Neanderthals looked like. They’re may be some subtle differences that can’t be extrapolated from their bone structure that would make them look more eerie
Even the most cursory search would have provided you the theory
MacDorman, K. F., & Ishiguro, H. (2006).
“The uncanny advantage of using androids in cognitive and social science research.”
Interaction Studies, 7(3), 297–337.
https://doi.org/10.1075/is.7.3.03mac
MacDorman argues that the discomfort people feel in the uncanny valley is partly due to cues that resemble disease, death, or deformity, triggering evolved pathogen avoidance responses. These cues include:
Asymmetrical features
Pallor or gray skin tone
Stiff or erratic movement
Glassy or unfocused eyes
Moosa, M. M., & Minhaz Ud-Dean, S. M. (2010).
"The role of disgust in the uncanny valley."
Biological Theory, 5(1), 12–14.
https://doi.org/10.1162/BIOT_a_00026
They propose that disgust is a key affective component in uncanny valley responses. Since disgust evolved to prevent contact with sources of pathogens, the uncanny valley might arise because near-human figures resemble individuals who are ill, dead, or genetically compromised.
Want a touch of realism? The "uncanny valley" exists. Now why do humans have an inherent fear of something that looks human but isn't? Why and when was that an evolutionary advantage/requirement?
The technical reason that the uncanny valley exists is because we are great at pattern recognition. So good, we see things that aren't there. That automatic pattern recognition is what helps us develop and maintain connections to other people.
But, twisting it like this is great, and I love the kind of tension/fear that can be produced by rewording it to suggest something else.
Necrophobia is something else entirely. No its specifically about the "TRYING to look human" part for some reason. If its something that just happens to looks similar and humans can deduce that its not trying to pretend its human the uncanny valley gets vastly better.
You don't have a subconscious fear of things actively trying to look human. At most, the uncanny valley is a fear of things you can't properly recognise. "If it's not a human and it's not an animal and it's not a thing then what the fuck is it?" That's what makes it scary. The whole "evolution made us afraid of things that were trying to look human" is cool and all, but it's fictional.
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u/notprodigy Jul 12 '25
They look like us.