Is this phenomenon prevalent in any other species?
In: Earth Science
We are afraid of these creatures because they can kill us. It’s really as simple as that.
Rats eat human babies. They also eat human adults if you’re too insensate to wake up when they bite you. If you look through hospital records, “rat bite” is one of the most common cause of lost fingers and toes among the homeless and alcoholic population in areas that also have huge rat populations – like New York. We are programmed to fear these creatures so that we get up and chase them away from our infants, our elderly, our defenceless, and ourselves.
Rats are a lovely example because they’re so extreme, but all small creatures that invoke that fear response are similarly dangerous. Cockroaches spread disease. Spiders are venomous. Mice decimate food supplies and spread disease, and also don’t mind chewing on you if you stay still long enough.
Apparently elephants are scared of mice… but the reason we innately fear rodents and cockroaches is because they frequently spoil or contaminate our food stores. They also in plague situations destroy crops and eat considerable amounts of stored grain. [In my state ](https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/mice-holes-everywhere-the-plague-threatening-our-farmers-summer-crop-20210207-p5708q.html) for example they are bating for mice in the hope to **limit** losses to 100kg/hectare (220lb/11,960 square yards or 0.3 ounce/yard^2 or a bit over a heaped teaspoon of sugar) which given most farms are measured in 100’s and 1000’s of hectares is a lot to be the minimum you hope to lose.
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Are people actually afraid of getting hurt by them or is that they find them to be disgusting? For lost I’ve seen, the fear of things like lizards and rats are different from the fear of things like scorpions and centipedes.
I’m not afraid of roaches, I just don’t want the damn things running in me. The sensation feels incredibly uncomfortable.
Evolution. Just because you can beat them in a fight, doesn’t mean they can’t kill you. We’re afraid of animals that can kill us. You’re afraid of rats and roaches for the exact same reason you’re afraid of a grizzly bear.
Rats and roaches carry disease. Spiders and snakes are venomous. Mice and locusts eat all your food and/or spoil the local water by dying in it.
Consider two people: One of them avoids all these poisonous and/or disease-carrying animals, and kills them whenever they can. The other doesn’t care and lives among them. If person A has even *slightly* greater chance of being *slightly* healthier, over a million years this avoidance of those animals will be advantageous and will be selected for until it’s common in the population.
Jesus I’m a dark person but I was gonna say they are creepy, literally they creep up on us.
We’re scared of them because they’re unpredictable. I read that somewhere and believed it for years. Like when you startle them or they’re scared and they run towards you in a frenzy. Otherwise they hide only to emerge at night when you’re most vulnerable.
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