Animal-Behaviour | Sebastian J. Spicker

2026

1 article

18 Oct 2026 Cats Adopted Us First The blurb for De Kai’s Raising AI says our artificial children “began adopting us”. Cats did that first, and the archaeological and genetic record of how they did it is a useful check on the parenting metaphor for AI. Moving in is not the same as being domesticated; selecting on one behaviour drags other traits along, though the famous fox evidence for this is contested; and the cat tuned its signals to us while we thought we were raising it. The cat is a precedent for living with an agent whose values nobody installed, and the way we manage it, by changing its costly wants without asking, is exactly what will not carry over to powerful AI. raising-machinesaicats