[sctb]

I don't have access to the full text, but based on the abstract I think it's likely that I relate to this phenomenon (I am autistic).

My experience is not so much the attribution of human characteristics to non-human objects, but I understand why this might be the only accessible language of expression. For me, if a useful object is damaged or otherwise loses its usefulness through neglect or malice, I experience something like an emotional response. A good example would be a dull knife. There's something "sad" about an object whose nature or purpose it is to be sharp to lose or lack that sharpness.

Or perhaps a more subtle example would be a room whose contents are haphazard or in disarray. In that situation I would sense a lack of care or attention and there might be an emotional feeling that these objects had not been respected or appreciated.

It's (usually) easy for most people to care about other people. It's a little less easy, though still pretty common, for people to care about animals. The further away from recognizably human you get, the less people seem to care: e.g. insects, plants, bacteria, viruses, etc. For me there is something that "scales" down all the way to inanimate objects.

[soulofmischief]

I like the Japanese concept of Tsukumogami[0], where certain objects that live to be 100 years old become imbued with a soul.

It's easy to get sentimental over neglected things because I seem to have an innate appreciation and sense of duty toward objects that are designed to help people. It only seems fair that the contract includes care and maintenance from the user.

I live in an aging neighborhood and weep for some of these homes. I visited an abandoned unit just this weekend and went through the spectrum of sadness and anger that such a beautiful building had been allowed to fall into such disrepair. The unit was unsafe to live in, the foundation is cracking in two, one wall has a crack so large that you can see the outside and in several places, the floor is close to caving in. But the outside of the building is so nice. :(

We just bought a house in the neighborhood that is in mostly good shape considering its owners were older and lived there for over 20 years. I look forward to shaping her up, replacing the roof, refinishing the floors, repairing the foundation, fixing some water damage, etc. She's a great little home and it pains me to see her not at her best.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tsukumogami

[astrobe_]

Yes, Tsukumogami is I believe an instance of animism [1].

AFAIK I am not affected by autism, but I distinctly remember when as a child I refused to eat something because that thing didn't "want" to be eaten. I guess that from my parent's perspective, it was just their child's whim-of-the-day.

But that memory makes me think that animism is something natural - perhaps some sort "bug" in the system that make us attribute intentions [2] to others.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animism [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_mind_in_animals#Attr...

[supriyo-biswas]

Thank you for sharing your experience.

I remember a similar experience as a child when I started crying because my dad would pop a balloon; because I believed that it was not meant to be burst and asked him to repair it afterwards.

I can now take some comfort in the fact that I was not in fact, too weird :)

[WesolyKubeczek]

> I like the Japanese concept of Tsukumogami[0], where certain objects that live to be 100 years old become imbued with a soul.

I feel like cars tend to do it much, much sooner, given how short their life is. :-)

My personal and private belief is that once I have owned an item for a while, I give it a portion of my own soul. The "personality" doesn't have to match mine, or have any desirable traits, but it is there, it is because I am, and I'm shaping the thing by my own usage patterns.

[steve_adams_86]

I relate to this easily. My family finds it so strange that I can look at a flat tire and say something like "aw, poor thing". And I'm half-joking, yet... Well, it gives me an emotional response. I think a lot of people can relate to that example in particular because there is a sort of 'deflated' sense of self most people can experience, but not so much with the dull knife or a rock being split in half.

Something I found which coincides somewhat well with what you're saying: it seems like a disproportionate number of vegans are not neurotypical. I'm mostly plant-based because I can't separate animals from humans enough. It feels wrong to eat them. Not that I lower humans to animal level, though. I raise animals, or the hierarchy is flatter. I also find insects so much more amazing—and neurologically salient I suppose—than virtually everyone I know. Yet in the isopod collecting hobby, you'll find plenty of people who love insects and arachnids and so on, and they seem to lean towards neurodivergence as well.

[metalman]

my recent experience as an adept tool user/maker and repairer of all things mundane is that my emotional response is sufficient and planing or thinking about what I am doing isn't realy ressesary...unless it's something potentialy dangerous or deadly I am doing, and then I mainly stay out of gravitys way and/or any line of potential failure involving a lot of mass and torque living in a rural maritime area, many objects are personified and gendered, mostly female here,but the pennsylvania side of the family says "he's a good truck!" which is completely different from outport fisherfolk who refer to anything manufactured as a machine, "bring me that blue machine der you" refering to a plastic bucket, which was a common attitude in pre industrial societies that were rubbing up against the manufactured world, where everything in there world was personified by the person (who they know) who made it echos of this, everywhere diagnosible now....

[tetromino_]

> A good example would be a dull knife. There's something "sad" about an object whose nature or purpose it is to be sharp to lose or lack that sharpness.

Interesting - I think you've just explained "Tear-Water Tea" [1] (Arnold Lobel's classic childrens story) for me.

[1] https://archive.org/details/Tear-waterTea-English-ArnoldLobe...

[AnthonyMouse]

> It's (usually) easy for most people to care about other people. It's a little less easy, though still pretty common, for people to care about animals. The further away from recognizably human you get, the less people seem to care

I think this also explains a lot about how normal people behave. They not only care mostly about humans but mostly about their tribe. The operation of some system which is designed to protect everyone is only important when it's protecting their own people and can be disregarded when that isn't the case. Whereas people whose empathy extends past their own walls can feel a harm to the whole society when that happens.

Even now I'm sure there are people reading this and thinking "yes, the other tribe does that all the time! They're such hypocrites!" But that's the easy one. The hard thing is to recognize it and stop it when you're doing it.

[thayne]

I relate to that. I wouldn't say I attribute human characteristics to non-human objects, but I definitely feel emotional distress when I see objects destroyed harmed, throw away, etc.

For me, I think a big part of it is a sense of waste or lost potential. If the object hadn't been broken, it could have had longer useful life, and it upsets me that that was cut short.

[michaelg7x]

I don't find this surprising at all. Humans are tool-users, and valuing an object's utility and experiencing a feeling of something like loss when it's neglected or loses efficacy would seem to be an advantageous trait.

[thinkingemote]

For me, even software running on devices can make the device "content" or "unhappy". It's like the software is in line with how the silicon wants to be. Its not design, it's something deeper. Like a kind of flow state for bits.

One large scale example could be linux vs windows on a server. Linux seems to be more attuned to how the system wants to run. With reflection this might be me combining anthropomorphising and my own prejudices and likes and biases with a projection of my personality onto the software.

But I remember certain Windows applications felt they run better than others - even ones with worse design or that were proprietary. With more consideration this might be when computers had visual blinking LEDs and audible HD clicks and subliminal capacitor whine. If that's the case then in my feeling, software that made conservative use of CPU and HD beyond looking nice might be "happier" than more popular applications.

Writing the above I'm reminded of Terry Davis's TempleOS but I'm not sure what to make of that feeling!

[moffkalast]

This doesn't sound exclusive to autistic people to me at all, more like normal human behaviour. Though I would imagine the average person is more likely to get angry about the dull knife for wasting their time.

[QuantumGood]

I remember in the 1990's when I felt very strongly that in chess, rook pawns could be advanced far more often than they were in Grandmaster games. And in recent years modern computers confirm that (it has been called "the rook pawn revolution"). Looking back on it a bit later, I realized I had no logical, left-brain systems support for it, only one of the strongest "systems" feelings I can remember ever having. I also grew up on the spectrum, with a side of moderately severe anxiety disorder, and extreme difficulty sleeping.

[LoganDark]

I agree, it's more like empathy for objects directly rather than assigning human anything to objects. For instance, I don't perceive objects as human, honestly if I can help it I don't even perceive humans as human. I have empathy for concepts that have nothing to do with humanity or with assigning things humanity or human characteristics. Nothing I do or feel is human-centric. I don't even identify human myself (I am otherkin)

[jacinabox]

Oh dang, so the others do walk among us?

[LoganDark]

Hehe :) in that sense I'm not sure if I exist in the physical world at all. It's more of an in-my-head thing. I perceive the outer body as entirely separate from my actual self. Maybe that's due to my dissociative disorder, I dunno for sure.

[cogman10]

Here's where you can find the full paper.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/326979070_Object_pe...

It's pretty short and was basically just a survey monkey survey of ~100 people (400 total) who report having autism.

[amelius]

I don't know but maybe it helps if you try to look at things from the other perspective.

For example in your dull knife example, maybe you could think: "the knife can now be happy because it doesn't need to be so dangerous anymore and it can make friends with the other cutlery in the drawer"

It sounds silly, buy maybe it helps.

[tudorw]

Are you familiar with Shinto, you might enjoy the perspective.

[layer8]

Object personification is if you would feel that the knife itself is sad, is hurting, etc., and you’d feel for it. If, on the other hand, you’re just sad yourself that the knife is dull, because that’s not how a knife is supposed to be, then that’s not personifying the knife, it’s more an aesthetic judgement about a state of affairs. Similarly for the room example. You feel emotional about the state of affairs that other people haven’t respected it, but you don’t think the room itself is emotional about it.

Another example is if one is sad that a favorite software or service has become enshittified. One doesn’t attribute emotion to the software or service itself, rather one feels emotional about the state the software or service is in.

Those are completely neurotypical emotional reactions.

[sctb]

It's hard to convey precisely what I mean, of course, but to try to clarify further I would say the emotion is experienced on behalf of the object itself in a direct way that does not involve my personal sense of self. I do not mind a dull knife at all, I feel no personal emotion in that sense. Either I sharpen it because it's mine or not. That's neutral.

So it's much closer to object personification because it's the same mechanism by which I empathize with other people, animals, etc. In my description I've tried to generalize because to me it's not accurate to say that I feel the knife is sad, but the experience is almost as if that were the case.