you can ask that an infinite amount of times
EDIT: it is not species bias. The very simple facts, like, animals struggle to learn even singular words from human language or their complete lack of neurological areas responsible for language generation and comprehension, are pretty much insurmountable for the "maybe we just don't get it" arguement
Originally posted by inimalist
you can ask that an infinite amount of timesEDIT: it is not species bias. The very simple facts, like, animals struggle to learn even singular words from human language or their complete lack of neurological areas responsible for language generation and comprehension, are pretty much insurmountable for the "maybe we just don't get it" arguement
It was a rhetorical question.
My point is simple, it is very difficult for animals to learn human language, but it is just as difficult for humans to learn dolphin. Intelligence put aside, couldn't there be a similarity to the fundamental structure of all mammals, that under the correct circumstances, naturally leads to language? The difference between human and other animal language is a product of the human language reaching a point of critical mass. There is a word for that, but I can't remember it right now. Where a complex system gains in complexity experimentally do to the fact of the level of complexity of the system. But now I am getting way over my own head. 😄
Originally posted by Shakyamunison
It was a rhetorical question.My point is simple, it is very difficult for animals to learn human language,
I don't think you appreciate the magnitude of this point then
if you are talking about an evolutionarily similar language acquisition process in all mammals, it would be almost certain that dogs would at least learn to comprehend human language.
This is because a human infant's brain is not specifically tuned to language or human voices (ok, maybe a bit, but not in a relevant way here), but rather to statistical frequencies of sounds following one another. any sounds, even computer generated gibberish.
So, if dogs had such a system searching for these patterns in sound, and given how frequently puppies are surrounded by language, it would be impossible for them not to understand a huge variety of common words. Given it takes months of intensive training to teach them a dozen, it is fairly obvious they don't have such a device.
The best evidence, however, comes from other great apes. It is true, that after years of intensive training, other great apes can be taught language abilities in sign or in symbollic forms. However, their is a peak to their abilities, and it comes to about that of a human child.
The long and short of it is that these creatures just don't have the language regions of the brains. Because apes do have a slightly analogous area (typically used for interpreting hand gestures from other apes) they can be taught some properties of it, but it is not something they do passively (humans do aquire language passively), nor is it something they do very well.
Originally posted by Shakyamunison
but it is just as difficult for humans to learn dolphin.
this isn't really true either. The way we know dolphins don't use a grammatically structured and infinitively generative system of communication (iirc, the 2 features of human language that differentiate it from other communication) is because we have studied it. We have people who can train and communicate with dolphins very efficently, there are people who have run sound frequency analyses of dolphin and whale sounds. These questions have been asked.
Now, dolphins do have an extremely complex form of communication involving audio signals, and it is highly unique to them. However, something being auditory and complex does not make it a language as comparable to human languages.
Originally posted by Shakyamunison
Intelligence put aside, couldn't there be a similarity to the fundamental structure of all mammals, that under the correct circumstances, naturally leads to language?
that is dangerously close to suggesting that evolution progresses toward some "human-like" end point.
There is nothing to suggest that extremely complex communication, such as that of insect colonies, would ever become a formal language. Human language is a byproduct of all of the specific evolutionary steps that it took to make humans, including our social behaviour, the shape and structure of our physical bodies, and certain capacities for long term abstract associations between states of being and objects in the world (assigning meaning to things through words).
imho, the only way that something would ever evolve human language would be if it faced the exact same evolutionary history as humans.
otherwise, there is nothing to suggest that a capacity for language is shared with all mammals, the lack of language centers in the brain is the best evidence of this.
Originally posted by Shakyamunison
The difference between human and other animal language is a product of the human language reaching a point of critical mass. There is a word for that, but I can't remember it right now. Where a complex system gains in complexity experimentally do to the fact of the level of complexity of the system. But now I am getting way over my own head. 😄
but the thing that differentiates language from other forms of communication is not its complexity.
It is a system of rules for generating new words from previous symbols (things like -ing, -ed, allowing one to generate an infinite number of words that all have meanings, verb conjugations for instance) and a system of grammar for arranging these words in a coherent form, such that there are an infinite number of sentences that can be formed (though as Chomsky pointed out, not all sentences need to be semantically coherent).
This is, at least, the psycholinguistic view, which, obviously, I feel is the most appropriate, as we are discussing behaviour
I'm going to refrain from jumping into the linguistic discussion beyond what I've talked about earlier. The biological implications are fascinating, but there's not much I can add to the topic that hasn't been mentioned. And there's not a whole lot of point revisiting my earlier topics involving the technical side of x-bar theories, since we've moved past that anyway.
To briefly touch on an earlier comment though, in, it's not the breadth of the language that annoys me about the English language. Just the spelling. I feel like we could assimilate numerous languages and traditions and still spell phonetically. I've literally have to teach aspects of spelling to some behind-the-curve high school students, and the places I've taught are far from the lower end of things. It's an educational hindrance, one that most other languages don't face.
In Italian, for example, there's a small number of exceptions to their spelling rules that are easily memorized at an early age. After that, no one needs to be taught spelling, because there aren't exceptions to the exceptions to the exceptions, etc. Teachers are handicapped by the diversity of the language, but phonetic spelling could correct the wrongs without sacrificing the diversity.
Originally posted by lil bitchiness
And all religious people are irrational?
lol. Somebody bit.
It was a joke, lil. I don't feel that way at all. I just needed a humorous way to steer us back on topic, since we've been away from religion entirely for a page or two.
It was also a subtle jab at a member who thought that my above post would be the gist of the entire thread. A quick perusal of the contents of this thread will reveal it is anything but. I've actually been quite pleased with the discussion here, from atheists and theists alike.
Originally posted by Digi
lol. Somebody bit.It was a joke, lil. I don't feel that way at all. I just needed a humorous way to steer us back on topic, since we've been away from religion entirely for a page or two.
It was also a subtle jab at a member who thought that my above post would be the gist of the entire thread. A quick perusal of the contents of this thread will reveal it is anything but. I've actually been quite pleased with the discussion here, from atheists and theists alike.
I just went on a site of Richard Dawkins and was amazed to find he was even more of a pompous prick than I previously suspected.
I saw your post and I was like ''noes! sjrg\ijrwsngjv\nsjrghjvk\s''
Originally posted by lil bitchiness
I just went on a site of Richard Dawkins and was amazed to find he was even more of a pompous prick than I previously suspected.I saw your post and I was like ''noes! sjrg\ijrwsngjv\nsjrghjvk\s''
😂
Dawkins IS a dick sometimes. Which is a shame, because he's can be brilliant too. He just sullies it constantly with his attitude.
But yeah, I'm not a prick. At least not usually.
😉
Dawkins is a brilliant biologist, simple as that. His incorporation of theology is at times fail. I'm not a fan, and that's coming from a student majoring in molecular bio.
As for Hitchens, I'm orthodox christian, but I'm a HUGE fan. Shame about the esophageal cancer. Probably less than a year to live? Looks like he's in the later stages of the cancer.
Originally posted by King Kandy
He's not bad. You should read Christopher Hitchens if you think Dawkins is negative towards the religious. And being about the #1 most hated atheist figure on earth would probably make anyone bitter.
At least Dawkins is an actual scientist who knows what's up, though.
Hitchens on the other hand is just a gossip columnist who decided to write an anti-religion book to make a quick buck.
---
Have you read What's So Great About Christianity by Dinesh D'souza? Its a rebuttal to all the Angry Atheist books that have come out in recent years.
Originally posted by Digi
Well, I'm not entirely amiable toward religion. Just the more moderate types who are, for all intents and purposes, secularists living under the guise of theism.
"Living under"? You feel like an oppressed outsider?
It's not like you're in Saudi Arabia.
Re: Atheism
Originally posted by Quiero Mota
What "guise"? They're pretending?
This:
Originally posted by Digi
...many Christians aren't practicing or devout, and they live secular lives for all practical purposes, but remain vaguely religious either out of apathy for truly investigating their beliefs or simply to stay with the social norm.
Not pretending. But if you truly (TRULY) believed God was real, you'd be ultra-religious 24/7. Most people never investigate their beliefs fully, are happy enough calling themselves Christian and paying lip service to their religion without ever really getting into. Christian in name only.
Perhaps 'guise' was the wrong word. Hopefully that gets my point across though. It's not most theists I have an issue with, it's headline theists that either create a society where the nonreligious feel ostracized, those who try to force their beliefs upon others, or those who create suffering in the world as a result of their beliefs.
Which relates back to this:
Originally posted by Digi
[b]2. Tolerance - I don't dislike or begrudge religion or the religious. I do shy away from a touchy-feely acceptance and tolerance of all religious beliefs, because there are many that I believe are harmful either on a societal/global level or individually to those who believe them. [/B]