[PDF] Apes Language And The Human Mind eBook

Author : Sue Savage-Rumbaugh
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 255 pages
File Size : 15,58 MB
Release : 1998-06-18
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 0198026978

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Current primate research has yielded stunning results that not only threaten our underlying assumptions about the cognitive and communicative abilities of nonhuman primates, but also bring into question what it means to be human. At the forefront of this research, Sue Savage-Rumbaugh recently has achieved a scientific breakthrough of impressive proportions. Her work with Kanzi, a laboratory-reared bonobo, has led to Kanzi's acquisition of linguistic and cognitive skills similar to those of a two and a half year-old human child. Apes, Language, and the Human Mind skillfully combines a fascinating narrative of the Kanzi research with incisive critical analysis of the research's broader linguistic, psychological, and anthropological implications. The first part of the book provides a detailed, personal account of Kanzi's infancy, youth, and upbringing, while the second part addresses the theoretical, conceptual, and methodological issues raised by the Kanzi research. The authors discuss the challenge to the foundations of modern cognitive science presented by the Kanzi research; the methods by which we represent and evaluate the abilities of both primates and humans; and the implications which ape language research has for the study of the evolution of human language. Sure to be controversial, this exciting new volume offers a radical revision of the sciences of language and mind, and will be important reading for all those working in the fields of primatology, anthropology, linguistics, philosophy of mind, and cognitive and developmental psychology.

Author : E. Sue Savage-Rumbaugh
Publisher : New York : Oxford University Press
Page : 255 pages
File Size : 27,52 MB
Release : 1998
Category : Animal communication
ISBN : 0195109864

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Current primate research has yielded stunning results that not only threaten our underlying assumptions about the cognitive and communicative abilities of nonhuman primates, but also bring into question what it means to be human. At the forefront of this research, Sue Savage-Rumbaugh recently has achieved a scientific breakthrough of impressive proportions. Her work with Kanzi, a laboratory-reared bonobo, has led to Kanzi's acquisition of linguistic and cognitive skills similar to those of a two and a half year-old human child. Apes, Language, and the Human Mind skillfully combines a fascinating narrative of the Kanzi research with incisive critical analysis of the research's broader linguistic, psychological, and anthropological implications. The first part of the book provides a detailed, personal account of Kanzi's infancy, youth, and upbringing, while the second part addresses the theoretical, conceptual, and methodological issues raised by the Kanzi research. The authors discuss the challenge to the foundations of modern cognitive science presented by the Kanzi research; the methods by which we represent and evaluate the abilities of both primates and humans; and the implications which ape language research has for the study of the evolution of human language. Sure to be controversial, this exciting new volume offers a radical revision of the sciences of language and mind, and will be important reading for all those working in the fields of primatology, anthropology, linguistics, philosophy of mind, and cognitive and developmental psychology.

Author : Sue Savage-Rumbaugh
Publisher : Wiley
Page : 340 pages
File Size : 13,82 MB
Release : 1996-09-28
Category : Nature
ISBN : 9780471159599

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The remarkable story of a "talking" chimp, a leading scientist, and the profound insights they have uncovered about our species He has been featured in cover stories in Time, Newsweek, and National Geographic, and has been the subject of a "NOVA" documentary. He is directly responsible for discoveries that have forced the scientific community to recast its thinking about the nature of the mind and the origins of language. He is Kanzi, an extraordinary bonobo chimpanzee who has overturned the idea that symbolic language is unique to our species. This is the moving story of how Kanzi learned to converse with humans and the profound lessons he has taught us about our animal cousins, and ourselves. ". . . The underlying thesis is informative and well argued . . . Savage-Rumbaugh's results are impressive." — The Washington Post "This popular, absorbing, and controversial account is recommended." — Library Journal

Author : Herbert S. Terrace
Publisher : Columbia University Press
Page : 250 pages
File Size : 24,97 MB
Release : 2019-10-01
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN : 0231550014

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In the 1970s, the behavioral psychologist Herbert S. Terrace led a remarkable experiment to see if a chimpanzee could be taught to use language. A young ape, named “Nim Chimpsky” in a nod to the linguist whose theories Terrace challenged, was raised by a family in New York and instructed in American Sign Language. Initially, Terrace thought that Nim could create sentences but later discovered that Nim’s teachers inadvertently cued his signing. Terrace concluded that Project Nim failed—not because Nim couldn’t create sentences but because he couldn’t even learn words. Language is a uniquely human quality, and attempting to find it in animals is wishful thinking at best. The failure of Project Nim meant we were no closer to understanding where language comes from. In this book, Terrace revisits Project Nim to offer a novel view of the origins of human language. In contrast to both Noam Chomsky and his critics, Terrace contends that words, as much as grammar, are the cornerstones of language. Retracing human evolution and developmental psychology, he shows that nonverbal interaction is the foundation of infant language acquisition, leading up to a child’s first words. By placing words and conversation before grammar, we can, for the first time, account for the evolutionary basis of language. Terrace argues that this theory explains Nim’s inability to acquire words and, more broadly, the differences between human and animal communication. Why Chimpanzees Can’t Learn Language and Only Humans Can is a masterful statement of the nature of language and what it means to be human.

Author : Kristin Andrews
Publisher : MIT Press
Page : 307 pages
File Size : 31,93 MB
Release : 2012-07-20
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 0262017555

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Andrews argues for a pluralistic folk psychology that employs different kinds of practices and different kinds of cognitive tools (including personality trait attribution, stereotype activation, inductive reasoning about past behavior, and generalization from self) that are involved in our folk psychological practices.

Author : Sue Savage-Rumbaugh
Publisher : Turner Publishing Company
Page : 277 pages
File Size : 24,69 MB
Release : 1996-09-01
Category : Nature
ISBN : 1620459086

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The remarkable story of a "talking" chimp, a leading scientist, and the profound insights they have uncovered about our species He has been featured in cover stories in Time, Newsweek, and National Geographic, and has been the subject of a "NOVA" documentary. He is directly responsible for discoveries that have forced the scientific community to recast its thinking about the nature of the mind and the origins of language. He is Kanzi, an extraordinary bonobo chimpanzee who has overturned the idea that symbolic language is unique to our species. This is the moving story of how Kanzi learned to converse with humans and the profound lessons he has taught us about our animal cousins, and ourselves. " . . . The underlying thesis is informative and well argued . . . Savage-Rumbaugh's results are impressive." — The Washington Post "This popular, absorbing, and controversial account is recommended." — Library Journal

Author : Juan Carlos Gómez
Publisher :
Page : 360 pages
File Size : 14,94 MB
Release : 2004-06-30
Category : Psychology
ISBN :

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In this fascinating introduction to primate minds, Gómez identifies evolutionary resemblances—and differences—between human children and other primates. He argues that primate minds are best understood not as fixed collections of specialized cognitive capacities, but instead as a range of abilities that can surpass their original adaptations.

Author : Duane M. Rumbaugh
Publisher : Yale University Press
Page : 344 pages
File Size : 46,32 MB
Release : 2008-10-01
Category : Psychology
ISBN : 0300129351

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What is animal intelligence? In what ways is it similar to human intelligence? Many behavioral scientists have realized that animals can be rational, can think in abstract symbols, can understand and react to human speech, and can learn through observation as well as conditioning many of the more complicated skills of life. Now Duane Rumbaugh and David Washburn probe the mysteries of the animal mind even further, identifying an advanced level of animal behavior—emergents—that reflects animals’ natural and active inclination to make sense of the world. Rumbaugh and Washburn unify all behavior into a framework they call Rational Behaviorism and present it as a new way to understand learning, intelligence, and rational behavior in both animals and humans. Drawing on years of research on issues of complex learning and intelligence in primates (notably rhesus monkeys, chimpanzees, and bonobos), Rumbaugh and Washburn provide delightful examples of animal ingenuity and persistence, showing that animals are capable of very creative solutions to novel challenges. The authors analyze learning processes and research methods, discuss the meaningful differences across the primate order, and point the way to further advances, enlivening theoretical material about primates with stories about their behavior and achievements.