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Language Evolution & Animal Communication

Language Evolution & Animal Communication. Do animals have language?. They all communicate Stimulus-bound & instinctual , human language is complex Experiments to teach animals more complicated systems have a history of failure. Can you think of examples of animal communication?.

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Language Evolution & Animal Communication

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  1. Language Evolution & Animal Communication

  2. Do animals have language? • They all communicate • Stimulus-bound & instinctual, human language is complex • Experiments to teach animals more complicated systems have a history of failure.

  3. Can you think of examples of animal communication?

  4. Experiments on Animal Communication • 1930s Prof and Mrs. Kellogg, raised their infant son together with an infant chimpanzee named Gua. • Exact same upbringings, continuously exposed to speech.

  5. Gua understood 100 words at 16 months (more words than their son at that age) • Never went beyond that. • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCxf7yUDzio (2:31)

  6. Parrots can replicate • Knowledge up to 30 objects • But researchers conclude- not language

  7. Human language is specific because: • Can refer to things far removed in time and space. • Complex in its structure. Animal expression through sound reflects a series of emotional states. • Open-ended; it can develop and change, animal communication is closed

  8. The Origin of Language • Studied extensively by Biologists, anthropologists, psychologists, neurologists, and linguists • Did primitive man had the physiological capacity to speak? • Human vocal tract evolved from a non-human primate form to facilitate efficient communication. • Why did it evolve?

  9. David Attenborough on Language Evolution • Survival & hunting on the African plains required co-operation- language • Man developed tools to hunt with- archeological evidence shows learning over generations- language

  10. Evidence of Written Language • Cave paintings earliest evidence of written language • Oldest in Spain- 40 000 years • Ability to pass on information over generations

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