The first step in unraveling the puzzle of the origin of human consciousness is to determine what distinguishes our mental processes from those of other creatures.
By Mark Hauser
לא מזמן ירדו לכדור הארץ שלושה חוצנים כדי לאמוד את מצב החיים התבוניים בעולם. אחד התמחה בהנדסה, אחד בכימיה, ואחד בחישוביות. פנה המהנדס אל רעיו ואמר (לפניכם התרגום): "כל היצורים כאן הם מוצקים, חלקם מפרקיים, ובעלי יכולת לנוע ביבשה, במים ובאוויר. כולם אטיים להחריד. הם אינם מרשימים." אחריו אמר הכימאי: "כולם דומים למדי, בנויים מרצפים שונים של ארבעה מרכיבים כימיים." ואז תרם את דעתו המומחה לחישוביות: "יכולת חישוב מוגבלת. אבל אחד מהם, הדו-רגלי חסר השיער, אינו דומה לאחרים. הוא מחליף מידע באופן פרימיטיבי ולא-יעיל, אבל באופן שונה מאוד מן האחרים. הוא מייצר עצמים שונים ומשונים לרוב, מהם אכילים, מהם מפיקים סמלים, ומהם משמידים את בני שבטו."
"אבל איך זה ייתכן?" תהה המהנדס. "אם הם דומים בצורה ובכימיה, איך זה שיכולת החישוב שלהם שונה?" "אני לא בטוח," התוודה החוצן החישובאי. "אבל נראה שיש להם מנגנון ליצירת ביטויים חדשים שהוא חזק לאין ערוך משל כל היצורים החיים האחרים. אני מציע שנסווג את הדו-רגל חסר השיער בקבוצה נפרדת מבעלי החיים האחרים, כבעל מוצא שונה ובן גלקסיה אחרת." שני החוצנים האחרים הנהנו, וכל השלושה מיהרו הביתה להגיש את הדוח.
Our outside reviewers cannot be blamed for classifying man in a separate group from the bees, birds, beavers, baboons and chimpanzees. Isn't it just our species that produces souffle, computers, guns, make-up, plays, operas, statues, equations, laws and religions. The bees and baboons, not only had they never made a soufflé, they had never even thought of the possibility. They simply do not have the brains endowed with the technological know-how and gastronomic creativity necessary for this.
צ'ארלס דרווין, בספרו "מוצא האדם" שראה אור ב-1871, טען כי ההבדל בין התודעה האנושית לבין שכלם של היצורים האחרים הוא הבדל של "דרגה, לא של סוג." דעה זו, הנתמכת במחקרים גנטיים שמצאו בשנים האחרונות כי אנו חולקים כ-98% מן הגנים שלנו עם השימפנזים, מקובלת על המדענים זה שנים רבות. אך אם מורשתנו הגנטית המשותפת אכן מעידה על מקורה האבולוציוני של התודעה האנושית, אז מדוע שימפנזה אינו כותב המאמר הזה, או שר את שירי "האבנים המתגלגלות" או מכין סופלה? אכן, הראיות המצטברות מלמדות כי, שלא כתיאוריה של דרווין על המשכיות התודעה מן האדם למינים אחרים, יש פער עמוק בין האינטלקט שלנו לזה של בעלי החיים. אין זה כדי לומר שהכישורים המנטליים שלנו הגיחו בשלמותם משום מקום. אמנם כמה מאבני הבניין של ההכרה האנושית נמצאו גם במינים אחרים, אך אין הן אלא אפס קצהו של המבנה האדיר המהווה את התודעה האנושית. המקורות האבולוציוניים של כישורינו השכליים עדיין לוטים בערפל. ואולם, תובנות וטכנולוגיות ניסוי חדשניות מתחילות להבהיר את התמונה.
Smart like us
If we scientists ever want to discover how human consciousness came to be, we must first clarify for ourselves what distinguishes it from that of other creatures. Although humans share most of their genes with chimpanzees, it seems that small genetic changes that have occurred in the human lineage since it split from the chimpanzee lineage have caused huge differences in computational ability. Reorganization, deletion, and copying of universal genetic elements created a brain with four special features. These distinct characteristics, which I have recently defined based on research conducted in my lab and elsewhere, together create what I call humaniqueness, or human uniqueness.
הראשונה בתכונות האלה היא החישוביות המחוֹללת. היכולת ליצור מגוון "ביטויים" אינסופי לכל דבר: מערכי מילים, רצפי תווים, צירופי פעולות, או מחרוזות של סמלים מתמטיים. חישוב מחולל כולל שני סוגי פעולות: פעולה מעגלית (רקורסיבית) ופעולה מצרפת (קומבינטורית). הפעולה המעגלית עושה שימוש חוזר בכללים כדי ליצור ביטויים חדשים. תנו דעתכם על כך שאפשר לשבץ ביטוי קצר בתוך ביטוי אחר, שוב ושוב, וליצור כך תיאורים ארוכים ועשירים יותר של מחשבותינו – לדוגמה, המשפט הפשוט אך הפיוטי של גרטרוד שטיין: "ורד הוא ורד הוא ורד." הפעולה המצרפת עושה שימוש ביסודות בדידים ומשלבת אותם ליצירת רעיונות חדשים, שאותם אפשר לבטא כמילים חדשות ("בית ספר"), כמבנים מוסיקליים, או במגוון דרכים נוספות.
The second feature that distinguishes the human mind is our ability to match ideas casually. We tend to combine thoughts from different fields of knowledge, with our insights on art, sex, space, causality and friendship intertwining. This fusion sometimes brings up new laws, technologies and social relations, as for example when we decide that it is forbidden [the domain of morality] to intentionally push a person [the domain of motor activity] [the domain of folk psychology] under the wheels of a speeding train [the domain of objects] in order to save their life [the domain of morality] of five [the field of numbers] other human beings.
Third on my list of essential features is the use of mental symbols. We can spontaneously transform any sensory experience - real or imaginary - into a symbol, which we can keep to ourselves, or share with others through language, art, music or computer code.
Fourth, only humans think abstract thinking. Unlike the thoughts of animals, which are anchored mainly in sensory and perceptual experiences, our own thoughts do not, in many cases, have a clear connection to such events. Only we alone think of dragons and extraterrestrials, nouns and verbs, infinity and God.
Although anthropologists differ in their opinions on the exact time when modern human consciousness took shape, archaeological findings clearly indicate that within a short evolutionary period a considerable change took place, which began about 800,000 years ago, in the Paleolithic period, and which reached its peak about 45,000 to 50,000 years ago. In this period, no more than an evolutionary blink of an eye, multi-part tools are seen for the first time; pierced animal bones for use as musical instruments; Burial of a person next to accessories indicating beliefs related to aesthetics and the afterlife; Cave paintings are rich in symbols that describe in detail events from the past and the foreseeable future; and control of fire, a technology that combines folk elements of physics and psychology, which gave our ancestors the ability to successfully cope with new environments by producing heat and cooking food to make it edible.
These relics from our past are glorious reminders of how our ancestors faced new environmental problems and struggled to express themselves in new and creative ways to express their cultural identities. However, the archaeological evidence will forever remain silent as to the origins and environmental pressures that led to the four components that make up our human uniqueness. The magnificent cave paintings in Lascaux in France, for example, imply that our ancestors understood the dual nature of images - that they are both objects and represent objects and events at the same time. But they do not reveal whether those painters and their admirers expressed their aesthetic preferences about these works of art through symbols organized into grammatical groups (nouns, verbs, adjectives), or whether they thought that these ideas could be equally expressed in sounds or signs - according to the correctness of their sensory systems. Similarly, the ancient musical instruments found, such as 35,000-year-old bone and ivory flutes, do not tell a story about their use, if they were repeatedly played a handful of single notes, in the style of Philip Glass, or if the composer conceived in his imagination, like Wagner, themes within circularly integrated themes .
What we can say with complete confidence is that all human beings, from the hunter-gatherers of the African savannah to the traders on Wall Street, are born with the four elements of human uniqueness. But combining these ingredients into a recipe for creating a culture varies greatly from group to group. Among the different human cultures there are differences in language, musical compositions, morals and objects. From the perspective of one culture, the customs of another culture are often strange, sometimes repulsive, in many cases incomprehensible, and occasionally immoral. No other animal exhibits such diversity in its lifestyles. In this view, chimpanzees are cultural failures.
But chimpanzees and other animals are still interesting and relevant to understanding the origin of human consciousness. In fact, only if they decipher which abilities we share with other animals and which are ours alone can scientists hope to add the pieces of information to the story of the emergence of human uniqueness.
A Beautiful Mind
כשהייתה בתי הצעירה, סופיה, בת שלוש, שאלתי אותה מנין באות המחשבות שלנו. היא הצביעה על ראשה ואמרה: "המוח שלי." הוספתי ושאלתי אם לבעלי חיים יש מוח, כלבים וקופים תחילה, ואז ציפורים ודגים. היא אמרה כן. כששאלתי אותה על הנמלה שטיילה למרגלותינו, היא אמרה: "לא, היא קטנה מדי." אנו, המבוגרים, יודעים שהגודל אינו יכול לשמש מדד לקיומו של מוח, אף כי הוא משפיע על היבטים שונים של מבנה המוח וכתוצאה מכך על כמה מהיבטי החשיבה. מחקרים הראו כי רוב הסוגים השונים של תאי המוח, על שליחיהם הכימיים, מופיעים בכל מיני החולייתנים, כולל בני האדם. יותר מזה, הארגון הכללי של המבנים השונים בשכבות החיצוניות של המוח דומה מאוד בקופים, בקופי אדם ובבני אדם. במילים אחרות, לבני האדם יש כמה מאפייני מוח משותפים עם מינים אחרים. ההבדלים ניכרים בגודל היחסי של אזורים מסוימים של קליפת המוח ובחיבורים שבין האזורים האלה, הבדלים שמהם נובעות מחשבות שאין דומה להן בכל רחבי ממלכת החי.
Even among the animals one can find sophisticated behaviors, which seem to foreshadow some of our abilities. Take, for example, the ability to create or modify objects for certain needs. The male woodpecker builds magnificent architectural structures and decorates them with feathers, leaves, buttons and the color of crushed berries to attract the female. New Caledonian crows carve sticks from branches to catch insects. Chimpanzees have been observed using pointed wooden sticks to impale tiny primates hiding in tree crevices.
Moreover, studies of some animals have revealed that they have an intuitive understanding of physical laws, which allows them to make generalizations beyond their direct experience to create new solutions when exposed to unfamiliar challenges in the laboratory. In one of the experiments, orangutans and chimpanzees were given a plastic cylinder with a peanut on the bottom. They obtained the coveted delicacy by sipping water and spitting it into the cylinder, until the peanut floated on the surface of the water and reached their reach.
בעלי חיים מראים גם התנהגויות חברתיות דומות להתנהגויות של בני אדם. נמלים ותיקות מוסרות את הידע לתלמידות חדשות על ידי הכוונתן אל אתרי מזון. סוריקטות מעבירות לגוריהן שיעורים באמנות הביתור של עקרבים קטלניים אך ערבים לחך. שפע מחקרים הראו כי בעלי חיים רבים ושונים, כמו כלבי בית, קופי קפוצ'ין ושימפנזים, מוחים על חלוקת מזון לא הוגנת ומפגינים התנהגות שכלכלנים מכנים בשם "סלידה מאי צדק". יותר מזה, יש בעלי חיים המטפלים בגורים או מחפשים בני זוג או שותפים לקואליציה. הם נכונים בהחלט להגיב למצבים חברתיים חדשים, כמו למשל כשפרט ממעמד נחות הניחן במיומנות ייחודית זוכה בשל כך להטבות מפרטים בעלי מעמד שליט.
תצפיות כאלה מעוררות רטט של השתאות נוכח יופיים של פתרונות המו"פ של הטבע. אך בחלוף הרטט, עלינו לעמוד על הפער שבין בני האדם ובין המינים האחרים, פער עצום ורחב, כפי שדיווחו החוצנים שלנו. כדי להמחיש את ממדיו של הפער הזה ואת הקושי שבפענוח חידת היווצרו, אתאר את הייחודיות האנושית ביתר פירוט.
great abyss
One of our most basic tools, the No. 2 pencil, used by everyone ever tested, demonstrates the extraordinary freedom of human consciousness compared to the limitations of animal cognition. You hold the painted wood, write in graphite and erase with the pink eraser fixed in the metal hoop. Four different materials, each with a special function, all combined in a single tool. And even though this tool was created for writing, it can also be used to gather hair into a bun, mark a page in a book or stab an annoying insect. Animal tools, on the other hand - like the sticks used by chimpanzees to fish termites from their hangings - are made of a single material, serve a single purpose and are never used for other purposes. Not a single one of them has the combined properties of the pencil. Another simple tool, the folding telescopic mug found in many camping kits, is an example of circularity in action. To produce this device, the manufacturer only needs to program a simple rule - add a larger segment to the previous segment - and repeat the operation until the desired size is achieved. Humans use circular actions like this in every aspect of mental life, from language, music and mathematics to producing an unlimited variety of movements with our legs, hands and mouth. The faint circular flashes in animals, on the other hand, are observed only in the action of their motor systems.
All creatures are endowed with circular motor mechanisms as part of their basic operating equipment. To walk, they put one foot in front of another, over and over. To eat, they may grab a food item and bring it to their mouth repeatedly until their stomach signals to stop. In animals, this circuit system is locked in the motor areas of the brain, without access to other brain areas. Its existence implies that a critical step in the formation of our unique thinking was not the evolution of circularity as an innovative form of calculation but its release from the motor prison into other areas of thinking. The way we got out of this limited function connects to one of our other features - mixed interfaces - which I will talk about right away.
The mental chasm widens when we compare human languages to communication in other species. Like other animals, humans have a non-verbal communication system that conveys our feelings and the factors that motivate us - the giggles and cries of small babies are part of this system. But only humans have a linguistic communication system based on the use of mental symbols and their processing. We classify each symbol into a specific, abstract category such as a noun, verb, or adjective. Although there are animals that make sounds that probably represent more than emotions, and convey information about objects and events such as food, sexual activity, and the presence of a predator, the range of these sounds pales in comparison to ours, and none of them belong to the abstract categories from which our linguistic expression is built.
טענה זו מצריכה הבהרה, מכיוון שהיא מעוררת ספקנות רבה. אפשר לחשוב, למשל, שאוצר המילים של בעלי חיים נראה קטן כי החוקרים הלומדים את התקשורת שלהם אינם מבינים על מה הם מדברים. אף שיש למדענים ללמוד הרבה על קולותיהם של בעלי החיים, ועל תקשורת באופן כללי יותר, אני סבור שאין די בזה להסביר את הפער הגדול. חילופי הצלילים בין בעלי חיים מסתכמים, בדרך כלל, בנהמה, או בהמיה, או בצווחה יחידה מכל צד. ייתכן שנהמה באורך של 500 מילישניות תכיל מידע רב – נאמר, משהו כמו "גרד לי בשיפולי הגב עכשיו, ואני אגרד לך בחזרה אחר כך." אך מדוע אפוא פיתחנו אנו, בני האדם, מערכת מורכבת כל כך ועתירת מילים אם יכולנו לפתור הכול בנהמה או שתיים?
Moreover, even if we agree that the bee's dance symbolically represents the delicious pollen two miles north of the hive, and that the various warning calls of the white-nosed gardener symbolize different predators, these uses of symbols differ from ours in five different ways: what evokes them is always objects or actual events, never imaginary; They are limited to the present; They are not part of a more abstract system of classification, like the one that sorts our words into nouns, verbs, and adjectives; They are almost never combined with other symbols, and if so, the combinations are limited to a string of two, with no rules; And they are fixed to certain contexts.
Human language is special and completely different from the communication systems of other animals also in its adaptation to two modes of action, auditory and visual, in equal measure. A songbird that loses its voice or a bee that loses its ability to dance will not be able to continue communicating. But for a deaf person, sign language is an effective means of communication and has a structural complexity just like using voice.
Our linguistic knowledge, with the calculations it requires, also works with other fields of knowledge in fascinating ways that beautifully reflect our unique human ability to make wild connections between systems of understanding. Think about the ability to quantify objects and events, an ability we share with other animals. A wide variety of species have at least two non-linguistic abilities to count. One is exact and limited to numbers smaller than four. The other is not limited in range, but is approximated and limited to certain number ratios: an animal that can distinguish between one and two, for example, can also distinguish between two and four, between 16 and 32, and so on. The first system is anchored in the area of the brain that deals with tracking details, while the second is anchored in the areas of the brain where computers grow.
ב-2008 תיארנו, עמיתיי ואני, שיטת ספירה שלישית בקופי רזוס, כזו שעשויה לסייע לנו להבין את מקורות היכולת האנושית להבחין בהבדל בין יחיד לרבים. מערכת זו פועלת כשקבוצה של עצמים מוצגים במקביל – בניגוד לעצמים יחידים המוצגים בזה אחר זה – ומאפשרת לקופי רזוס להבחין בין פריט מזון אחד לפריטים רבים, אך לא בין רבים לרבים. בניסוי שלנו, הראינו לקוף רזוס תפוח אחד והנחנו אותו בקופסה. לאחר מכן הראינו לאותו הקוף חמישה תפוחים והנחנו את כל החמישה בבת אחת בקופסה שנייה. כשנתנו לו לבחור, העדיף הקוף תמיד את קופסה השנייה, שבה חמישה תפוחים. ואז הנחנו שני תפוחים בקופסה אחת וחמישה באחרת. במקרה זה לא הראה הקוף העדפה קבועה. אנו, בני האדם, עושים אותו הדבר, בעצם, כשאנו אומרים "תפוח אחד" ו"שלושה, חמישה או מאה תפוחים."
אך משהו יוצא דופן קורה כשהמערכת הלשונית של האדם מתחברת אל מערכת התפיסה הקדומה הזאת. כדי לראות זאת, נסו את התרגיל הזה: למספרים 0, 0.2 ו-5-, הוסיפו את המילה המתאימה ביותר: "תפוח" או "תפוחים". רובנו, ובכלל זה ילדים קטנים, נבחר במילה "תפוחים". למעשה, נבחר ב"תפוחים" גם בשביל "1.0". אם אתם מופתעים, אכן, מן הראוי שתהיו. זה איננו כלל שלמדנו בבית הספר – למעשה, אם לדייק, אין זה נכון מבחינה דקדוקית. אך זה חלק מן הדקדוק האוניברסלי שרק אנחנו נולדים אתו. הכלל הוא פשוט אך מופשט: כל דבר שאיננו "1" הוא רבים.
The example of the apple illustrates how different systems - syntax and group perception - work together to create new ways of thinking or conceptualizing the world. But the creative process in humans does not stop here. We apply our language and number systems in cases of morality (it is better to save five people than to save one), economics (if I give 10 shekels and offer you XNUMX shekel, you will find it unfair and reject the shekel), and forbidden barter transactions (selling children, even For a lot of money, it is not kosher).
foreign thoughts
From the didactic meerkats to the unjustly averse monkeys, the observations remain: each of these animals has developed superior thinking adapted to unique problems and is therefore limited in applying skills to solving new problems. Not so with us, the bald bipeds. After our ancestors developed modern consciousness, it allowed them to go out and explore new and uninhabited areas of the earth, create language to describe new events, and envision an afterlife.
The roots of our mental abilities are largely unknown, but after scientists identified the unique components of human consciousness, they now know what to look for. In this search, I hope neurobiology will enlighten us. Although scientists still do not understand how genes build brains and how electrical activity in the brain builds thoughts and emotions, we are witnessing a revolution in neuroscience that will fill in the gaps and help us understand why the human brain is so fundamentally different from the brains of other creatures.
For example, studies on chimeric animals - in which brain circuits from one species have been transplanted into another species - help to discover how the brain is wired. And in experiments where the genomes of animals are changed, genes with roles in language and other social processes are discovered. These achievements do not reveal what our nerve cells do to give us our unique mental ability, but they outline a road map for further research into these qualities.
עדיין, לעת עתה, אין לנו ברירה אלא להודות שתודעתנו שונה מאוד אפילו מזו של קרובינו הפרימטים הקרובים ביותר, ושאיננו יודעים הרבה על האופן שבו נוצר השוני הזה. האם שימפנזים יכולים לתכנן ניסוי כדי לחקור בני אדם? האם הם יכולים לדמיין כיצד זה יהיה בשבילנו לפתור אחת מבעיותיהם? לא ולא. אף כי שימפנזים יכולים לראות מה אנו עושים, אין הם יכולים לדמיין מה אנחנו חושבים או מרגישים כי חסר להם המנגנון המנטלי ההכרחי לשם כך. אף כי שימפנזים וחיות אחרות נראים לעתים כמפתחים תכניות ובוחנים התנסויות מן העבר ואפשרויות עתידיות גם יחד, אין ראיות לכך שהם חושבים במונחים של "מה היה אילו" – מדמיינים עולמות שהיו ומציבים לעומתם כאלה שהיו יכולים להיות. אנו, בני האדם, עושים זאת כל הזמן ועשינו זאת מאז שהגנום המיוחד שלנו הוליד את תודעתנו המיוחדת. מערכות המוסר שלנו מושתתות על יכולת מנטלית זו.
האם הגיעה תודעתנו הייחודית לשיאה? בכל צורה של ביטוי אנושי – ובכלל זה לשונות העולם, היצירות המוזיקליות, אמות המוסר והצורות הטכנולוגיות – אני חושד שלעולם לא נוכל למצות את מרחב כל האפשרויות. יש מגבלות רציניות ליכולתנו לדמיין חלופות. אם יש מגבלות מהותיות למה ששכלנו מסוגל לקלוט, הרי שהמושג של "לחשוב מחוץ לקופסה" הוא שגוי מעיקרו. אנחנו תמיד בתוך הקופסה, מוגבלים ביכולתנו לחזות חלופות. כך, כשם ששימפנזים אינם יכולים לדמיין איך זה להיות אנושי, כך בני האדם אינם יכולים לדמיין איך זה להיות חוצן אינטליגנטי. כל ניסיון לדמיין ייתקל בקירות הקופסה שאנו מכנים התודעה האנושית. הדרך היחידה החוצה היא באמצעות אבולוציה, שינוי מבני מהפכני בגנום שלנו והפוטנציאל שלו לעצב חיבורים חדשים בין תאי עצב וליצור מבנים עצביים חדשים. שינוי כזה יוליד תודעה חדשה, שתסתכל על אבותיה הקדמונים כפי שאנו מסתכלים על שלנו: בכבוד, בסקרנות, ובתחושה שאנחנו כאן לבד, יצורים מופתיים בעולם של פשוטי שכל.
About the author
Mark Hauser is a professor of psychology, human evolutionary biology, and organismic and evolutionary biology at Harvard University. He studies the evolutionary and developmental foundations of the human brain, with the aim of determining which mental abilities humans share with other animals and which are unique to us.
The question of size
Humans are smarter than creatures whose brains are bigger than ours in absolute terms, such as the killer whale, and also creatures whose minds are bigger than ours in relative terms (that is, in relation to their body size), such as the humpback whale. Size alone therefore does not explain the uniqueness of a person's mind.
The brain of a killer whale
5,620 g
human brain
1,350 g
Etruscan brain
0.1 g
And more on the subject
The Faculty of Language: What Is It, Who Has It, and How Did It Evolve? Marc D. Hauser, Noam Chomsky and W. Tecumseh Fitch in Science, Vol. 298, pages 1569–1579; November 22, 2002.
Moral Minds: How Nature Designed Our Universal Sense of Right and Wrong. Marc D. Hauser. Harper Collins, 2006.
Baboon Metaphysics: The Evolution of a Social Mind. Dorothy L. Cheney and Robert M. Seyfarth. University of Chicago Press, 2007.
Comments
This is a very interesting article
In total, so far we have four participants in this discussion:
Yair Shimron, point, author of the article and selfish.
Of the four of us - three do not accept Yair Shimron's definition of abstract thinking.
A statistical refutation of the claim that Yair Shimron's definition of abstract thinking is the accepted definition is accumulating here.
Yair Shimron:
And in relation to your words to the point - it seems to me that you did not understand his words.
He did not claim that thinking does not take place in the brain but that not everything that takes place in the brain is thinking and not all thinking is abstract thinking.
Yair Shimron:
I really don't understand your insistence.
I talked about the fact that it is possible to disprove the claim that a certain definition is the accepted definition by statistics, but beyond the fact that these statistics are difficult to perform reliably in any case, it is not at all possible in a conversation between two people.
When you wrote "You are welcome to refute my definition" it was part of a conversation between two and in such a conversation there is no way to refute even statistically because each of the positions has exactly one supporter.
This sentence of yours was the basis of the debate, so please - don't explain to me now what I explained to you earlier - that when there are more people and it is possible to do statistics, there is a significance in refuting the claim that a certain definition is generally accepted (which, of course - it is also not a refutation of the definition because the only thing that can be refuted are claims and a definition in itself is not a claim).
I also demonstrated to you that in the conversation between us and the author of the article there is already a statistic of two against one regarding the definition of the term "abstract thought"
Michael,
There is a thing called an idiolect, a man's talk with himself. In this he is not obliged except for his own taste. When two people talk they need agreements. When many people participate in the conversation, the agreements should be broad.
A dictionary can only define words with words that people understand, that is, agree on their meanings. Therefore, the linguistic tolerance for differences between word definitions of dictionaries is very limited.
Even when it comes to terms there is only limited tolerance. If I define a table as a writing instrument, a person can find a reason for the definition, and still reject it as absurd. If a table is defined as a pet, any speaker of the language we use (Hebrew, Israeli, knowledgeable) will reject it as absurd, even though the definer will say that the table has four legs.
The possibility to define is not unlimited, therefore it is possible to refute a definition.
point,
Once upon a time it was believed that they thought in the heart, kidneys, and liver.
"Every thinker knows what it is to think" - a sentence (not a definition) as absurd as it is. So far, neither scientists, nor your people, nor those whose names we have forgotten, do not really know how to explain the thinking.
In any case, except for you, almost every person will say that thinking is done in the brain, in brain processes.
"If a person's brain processes are considered thinking" where did you see that the brain processes are considered thinking? Thinking is thinking (every thinker knows what thinking is), and a mental process is a mental process.
Yair Shimron:
It doesn't matter at all how many times you repeat the claim that a definition can be refuted - it won't help. It is irrefutable and all you can do is accept it or not.
This is the definition of the term definition. This is a word derived from the word "fence".
By definition you determine what it symbolizes in your eyes and no one has the authority to determine better than you what something symbolizes in your eyes.
All others can do is say "I wouldn't define it that way" or "most people define it differently so if you use that definition they won't understand you" and things like that.
A refutation is really irrelevant because a refutation applies to objective claims, whereas here it is a subjective claim. No one but me can claim to know better than I do about the meaning I attribute to this or that phrase.
Objective claims about definitions are statistical claims like "the majority of the public would accept such and such a definition".
This is an objective claim and therefore it can be confirmed (actually even verified) or refuted, but this can only be done by questioning a sufficiently large part of the people who make up that public. Confirmation and refutation come in this context only from the experiment and not from a deductive logical process that someone can carry out on their own.
Therefore - even on objective claims in relation to the definitions, you cannot appeal from logical considerations.
The restriction dictated by the other words is really zero. What is the connection between "got out", "martaz" and "sack" and "the adze came out of the sack"?
There is no connection. Context is an agreement that is based on a particular culture.
You write "But we must ask what about all the tiny and small and medium gap perfections, long before dragons, that make both men and animals."
And I answer - if we have to then we have to but do we have to call these perfections abstract thinking? no and no!
I certainly think that the ability to create symbols and do so in a recursive process is uniquely human.
I also think that the ability to understand the concept of "symbol" is unique to man.
In my opinion - and I assume also in the eyes of the writer - abstract thought is a quasi-mathematical thought in which the processing is done on symbols and not on concrete entities.
And when I say "symbols" I mean the symbols we consciously created and not the physical representation of a "lion" in the monkey's mind.
It turns out, therefore, that I define "abstract thinking" differently than you define this term.
It turns out that the author of the article defines abstract thinking in a similar way to how I define it.
Who is right? This is a meaningless question. We are all right because we make claims that do not contradict each other.
I claim that I define it this way and you claim that you define it differently.
Does it make sense for me to come and argue to you "Wrong! You define it exactly like me!"?
There is no logic in this.
And what about the meaning of the term in the general public?
Here a statistical test is needed.
So right now it's two against one, but it's obviously far from being a statistic based on which it can be argued how most people define abstract thinking (which is also certain that most people have never bothered to construct a definition for themselves for this term).
point,
The brain has been studied using the brains of mice and rats and monkeys and insects and fish. All brains work in the same basic ways. If a person's brain processes are considered thinking, the same basic processes in a chimpanzee are thinking, and in a rat and in any brain.
Yes, necessarily thinking.
We cannot interpret and redefine every word and term in every discussion.
There are quantitative and qualitative differences in the thinking of the different minds, but the principle processes are similar to the point of equality.
Abstract thinking does not begin with mathematics, but with the completion of tiny gaps between the sensory input and the actions derived from these completion processes.
Michael,
Your definitions refer to the access of word dictionaries. These dictionaries, also of the same language, are written for a reader who is considered ignorant. If it is explained to him that thinking is corn, he cannot dispute the definition, unless he obtains more information.
In our discussion the words and even the terms are already known to a large extent, if also vaguely. We are not allowed to define thinking here as we please. Bending the knee can be interpreted as a result of thinking, not as thinking.
Thinking, in the discussion here, is only brain processes.
We definitely use language thanks to agreements. Therefore you are very limited in every setting. Therefore, definitions of terms that follow actually create new, more precise, rebuttable agreements.
If the author of the article claims - "Only humans think abstract thinking. Unlike the thoughts of animals, which are anchored mainly in sensory and perceptual experiences, our own thoughts do not, in many cases, have a clear connection to such events. Only we alone think of dragons and extraterrestrials, of nouns and verbs, of infinity and God " - we understand that he begins the definition of abstract thinking at levels that can be described as "high", but we must ask what about all the tiny and small and medium gap perfections, long before dragons, which both humans and animals do.
How do we explain the fact that a dog changes its direction in a chase that does not follow the movement of the chased, that a chimpanzee is capable of several intermediate actions to achieve a goal, that a crow is able to initiate a series of indirect actions from food containers, when we know that brain processes are not fundamentally different between animals and humans.
The author of the article tells us that all animal actions are related to sensory and perceptual experience. This is XNUMX% true for humans as well. The ability to think about dragons and God and mathematics is built on early perceptual experiences. A baby does not invent any dragon or prove properties of right triangles.
In another passage the author tells us that only people use symbols. A symbol is a thing that stands against another thing. A word stands against something in reality, let's say the word horse against some animal. But also almost anything can symbolize something else, such as a piece of painted cloth that symbolizes a people and a country.
The Pavlovian effect demonstrates how a sound symbolizes food to an animal, just as words can symbolize sex or food to a person, and just as the dog unconsciously prepares for food following the sound, a person prepares by the same means for sex and food following the words.
Eddie:
You are just pasting my opinions and protesting them.
When did I say it's all genetics?
point:
Regarding your response on the 11th - due to your concern, you are of course exempt from reading and referring to my responses. It does not raise or lower anyway.
Michael Rothschild,
לתגובתך ב -12: לא הכל בקהיליה המדעית סבורים ש'הכל גנטיקה'. זה אפילו די סביר שלא הכל גנטיקה.
The dispute - apparently it is abandoned between you and part of the scientific community, and within itself.
Shimron you are funny.
"I presented actions of animals that are necessarily the result of thinking" you assume that those actions are necessarily of thinking, and from this you prove that the animals think.
entertaining.
With regard to phrases that have changed their meaning, perhaps it is better to avoid in advance the dogmatic implications of some people and to use the phrases "because from Zion will come the Torah" or "Ahithophel's advice"
Yair Shimron:
Not true.
A definition cannot be disproved.
It is possible to argue that the definition is different, but this is a claim that has no strength of its own against the opposite definition.
I can literally define abstract thought as thinking about naked people and all you can do to deal with this definition is to say "not true, abstract thinking is so and so".
If we were both alone we could continue to argue forever instead of understanding that language (including the definition of terms in it) is only a matter of agreement.
It is possible to accept your definition and choose a different nomenclature for my definition and it is also possible the other way around.
If we are not alone - the logical way to decide would be to compile statistics and determine which definition seems more appropriate to most people.
This is how language works and this is how it happened that all kinds of words like "finish" or phrases like "it's a shame about time" changed their meaning. It also happens that there are different languages in general and the word "enough" has a different definition in Hebrew than in English.
to the point,
I presented the actions of animals that are necessarily the result of thinking. There is no animal action at all without the brain-thought mechanism. If there is a gap between the act and the sensory input that precedes the act, the gap is filled by a hypothesis, which is abstract, and is followed by an action that relies on the abstract completion of the gap. The examples I gave indicate such phenomena in animals. I did not confuse the factors at all, and the computer example is irrelevant.
Michael,
Definition can be disproved. The words and sentences used for the definition must answer the question of what the defined thing is and what its properties are. Sometimes definitions answer this question partially, in a way that changes the description of the defined, by denying its value, by adoring the defined, and more. Such definitions are not rare and are between far-fetched and insufficient.
I also gave demonstrations of abstract thinking in animals. These demonstrations in themselves show that the claim that animals do not have abstract thinking is wrong, as defined by the author of the article.
Avi,
There are no holes in evolution, but the explanations of the mechanisms of evolution are far from satisfactory. There are phenomena in the world of life that are not well explained. Also out of the millions of experiments that have been done, tell me about a successful one.
Yair Shimron, you are confusing thought with action. According to this confusion of yours even a computer has abstract thought. It assumes that you will type on the keyboard and therefore it waits for you to type on the keyboard.
Yair Shimron:
No need for any lubrication.
A definition cannot be refuted because it is a definition.
If you define abstract thought as yellow kernels then corn has abstract thought and man does not.
Claims can only be made about a specific thing.
When you don't know how a person defined "abstract thought" (and you rightfully complain that he didn't share his definition with us) you are not allowed to claim that he is wrong because - as mentioned - you do not know what the definition he is talking about is.
You can snicker all you want, but the scientific mechanism has proven itself. Not only are there no holes in evolution, precisely because of its sensitivity it was called a challenge the most times and in millions of experiments it succeeded time after time.
Michael,
Your iron sense needs some lubrication.
I defined what abstract thinking is and gave some examples to show it in animals. There are countless more examples.
You are welcome to refute my definition and its demonstrations.
The writer, who probably did not investigate the question for the purpose of his article, used the usual arsenal of routine opinions.
Therefore he was wrong, unless my claims are wrong as you are welcome to show.
Yair Shimron:
I do not express an opinion about the abstract thought of animals precisely because of the reason that brought you to an opinion.
As long as there is no definition of what it is about - it is impossible to answer the question.
Among other things - it is impossible - without such a definition - to claim that the author of the article is wrong.
All you can conclude is that the author of the article probably referred to a different definition than yours.
Eddie:
There is disagreement on these points between you and the scientific community.
The question is whether in every discussion there is a place to discuss it.
In my opinion, no way.
Eddie, when you write too many things that can be written in a few lines, I fear serious brain confusion. And I try not to read. Time is short. And what's more, the things I said in my response do not need an answer or a position, these are simple and clear things.
Avi Blizovsky
About a hundred years ago, scientists like you thought that all questions were cracked except for some questions such as black body radiation and the like.
The number of holes that exist in the theory of evolution is large to the eye tenfold and you are sure that it is irreplaceable.
And in your opinion, it is also forbidden to disagree with the opinions of the experts in the field.
Please allow me to chuckle in the face of such thoughtless thinking.
point,
In response 8 I tried to clarify my position also in relation to your comment in response 6.
Avi Blizovsky,
איני מבקש לטחון קמח טחון, ושוב לדון בסוגיה של 'אבולוציה' כן או לא, ואם כן כמה וכיצד וכו'.
I meant to talk about something else - in the very specific context of the subject of the article - the development of consciousness. In the first quote I gave in post 4, I wanted to highlight that the author's overt/hidden assumptions are that -
1.הכל 'גנטיקה', כלומר הגנטיקה אחראית לכל הכישורים המנטליים ולתכונות המנטליות,
2.בהקשר של 'התפתחות' התודעה – 'הכל אבולוציה' ברמה הגנטית.
הציטוט השני שהבאתי מדברי המחבר אינו מאשש את ה'הנחה' בצורה כלשהי, כמובן, ולכן מובן שלא יתכן שמדובר כאן במסקנה. מדובר בהנחה שהיא 'השערה'.
Assumption 1 - is an assumption that needs a lot more research in order to decide on its validity. There are grounds for saying that mental skills and mental traits do not necessarily (or always) have a direct and complete causal relationship, or even an indirect one - with a defined genetic makeup, or even with a defined physical condition. Although, in some cases there is and is a correlation between skills and traits on the mental level and the genetic makeup/physical condition.
Assumption 2 - is also an assumption that needs a lot more research in order to decide on its validity. It is necessary to find out whether, and especially to what extent - evolution at the genetic level can be responsible/exclusively responsible/mainly responsible for the evolution of consciousness.
רק לאחר מסקנה לגבי התוקף שך ההנחות הנ"ל, יהיה לגיטימי לחשוב שנותר רק לברר את האופן והדרך של ההשתנות הגנטית ויצירתה, ככל שהדברים קשורים להתפתחות כלשהי של תודעה.
כמובן שבדיון ואפילו במחקר המדעי לא נשמרת הפרוצדורה הלוגית כרונולוגית דלעיל. המחקר מניח הנחות לצרכים מעשיים, עוד לפני שההנחות האלה 'הוכחו' דיין ברמה העקרונית. אבל רצוי לזכור תמיד, תוך כדי המחקר, וקל וחומר במאמר שיש לו תוכן ומגמה דידקטיים, שיש הבדל בין הנחה 'מוכחת' (כלומר – בעלת סבירות גבוהה לערכיות של 'אמת') עקרונית לבין הנחה מעשית ןלבין מסקנה, ויש עוד לבסס (לרבות, וביחוד במאטריה הספציפית דנן ) – מושכלות יסוד. קורה לפעמים ששוכחים את ההבדלים הנ"ל, או ששוכחים להעמיד עליהם.ובהקשר למאמר הנוכחי – באתי בתגובתי הקודמת רק להעמיד על כך.
.
The claim that only humans think abstract thought is wrong.
The writer does not clarify what abstract thought is. Here is a suggested definition: an assumption or conclusion not directly related to sensory input. Do the words assumption and conclusion sound ridiculous in the context of animals? Many cases are known in which animals wander in wide and complex areas to find food. They assume that in certain places they will find food, but did not receive any immediate sensory sign. Anyone who watches cats can see that they pass through many yards where food may be found, break into unfamiliar homes. These activities are the result of abstract thinking.
Anyone who has seen a dog chasing a cat may have seen how, when the cat turned ninety degrees, the dog turned at an obtuse angle to shorten the way, even before the cat reached the point estimated by the angle of the dog's turn. This is an abstract conclusion, since a dog needs a calculation ability that is not found in the sight of his eyes. Those who have watched the crows can see many cases of actions arising from abstract thinking about various cases. In monkeys, and in particular in chimpanzees, many cases have been observed of the ability to perform a series of actions in order to reach an unattainable goal directly.
The difference between a person's ability to abstract compared to animals is in scope, quality, but not in principle.
Eddie,
There are other concepts that indicate the level of probability beyond assumptions and information. And the author writes as you quoted "it seems that".
Eddie, do you think it is serious that every scientist will open up the theory of evolution anew in every article or is it also allowed in this scientific field to rely on the shoulders of giants who have already examined the subject and continue a specific study.
The author writes:
"Although humans share most of their genes with chimpanzees, it seems that small genetic changes that have occurred in the human lineage since it split from the chimpanzee lineage have caused enormous differences in calculation ability."
And I ask: is this an assumption or a conclusion?
The author continues:
"Still, for now, we have no choice but to admit that our consciousness is very different from even that of our closest primate relatives, and that we don't know much about how this difference came about."
So (at least for the time being) - it seems that with the author - this is an assumption...
Interesting links about the brain -
1. London and Kirschenbaum interview, The Computer Brain Project:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L0AR1cUlhTk
2. "From synapses to free will", a fascinating course on the subject of the brain:
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=D8C99F67C81778E8
3. A particularly fascinating lecture by the head of the project (a bit slow loading) is recommended
Enlarge to full screen (using the button under the video window)
http://ditwww.epfl.ch/cgi-perl/EPFLTV/home.pl?page=start_video&lang=2&connected=0&id=365&video_type=10&win_close=0
4. A short interview with Idan Segev:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bz5IUaRr8No
5. The artistic mind:
http://switch5.castup.net/frames/huji/20061112_HUJI_PPT/Main.asp?Lang=HE
6. Fascinating audio file on the subject of the project, right mouse click
and saving on the computer as an MP3 file:
part 1 -
http://sites.google.com/site/highqualitytts/Home/files/BBP_Part_1.mp3
part 2 -
http://sites.google.com/site/highqualitytts/Home/files/BBP_Part_2.mp3
7. Interesting PDF document, right click and "save as":
http://www.odyssey.org.il/pdf/עידן%20שגב-מסע%20מודרני%20אל%20נבכי%20המוח.pdf
8. The project for cracking the secrets of the brain:
http://www.themedical.co.il/Article.aspx?itemID=1868
9. The singularity is near:
http://www.tapuz.co.il/blog/ViewEntry.asp?EntryId=1065939
Interesting article. And indeed the direction is right, consciousness is closely related to the ability of language and speech. Recursion is less unique since all brains are based on recursive ability. Only when applying this ability with the ability to create symbols to remember and organize them. The possibilities are endless.
Our brain has developed a unique function that, by analogy to computer science, can be called a virtual brain (the analogy is to Virtual Machine). And so the imagination was created. Then all options are open.
Well, the response is requested