Received: by alpheratz.cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk id QAA01551 (8.6.9/5.3[ref pg@gmsl.co.uk] for cpm.aca.mmu.ac.uk from fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk); Wed, 1 Mar 2000 16:12:19 GMT Message-ID: <38BD6B3A.A1B07FE3@fcol.com> Date: Wed, 01 Mar 2000 11:10:51 -0800 From: "Robert G. Grimes" <grimes@fcol.com> Organization: Grimes & Grimes, Consulting X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.7 [en] (Win98; I) X-Accept-Language: en To: Robert Logan <logan@physics.utoronto.ca> CC: memetics@mmu.ac.uk Subject: Re: Monkeys stone herdsman in Kenya References: <Pine.SGI.4.10.10003010519250.6222784-100000@helios.physics.utoronto.ca> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Sender: fmb-majordomo@mmu.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Reply-To: memetics@mmu.ac.uk
Dear Robert,
My personal pique is probably at the use of the word "consciousness" as separating
humans from other animals. How much of this is due to the influence of Judæo
Christian concepts from the bible on our culture or how much is independently
derived, sans the other influence, is sometimes questionable of man's approaches.
Your paper sounds intriguing and I will read it as soon as possible. Again, my
personal leanings have been toward the degree of complexity as to the status of
"consciousness" in humans relative to animals. Certainly, because of a major lack
of language capability, etc., the "Time-Binding" abilities are certainly minuscule
as well as communicating their concepts to others of a different genus. Still, the
Great Tit cases in England where milk bottle caps became a liability as the Great
Tits learned to open the caps, the widening zone of expansion of this innovation,
etc., appears to many to exemplify "communication," and to a degree, conscious
options.
Now, some separate communication form, such as imitation, etc., may be just
differences in definition and it is true that our differences may be solely on a
semiotic basis. My humorous reference to my doggie Taffy was simply to remind
everyone of the obvious "grasp" of many of our animals, who share fairly "intimate"
relationships to humans, to our own communications (my wife and I have to spell
"cookie" to prevent our puppy form going berserk when the word is mentioned, an
obvious degree of "awareness of abstraction" in my opinion, i.e., she can't "spell"
but she can associate multiple symbols for likes and thus can partially profit from
words, etc.).
I don't mean to imply acceptance of the theory of Jaynes' "Origin of Consciousness
With the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind" but I do feel something similar happened
in man and that many of other animal forms simply do not have the cerebral
syntactical equipment nor capacity process or to proceed far from where they are in
"hearing themselves think." But, in another fashion of speaking, they may be in
some similar position as man prior to the "bicameral" division breaking down, i.e.,
lack of "self awareness," can't "hear themselves think." Just as some subjects
function perfectly well after blockage of the corpus callosum, others, particularly
those with superb abilities, seem to be severely impaired from such blockage or even
much lower-order CNS insults.
Thus, the distinction between man and animal is immense but still, IMHO, to a
varying degree depending upon the animals and the the relationships where
communication may transpire. If we can substitute, even to a small degree, certain
symbology for other signals, sound, sight, olfactory, tactile, etc., then
communication does transpire if only on a Pavlovian basis, still "communication" in
a signal/response mode that is modifiable (learning) can represent a low level of
consciousness and communication in making this association. But, does this mean
that those animals "here themselves think," or can manipulate other media to
communicate their wants, needs, etc., (Time-Bind), probably not, and then they are
indeed, "not conscious."
It just may be that an "either/or" approach, rather than a multiordinal scale of
meaning or representation of "consciousness," is part of our problem in
communication or agreement on these questions. Again, I just may be
anthropomorphizing these associations in a manner similar to my interpretation of my
dog's actions when she wants to accompany me and I leave her behind, only to return
and find that she has pulled every tissue from the Kleenex box and torn them up all
over the floor. This latter being something she doesn't ever do except under those
circumstances (although, with a much greater offense on our part, she may urinate in
our bed). Repeated instances of ears elevating, nose twitching as she searches for
familiar clues, perceptive stare, etc., when certain words are mentioned (and now we
think she has caught on to our "spelling" of "cookie," may simply be something else
other than identifying familiar behavioral symbology, whether movement or sound,
with desires or needs on her part. And, no doubt, we may "want" to translate such
activity into something else like "consciousness."
But, sometimes I may approach these questions with too much of a "solution finding
bias" (how's that for "non-objective"), I still may be in an anthropomorphizing bent
or bias. For example, even though we hear the words (and use them) "hear ourselves
think," I do not "hear myself think" nor do I "see things in my mind" (excluding the
dream state), so one of our problems remains the inability to see the differences in
others and thus, the differences in their perceptions of even what we consider
empirical knowledge about ourselves. But, again, my personal concepts may still be
too much of those of a "dilettante" in this regard...
I'll read your paper, look forward to your book, and perhaps admit that you have
"converted" me a little later...
Again, welcome aboard...
Cordially,
Bob
Robert Logan wrote:
> Robert and list members I do not believe my response to Robert's posting
> which is enclosed below ever made it to the list as I never saw it there
> my self and I received a message form the postmaster saying it was
> undeliverable. If you folks have already seen this my apologies
> Snipped for brevity...
> I go on in my paper The Extended Mind to argue
> that:
>
> "The origins of speech and the human mind are shown to have emerged
> simultaneously as the bifurcation from percepts to concepts and a
> response to the chaos associated with the information overload that
> resulted from the increased complexity in hominid life. As our ancestors
> developed toolmaking, controlled fire, lived in larger social groups and
> engaged in large scale co-ordinated hunting their minds could no longer
> cope with the richness of life solely on the basis of their perceptual
> sensorium and as a result a new level of order emerged in the form of
> conceptualization and speech. Speech arose primarily as a way to control
> information and then was used as a tool for communication contrary to
> popular beliefs and inherited wisdom. Thought is not silent speech but
> rather speech is vocalized thought.
>
> The mechanism that allowed the transition from percept to concept was the
> emergence of speech. The words of spoken language are the actual medium
> or mechanism by which concepts are expressed or represented. Word are
> both metaphors and strange attractors uniting many perceptual experiences
> in terms of a single concept. Spoken language and abstract conceptual
> thinking emerged together at exactly the same point of time as a
> bifurcation from the concrete percept based thinking of pre-lingual
> hominids. This transition was the defining moment for the emergence of
> the fully human species Homo sapiens sapiens."
>
> The above quote is from the paper:
> The Extended Mind: Understanding Language and Thought in Terms of
> Complexity and Chaos Theory
>
> This paper can be accessed at
> http://physics.utoronto.ca/undergraduate/JPU_200Y/EM_Front_page.html
>
> I would appreciate your reaction to these points and my argument that
> Taffy and other "dumb" (as in non-speaking not stupid) animals are not
> capable of the kind of consciousness that humans experience becasue of
> their lack of speech and hence a system for conceptualizing. For me
> language is both a medium of communication and a system of
> conceptualization and information processing.
>
> I extend my invitation to react to my position to all members of this
> list.
>
> By way of introduction I am a physics prof at the U of Toronto. I have had
> the good fortune of working with and collaborating with Marshall McLuhan.
> My principle research interests are applying chaos theory to understand
> the nature of language including speech, writing, math, science, computing
> and the Interent which I consider to be part of an evolutionary chain of
> languages. I believe I have developed a model for the evolution of
> language which can be found in my book The Fifth Language, 1995, Toronto,
> Stoddart. I would be happy to send the first chapter of this book by email
> to any member of the list who emails me a request.
>
> I recently read an article by Richard Dawkins in a collection of essays
> entitled The Third Culture which reignited my interest in his work on
> memes. I have come to the conclusion that language and in particular
> speech, writing, math, science, computing and the Internet are the sources
> of memes. A science theory is a meme and Thomas Kuhn theory of scientific
> revolution is about the creation and propogation of memes. I would love to
> explore these ideas with anyone on the list.
>
> Many thanks for your attention if you have read this far in my first
> posting. I hope to hear from those whose interest I might have piqued.
> I am rather new at the meme game but believe I have something to share
> vis-a-vis language, communications and chaos/complexity theory.
>
> Hoping to hear from some of you.
>
> Bob Logan
> ****************************************************************************
> * Robert K. Logan - Assoc. Prof. of Physics - University of Toronto *
> * 60 St. George Street - Toronto, Ontario, M5S 1A7 - Canada *
> * e-mail: logan@physics.utoronto.ca *
> * phone: (416)978-8632 or 652-2570 or 927-9200 fax: (416)927-7077 *
> * Author of: The Fifth Language: Learning a Living in the Computer Age *
> * and The Alphabet Effect *
> ****************************************************************************
> Snipped for brevity
-- Bob Grimeshttp://members.aol.com/bob5266/ http://pages.hotbot.com/edu/bobinjax/ http://www.phonefree.com/Scripts/cgiParse.exe?sID=28788 Jacksonville, Florida Bob5266@aol.com robert.grimes@excite.com bobinjax@hotbot.com
Man is not in control, but the man who knows he is not in control is more in control...
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore....."
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