Do Animals Believe In Supernatural Beings?

The cases of Helen Keller and Ildefonso are well cited in linguistic papers. Do you really want me to list them? And in Message 254 I cited links to the Harvard school of Linguistics and the University of California regarding brain abnormalities that result in hyper-developed language skills combined with cognitive retardation. LinkIn addition I have suggested that we talk about linguistically challenged individuals suffering from Broca Aphasia. There are various papers written on that too. But to give you the gist - Sufferers lose linguistic ability. If asked "The lion ate the tiger. Which one is dead?" (either verbally or written). They would be lost. Unable to comprehend the meaning of the question. Yet they understand their handicap, can do things like read maps, adjust clocks, do mental arithmetic, make constructions with building blocks and generally have unimpaired abilities that are not linked specifically to "verbal" reasoning and linguistic ability.Here is a case study of that regarding 39-year-old Coast Guard radio operator named FordAll the evidence suggests that language is not necessarily required for abstract thought.Where is your evidence for your repeated assertion that it is?

Not just one object. He had the realisation that a "sign" could be used to represent a concept. And that a shared "sign" could be used to communicate a concept. In short he grasped the abstract concept that is the concept of language itself.If abstract thought were not possible without language this could not have occurred. Your "rule of thumb" is simply badly applied common sense. Mistaking the everyday appearance of correlation for causation. I have provided case studies of languageless humans, brain abnormalities and brain damage that all strongly indicate you are just wrong.What have any of you supplied to support your assertion that language is essential for abstract thought? Fuck all. Just your "How can it be otherwise?" incredulity.If you think abtract thought is necessarily reliant upon language ability provide some evidence for your positive claim. Well let's call our theoretical chimps "deistic" to avoid wrangling about the term "religious" then. Do you see any reason for it to be impossible for chimpanzees to hold "deistic" beliefs? If so what are they? I don't know any deists who will pin themselves to any position regarding their beliefs at all. Do you?

That anecdotal evidence is hardly evidence. Since CS is doing a good job of addressing your use of such studies, I'll leave him to it; there's no reason for me to repeat him. I don't think the studies related to Broca's Aphasia at all demonstrate what you wish to demonstrate. If you have a specific case study in mind, please link to it, and we can address why that study may or may not support your claims. Says I'm not allowed to access that page of the book. Do you have another link? I am not sure I've claimed that one is required for the other; my contention is that the processes involved in each are so similar as to make the presence of one without the other quite remarkable. So remarkable, in fact, that the only time we may get even a glimpse at such a situation is in the odd case of specific and severe brain damage. And even then, demonstrating something like higher-level cognition without linguistic communication is extremely difficult and fraught with uncertainties.Jon

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Check out No webpage found at provided URL: Apollo's Temple!
Ignorance is temporary; you should be able to overcome it. - nwr

Crickets make distinct sounds to reflect a different mood and to convey different messages.

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There are four types of cricket song: The calling song attracts females and repels other males, and is fairly loud. The courting song is used when a female cricket is near, and is a very quiet song. An aggressive song is triggered by chemoreceptors on the antennae that detect the near presence of another male cricket and a copulatory song is produced for a brief period after a successful mating.

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This fits fine with the definition of language: "a system of complex communication." How do you know that is what went through their mind?Basic communication skills seem inherent in the human species. It's not surprising that it would dawn on Keller that she can communicate using signs. You're talking about LEARNING language, Straggler. Keller learned to use language, same with the Languageless Man.But a male cricket who hears (however they hear) an aggressive song coming from another male knows not to get close. He understood the language of that other cricket, yet he is not "grasping the idea of physical representations of reality." Not the way we would say humans do. And if you say the cricket is grasping the idea of physical representations in reality, then what would be an example of something that didn't grasp it? Very much so. The jist of which is, humans will always develop a language.But I thought this was about animals? Lingustics and the univsersal theory of grammar are for humans. Oh, I see where we went sour. I was being sarcastic quoting those philosophers because you used Einstein (a physicist) to explain complex language and thought to me. I found that rather humorous.Here was my position in that same post though: Ignoring the philosophers, where in the above do you disagree?- Oni

Even if he did, you are still talking about a human with neuroligical problems that could be far more complex than was ever realised. Language existed before this person existed, therefore it is possible that they grasped what was occuring around them (people talking and communicating) before they understood language.You would still have to explain the evolution of it; how this came up in a darwinian - bottom up - manner. That's when it becomes one and the same, the abstract thought and the language. It's almost like the mind and the body argument.The thought is expressed in some form of language, even the abstract thought and even in your mind. For the self to recognize the thought there must be some form of communication, in whatever language, between the self and the mind. How else would the self know it was having an abstract thought?- Oni

Let’s remember here that we are trying to discern whether or not animals like chimps are capable of some degree of abstract thought despite their linguistic limitations. My discussion of human language acquisition is a means to an end in this respect. Yes. Absolutely. That is my point. Even without language humans have the intellectual ability to make the abstract logical connections between symbols and concepts that are essential for language to be acquired. Therefore the assertion that the ability to think abstract thoughts is entirely dependent upon communicative linguistic ability is necessarily nonsense - Isn’t it? Universal grammar tells us that the human brain is evolutionarily designed to deal with the abstractions of things like time, substance, logic, quantity, intent etc. And that all human communicative languages are commonly derived from this pre-existing ‘conceptual framework’. Our closest living evolutionary relatives would seem to share something of this basic ‘conceptual framework’ and be capable of some degree of abstract thought within it. Regardless of their limited communicative language ability. No. Animals making simple warning or mating calls are acting instinctively based on cause and effect relationships (see panther —> yelp —> everybody run like fuck) or (make noise -> get laid -> Wehey!). This is not language in the sense of using symbols to express concepts. Likewise when a dog hears walkies I very much doubt if it is making a logical connection between a symbolic representation of going out and the concept of going out. Instead the dog is simply applying learned cause and effect behaviour (walkies -> leash —> go outside —> sniff other dogs bums).Language involves more than simple instinctive cause and effect relationships. Language requires that one makes the logical connection between symbols and concepts.Straggler: This is an apple (draws a small square)
Son (4 years old): Apples aren’t square. You’re silly.
Straggler: Can we pretend that it’s an apple? I want to ask you something.
Son: OK then. But if you want to eat it you will need a square mouth (laughs hysterically at his own joke)
Straggler: (Draws 3 more small squares) — How many apples are there now?
Son: Four apples. I’m four. That is my favourite number because my friend is four as well.(etc. etc.)A four year old human child fundamentally gets the link between symbols and concepts. He will accept that a square means an apple (almost) without question. He all but unthinkingly gets the logical link required for language. Now you might be able to get a dog to associate a picture of a square such that it then expects to be taken for a walk or be fed. But there is no evidence to suggest that you will ever be able to train a dog (or a cricket) that a symbol means a concept in the manner required for language.Do you see the difference? To use or understand language it is first necessary to make the logical link between representations and concepts. This logical link is itself requiring of basic abstract thought. If intelligent but linguistically challenged animals (e.g. chimps) can demonstrate an ability to make these logical links then we must accept that they are capable of some degree of abstract thought despite their lack of complex communicative language. Maybe..?Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

I think most of your questions are answered above. Obviously. Something like mentalese. As I suggested previously.But why would you think animals or prelingual human infants (or languageless people like Helen Keller) are not capable some version of this internal "language of thought" simply because they are otherwise linguistically challenged in the sense of lacking communicative language?In fact how would they think at all without it? All the evidence indicates that the ability to conceptualise time, space, substance, intent etc. and to make logical connections between these things is not dependent on "language" of the English, French, Spanish etc variety.Your mistake in this thread is to think that the absence of a communicative language of the variety that humans excel at equates to an absence of any means of internal abstract thought at all.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

You need to learn the difference between scientific case studies and anecdotal evidence.We have looked at languageless (but otherwise fully developed) humans and their ability to suddenly make the abstract logical link between representations and the concepts being represented (i.e. to grasp the abstract concept that is language itself). We have looked at those with brain abnormalities resulting in highly developed linguistic ability but subnormal ability to think abstractly. And we have considered cases of brain damage where linguistic abilities are severely impaired but the ability to think in abstract terms remains unaffected. All of which rather pisses on the claim that the ability to think abstract thoughts is either synonymous with, or entirely dependent upon, linguistic ability.Further to the above we have evidence that prelingual human infants have an ability to abstractly reason in terms of number, space and time that, again, is not dependent on communicative linguistic ability. Do you have any evidence at all for your claim that communicative language is required for abstract thought?Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

First, let me select one thing you said as the most critical point: But it is language in the sense of "sound" to express a concept. Language is not limited to symbols only. Yes, but you are making this destiction now, in the current stage of human development where there is a complex language. You do not know if the origni of abstract thought required communication in some kind of language, whatever that primitive, basic communcative language was.Today, in 2010, and I'd say for the entirety of homo-sapiens, is not entirely dependent, but that is not to say it never was. Fair enough. But with some serious limitations. And it is these limitations that may also limit their ability to think abstract thoughts to the complex degree that humans do.In fact, since we don't see religious beliefs in apes (chimps, etc.) - and we do in humans, but not in all of the homo-genus - it can be concluded that it required a much more complex brain to produce these beliefs. Yes I do. But I also see that a human child, today, is the by-product of millions of years of evolution, and so it is perfectly understandable that a child makes that link. Evolution would say, "you're welcome" to the child.Where as with dogs and crickets, we're looking at a more primitive form of making that link. It is not equal to that of a child, but that's not to say that it isn't the same link being made with a lesser degree of complex understanding.Dogs and crickets also have a very raw form of language, crickets even less than dogs. And dogs have less than chimps. So it would be expected to see that a chimps has the ability to have more abstract thoughts than dogs, and dogs more than crickets.But, that would also mean that humans have more than chimps - even human babies.So just because babies can make the link, doesn't mean that chimps, who show some degree of abstract thought, can make that link too. A baby is still separated from a chimp by millions of years of evolution. Just because the child isn't as aware and conscious as a 4 year old kid, that doesn't mean his brain isn't already capable of it sub-consciously.And I would say language plays the main role in bringing about higher levels of abstract thought ability. As you can see from our cricket, dog, chimp and human baby example, language and the ability to have abstract thought is directly correlated. The more complex the language, the more ability to think in the abstract. Sure, but to a degree. There is a limit. And that limit is due to, about, 7 million years of separate evolutionary paths.Apes IMO are showing the origin of abstract thought with their very limited abilities to think in the abstract. A dog is displaying that same ability to think in the abstract but to an even lesser degree. And the cricket is doing the same to an even lesser degree than the dog. And I'd say this goes on, down the line, as we go down the of itelligence, sentience and consciousness, till we get to no ability to think in the abstract at all.- Oni

Huh? When? You have yet to offer a shred of evidence that learning Language requires a grasping of some set of abstract concepts and the logic that links them to certain representations.Showing that an individual was capable of learning Language does not show that they possessed an 'ability to suddenly make the abstract logical link between representations and the concepts being represented (i.e. to grasp the abstract concept that is language itself)'; your claim that this ability is required for Language development remains entirely unsubstantiated. It is fortunate, then, that I've never made that claim. Your threshold for 'abstractly reason' is so low as to be meaningless in the applications for which we are attempting to understand the process of 'abstract thought', namely, religious beliefs and behavior in non-humans. I am not sure I've claimed that one is required for the other; my contention is that the processes involved in each are so similar as to make the presence of one without the other quite remarkable. So remarkable, in fact, that the only time we may get even a glimpse at such a situation is in the odd case of specific and severe brain damage. And even then, demonstrating something like higher-level cognition without linguistic communication is extremely difficult and fraught with uncertainties.Jon

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Check out No webpage found at provided URL: Apollo's Temple!
Ignorance is temporary; you should be able to overcome it. - nwr

First, I have not stated that languageless people, or even infants, are not capable of this "language of thought." As humans, they should be because evolution has provided the mechanism for this in their brain. They may fault in other areas, but they are certainly equiped with the mechanisms.As for animals, we just don't know. We can only study them and make a comparison. And when we do, we only find things that can be catagorized as religious rituals, such as the elephants with the bones, but nothing as complex as worshiping, praying and offerings to a shrine. This would require a much more complex language of thought. If this is what you've gathered from my posts, then I have not done a good job at explaining myself - or you've misunderstood - because I don't think we need a communicative language of the variety that humans excel at to have meaning in one's internal dialogue. In fact, I thought I was arguing against that exact point.I'm saying humans have a much higher ability to think in the abstrct because of our complex language, and thus internal dialogue, but not in the sense that you have to be able to speak to do it.I mean neurologically - pre-wired brains that have evolved the mechanisms for much more complex language and complex abstract thought. Whether or not the individual has the ability to speak or not, the brain is still the same (for the most part) - they have human brains.- Oni

Don't be pedantic. A "sound" (e.g a spoken word) is a symbol. A cricket emits sounds. It doesn't express concepts. At least in any way that has any relevance to "language" with regard to the logical link between symbols and concepts. OK. So how much "abstract thought" is required to hold "religious" beliefs? OK. So how much intelligence/abstraction is required for the most basic of superstitious of beliefs?

The arguments and links I have provided demonstrate that abstract thought is not dependent on linguistic ability.If you disagree with this conclusion you need to provide positive evidence for your assertion.

I agree.But why does that make abstract thought amongst (e.g.) chimps impossible?

LOL. Whatever, Straggler.When your replies to Oni and CS devolve into similarly meaningless two-liners, they will hopefully do as I'm doing and leave you to your silly games.Later.Edited by Jon, : clarity, of course

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Check out No webpage found at provided URL: Apollo's Temple!
Ignorance is temporary; you should be able to overcome it. - nwr