No - it does not. Recognising an offspring by sound is NOT speech, but instinctive, basic interaction of recognition and identification. All life forms have this ability - none have speech.
Denial does not make it so, all it shows is that you are in denial.
AND (as noted) we are not talking about recognizing offspring but about communicating complex concepts. It is obvious that you have not
observed the video, and it appears that you have missed the
speech communication in it.
Answers to questions like "what color bigger" and "what material green" mean complex understanding and communication of the ideas.
When Alex asks to "go back now" or for water or a nut, he is not responding to test conditions but communicating what he wants with speech.
Speech is recordable, memorable and enfusable for all who have this attribute, to recognise, transfer to an unknown third party/s, and able to form 'new' paradigms unrelated to immediate environmental impacts ...
According to this definition of speech the various communications used by Alex qualify. You need to show how you can include humans and exclude Alex in your assessment.
As I said before it is a matter of degree, or your definition will require you begging the question to exclude animals in favor of humans.
Speech begets science, maths and all philosopies: even new ones, and is the sole attribute which renders humans able to have dominion of all other life forms.
See now, when you include humans in your definition of what speech is then you are begging the question. This is like saying that "all blocks are red" and then defining "blocks" to be "cube like solids that are red" -- it's a logical fallacy and not science.
The answer to the question "how many green blocks" when the tray has green and other blocks and green and other not block items requires science (observation and testing), math (counting and adding) and philosophy (logic) to answer.
You still have not provided a definition that distinguishes the "speech" from Alex from that of humans (except when you include humans only in the definition).
Message 18Its an interesting point, and should give deeper cadence of this issue. In a sense, a mute showing speech like qualities is firstly, a human action, and unrelated to the communication skills of any other life form, such as a parrot. It says that speech is an intrinsic quality in humans, and backed up by being 'intrinsic' - as opposed the result of any organ in the gullet.
As pointed out this means that Koko communicates as much as a human mute. Note that once again you beg the question by including human in your definition. If you only include human actions in your definition then you are begging the question.
We find that a mute animal cannot emulate what a mute human can.
Except that this is totally at odds with the evidence. All the apes (chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas) that have been taught sign language and the use of symbols to communicate do in fact emulate what humans do. They also talk about complex concepts and introduce ideas of their own. The evidence invalidates your position of human uniqueness.
This means, again, speech is an inherent and unique attribute in humans. That it is intrinsic, and not an unculcated skill, is the reason we see even a deaf or dumb person able to recognise and interact with speech - in a manner different than the same mute human would interact with a life form which does not possess this attribute.
And again this is totally at odds with the evidence. All the animals in speech studies (the apes, parrots, dolphins, etc) are able to recognize,
understand and interact with speech. Once again the evidence invalidates your position of human uniqueness.
The 'SABU' analogy is likewise a poor contriving of this issue, and more an outsome of wanton denial. Lets face it - if Genesis is right, it blows a fatal blow to many currently held theories, assumptions and derivitive factors. There is a motive to deny here!
Nope. There is, however, motive for you to provide substantiation and evidence that your position is correct, but so far all you have done is blow smoke, deny the evidence and beg the question. So far all the evidence invalidates your position of human uniqueness.
Message 19This analogy is the same as enabling a rat in an imprisoned maze, learning how to get a piece of cheese. Speech is different even from intelligence, recognising colors, sounds and gestures. It comes in a ratio of one and all other life forms.
But that is also not what the speech studies cover -- they have nothing to do with learning to run mazes for cheese. They do have to do with intelligence, recognizing colors, being able to count and make logical conclusions. You have not (yet) shown in any way that there in any exclusivity to the speech of humans, and the evidence is otherwise.
Message 22Thanks. But its not speech. Not even gorilla speech, or a different mode of speech. Its called teaching a dog new tricks.
So this is what we do for mute humans? Teach a dog new tricks? How is it different when done by a human and when done by Koko?
Trick questions can beget only trick answers, but I'm not going there.
So far that's the only "there" you have been. You have not provided any evidence of exclusivity to human speech, you dodge the issue and beg the question. All of these are "tricks" to keep from actually confronting the evidence that refutes your position.
Definition of Speech is what humans do ...
The only true debate left after the contrivings have exhausted themselves in their own cyclical wonderings - is to examine the issue as if Genesis is correct: that speech is unique to humans.
There you go begging the question again. You realize that if this is the
only way you can distinguish between the speech of humans and the speech of animals that the difference really is only a matter of degree and not a different kind.
Fact is, we bring up parrots mimicking speech - only because we know they are not 'speeching'; else we would'nt point to parrots mimicking speech: its a HAHA only.
How do you distinguish between mimicry and communication? You test to see if the words are comprehended for thier meaning. Thus the answers to questions like "what material block" and "how many green" means more understanding than just mimicry. Your denial of it and your weak attempt to portray it as just mimicry is only evidence of your denial of the evidence of communication involving complex ideas and concepts.
We bring up Alex and his tested ability to communicate through the use of words because it is demonstrably
NOT mimicry.
But the operative factor here is - that we can click on a switch in humans and not in any other life form - and speech comes out. Education is mandatory and an onus - but the tool for speech is an inherent one in humans.
But this doesn't answer how the same thing happens with Alex. Speech comes out. Yes, he has been educated, but he was also capable of learning and using the language to communicate complex ideas and concepts. What is different that is unique to humans?
The reason one does and all do not, means its not an evolutionary impact - obviously. The definition of what causes speech is more than what can be listed as denoting this action can be performed by all life forms in different modes: science does NOT know what causes this difference - else they would prove it long ago in a museum or lab. We know that animals and birds can perform voice phonations better and greater than humans, and that they can communicate, have brains, recognise their environment and kin - but still not possess speech. This factor inclines toward my premise and against yours in its intensity and pointedness.
Again you do not show that they are different from humans. All you have done is repeat your false assertion regardless of the evidence that invalidates it.
And now deal with the evidence of Alex and the communication of complex ideas and concepts that is much more than "sugar please" ... or do you have nothing that relates to the evidence of speech in Alex?
I don't think so. Not with proving speech as a unique human quality. Its like winning a prize for saying the sun is hot or water is wet. The best definition of human speech is the absence of a single life form to do so.
Not even humans now? That is taking begging the question to new heights.
Message 23For any honest biologist, a host of enigmas present themselves if speech is an exclusive human attribute not resultant from evolution.
These are really rather pathetic misrepresentations of evolution rather than any real "enigmas" to worry about. They are also off topic, so I suggest you start a new topic on that issue (you know, like you tried to avoid doing on the speech issue to defend your ridiculous position).
Go to
Proposed New Topics to post new topics.
Now try to find a source based on facts and not wishful thinking and preconceived conclusions.
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/...-dolittle-project.html
quote:
Now, researchers from several universities and institutions are working on an effort called the Dr. Dolittle Project, which aims to crack the code of animal communication.
In the past three years researchers with the project have captured sounds from a variety of animals, including African elephants, rhinos, horses, chickens, and bottlenose dolphins.
Scientists also videotape the animals' corresponding behavior and feed the data into a modified human speech-recognition program.
"There is a lot of information”such as individual identification, emotion, and function”that is encoded in their rumbles that we are just beginning to understand," she said.
"A lot of people, when they have to go deliver bad news to their boss, they'll get a little nervousness in their voice," she explained. "And you can actually measure the amount of shaking in their voice."
Savage found that the same thing happens in elephants: When lower-ranking animals approach dominant ones, their rumble contained a nervous jitter.
Savage wondered if elephants that had previously lived together would still communicate, even if the new ranking system separated them.
She discovered that the strong social bonds the elephants had previously forged won out.
"One of the things that was very clear in all of this is that best friends talk to each other all the time and are more likely to answer a call of their close friend than others," she said.
We learn more every year about speech in animals.
Message 25This is an article which makes clear that the writings in Genesis is far from simplistic, able to transcend any writings in geo-history in its exacting, scientific, mathematical and grammatical status. It is therefore a mystery considering its ancient datings, and easily misunderstood and misrepresented by later conclusions to fault it - more on the grounds of neo science preferences than by contextual veracity.
But it still doesn't answer the question of the speech used by Alex to communicate complex ideas and concepts. Nor does it specifically make speech exclusively a human quality.
Thank you for spending all that bandwidth to date without answering the question of Alex and his speech.
Enjoy.
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