 |
|
Current group: sci.archaeology
Re: genes and language (Homer, Richard Dawkins)
|
|
| | From: | Franz Gnaedinger | | Subject: | Re: genes and language (Homer, Richard Dawkins) | | Date: | 20 Jan 2005 23:43:54 -0800 |
|
|
 | Evenings on the hill were magic. Somewhere between 5
and 6 o'clock the farmers' dogs began barking, as if
exchanging news: Everything okay at my farm; how are
things over there? Nera sometimes chimed in, but she
loved best to howl with the church bells at 11 o'clock
in the morning. And then, one morning, when the bells
went silent and Nera sat on kind of a natural pulpit
of the horse pasture by our garden above a couple of
houses, she began barking. An echo came back from a
house front. She replied to that echo. Then another
echo came from a more distant house. She responded.
More echoes arrived. She tried to reply to each of
them. Her head flew around, her ears flapping. Her
barks and the echoes turned into an acoustical mess
and chaos. But by and by Nera got control. She was
very busy, always answering an echo in time, always
anticipating the next one and replying to it quickly,
but now in a relaxed manner. She obviously enjoyed
her concert. It got swing. She was playing orchestra
and conductor at the same time ... Our twosome stood
about fifteen meters behind her, simply stunned by
her amazing performance. Then one of us shifted his
weight from one to the other leg and made a small
twig crack. Nera woke up as from a trance, stopped
barking, stood up, turned her head toward us, wagged
her tail, and strolled away, heading for her daily
date with the children returning home from school,
especially the ones of the family with goats in their
garden. Nera was an Indian dog, slender and agile,
kind and clever -- but she lived by Swiss clocks,
what with all her dates in the village.
Animals can't speak. In my previous message I told you
how Nera spoke with her expressive white eyebrows in
her black face. Animals follow bare necessity; playing
is an exclusive ability of the human mind. In my above
lines I told you how Nera was playing with the echoes
provided by her own barking. Animals can't think. In
my next message I shall tell you how I observed a cat
reasoning: pondering a problem of daily survival and
making her decision, much in the way a human does.
-
Regards Franz Gnaedinger www.seshat.ch
> Years ago we were living in a farmhouse in a village
> on top of a hill; a commune of hippies, students and
> working people. Our Marian spent half a year in India.
> She returned one morning in spring. I was working by
> the stable and saw her climbing the hill, clad in a
> red Afghan dress, accompanied by a flash zigzagging
> through the tall grass ... The flash turned out to be
> a young dog. Marian had been invited to a marriage,
> the feast lasted three days, and when she left she was
> presented with a dog she could not refuse. Well, Nera
> was the best dog I ever met in my life, independent,
> clever, loved by the village. You could hear people
> calling her: hetera, jello, tikae (hetera means come,
> tikae good or fine, while I forgot what jello means).
> Nera left our farmhouse every morning at six o'clock.
> Marian wondered where she went, followed her one
> morning, and found her in the block, where one of our
> neighbors, a bank manager, sat on the stair and sliced
> a sausage for Nera. He confessed to do so every day;
> meeting Nera made his morning ... Nera was black, she
> had expressive white eyebrows, and she was just tall
> enough to lay her head on the table when we were eating.
> And then she played her eyebrows, as if saying: You are
> feeding me well, I can't complain, moreover you found
> out that several people in the village are spoiling me
> with delicacies - and yet, the very best food there is
> in the world must be what you are eating on your table,
> from which you are always exluding me. If only once I
> could share your meal ... If she got no language then
> certainly eyebrowage ;-) On December 6 we held our Santa
> Claus meal of peanuts, mandarines, gingerbread and punch.
> Nera was begging and begging, so I gave her some peanut
> shells. She gulped them at once, much to our surprise.
> I gave her more. She swallowed the whole heap, molto
> con gusto, and told us in her way: Thank you very much,
> that was my best meal ever, and you know why? because
> you let me share your meal and thus really took me up
> into your tribe ...
> -
> Regards Franz Gnaedinger www.seshat.ch
>
>
> > Peter T. Daniels got me wrong many times over the past
> > weeks. In his latest reply to me he even placed me in
> > the same boat as a Canadian psychologist and Princeton
> > professor who wrote that the builders of the early
> > civilizations such as ancient Egypt were not conscious
> > in the human sense. Omigod. By Nut, Isis and Nephtys.
> > I am struggling against such prejudices since I was
> > a boy. Will I have to go on for ever? for the rest of
> > my life? Well then, I am ready, and got arguments for
> > a long time to come, but I shall argue in a way that
> > I and hopefully some of my readers will enjoy.
> >
> > Animals got no language? I shall tell you about Nera,
> > a dog from India, who understood human language very
> > well and could speak with her white eyebrows in her
> > black face, and how she gave an open-air concert,
> > playing orchestra and conductor in personal union.
> > Hereupon I shall tell you how I observed a cat
> > reasoning, pondering a question of daily survival
> > and making her decision, much as a human does.
> > >From there I shall draw a line to human reasoning
> > and human language.
> >
> > I'll teach you by means of telling examples, as did
> > the ancient Egyptians, who knew that the mind loves
> > to learn by drawing its own conclusions. They were
> > more conscious in the human sense than many of our
> > teachers and professors who stuff the mind of their
> > pupils with theorems and choke them with abstract
> > propositions, depriving them of a chance to learn
> > in a natural and pleasing way.
|
|
|
| | |
|
 |