Damn those Monkeys are smart, kinda
Really wish we still had our free will and teaching debates going on, (had some recent ironic examples) but seen a great NG special yesterday...
It really broke down how apes have learned to use tools and cooperate, but they learn by imitation. If they could see a better way though, a puzzle box was used to demonstrate, they were smart enough to skip the useless steps, where human children wouldn't. What they lacked was a communication triangle or "teaching" structure.
It came down to a simple "pointing with a finger". Small babies learn to do this before language is understood and dogs can understand it, but apes never learned to identify the triangle or 2 parties communicating over an object.
Miming could transfer basic skills from the smarter apes, but new ideas would never be formed. The triangle between 2 beings and the object is needed for
teaching to lead to advanced thinking.
They concluded apes were emotionally driven and demonstrated that this overruled cooperation in many cases, but was neat to see if they controlled the need to dominate, the apes made better choices.
Also, one ape knew 3000 words, amazing comprehension, but never made small talk. This is their pitfall and goes to show that evolution is hampered by lack of bieng social and cooperative to any degree. You have to identify what others might be thinking to come up with new ideas.
It really broke down how apes have learned to use tools and cooperate, but they learn by imitation. If they could see a better way though, a puzzle box was used to demonstrate, they were smart enough to skip the useless steps, where human children wouldn't. What they lacked was a communication triangle or "teaching" structure.
It came down to a simple "pointing with a finger". Small babies learn to do this before language is understood and dogs can understand it, but apes never learned to identify the triangle or 2 parties communicating over an object.
Miming could transfer basic skills from the smarter apes, but new ideas would never be formed. The triangle between 2 beings and the object is needed for
teaching to lead to advanced thinking.
They concluded apes were emotionally driven and demonstrated that this overruled cooperation in many cases, but was neat to see if they controlled the need to dominate, the apes made better choices.
Also, one ape knew 3000 words, amazing comprehension, but never made small talk. This is their pitfall and goes to show that evolution is hampered by lack of bieng social and cooperative to any degree. You have to identify what others might be thinking to come up with new ideas.
Comments
pretty sure this is the one:
Mysteries of the Animal Mind - The Nature of Things - CBC Player