This book takes a fascinating look at the linguistic, psychological, and anthropological implications of Sue Savage-Rumbaugh's work with Kanzi--a bonobo who has achieved stunning cognitive and linguistic skills.

This book takes a fascinating look at the linguistic, psychological, and anthropological implications of Sue Savage-Rumbaugh's work with Kanzi--a bonobo who has achieved stunning cognitive and linguistic skills.

This article questions traditional approaches to the study of primate cognition. Because of a widespread assumption that cognition in non-human primates is genetically encoded, these approaches neglect how profoundly apes' cultural rearing experiences affect test results. We describe how three advanced cognitive abilities – imitation, theory of mind and language – emerged in bonobos maturing in a Pan/Homo culture.

This article questions traditional experimental approaches to the study of primate cognition. Beecuse of a widespread assumption that cognition in non-human primates is genetically encoded and “natural,” these approaches neglect how profoundly apes’ cultural rearing experiences affect test results. We deseribe how three advanced cognitive abilities - imitation, theory of mind and language - emerged in bonobos maturing in a bi-species Pan/Homo culture, and how individual rearing differences led to individual forms of these abilities. These descriptions are taken from a (...) rich ethnographic material, and we argue for the scientific superiority of participant-based ethnographic studies of primate cognition in shared Pan/Homo cultures. (shrink)

Culture can be said to be about the business of 'self-replication'. From the moment of conception, it impresses its patterns and rhythms on the developing, infinitely plastic neuronal substrate of the fetal organism. It shapes this substrate to become preferentially sensitive to its patterns and thus to seek to replicate them as an adult. This process of neural shaping continues throughout life as the capacity of the brain to reorganize itself according to the uses to which it addresses itself never (...) ceases. The extraordinary capacity of culture to extract different abilities from the biological form is clearly manifest in the lexical, vocal, tool manufacture, and writing capabilities emerging in bonobos raised in a Pan/Homo culture. These findings render moot old questions regarding the innate limits of the ape brain. They raise instead far more productive questions about the form and function of the perpetual dance that is constantly taking place between plastic neuronal systems and their external culturally devised ways of being. (shrink)

This article questions traditional approaches to the study of primate cognition. Because of a widespread assumption that cognition in non-human primates is genetically encoded, these approaches neglect how profoundly apes’ cultural rearing experiences affect test results. We describe how three advanced cognitive abilities – imitation, theory of mind and language – emerged in bonobos maturing in a Pan/Homo culture.

Bien que la dichotomie classique homme/animal continue de sous-tendre la pensée scientifique occidentale, la génétique moléculaire prouve que les humains sont bien plus proches des chimpanzés et des bonobos que ne pouvaient le supposer les chercheurs en se fondant seulement sur l’évidence anatomique, il y a quelques décennies. Le degré de similitude de l’ADN entre humains, bonobos et chimpanzés autorise à nous classer tous trois comme espèces-sœurs. Ce qui signifie, aussi étrange que cela pui..

We approach the issue of holophrasis versus compositionality in the emergence of protolanguage by analyzing the earliest combinatorial constructions in child, bonobo, and chimpanzee: messages consisting of one symbol combined with one gesture. Based on evidence from apes learning an interspecies visual communication system and children acquiring a first language, we conclude that the potential to combine two different kinds of semiotic element — deictic and representational — was fundamental to the protolanguage forming the foundation for the earliest human language. (...) This is a form of compositionality, in that each communicative element stands for a single semantic element. The conclusion that human protolanguage was exclusively holophrastic — containing a proposition in a single word — emerges only if one considers the symbol alone, without taking into account the gesture as a second element comprising the total message. (shrink)

It has been much disputed to what extent thinkers in Greek and Roman antiquity adhered to ideas of evolution and progress in human affairs. Did they lack any conception of process in time, or did they anticipate Darwinian and Lamarckian hypotheses? The Origins of Civilization in Greek and Roman Thought, first published in1986, comprehensively examines this issue. Beginning with creation myths – Mother Earth and Pandora, the anti-progressive ideas of the Golden Age, and the cyclical theories of Orphism – Professor (...) Blundell goes on to explore the origins of scientific speculation among the Pre-Socratics, its development into the teleological science of Aristotle, and the advent of the progressivist views of the Stoics. Attention is also given to the ‘primitivist’ debate, involving ideas about the noble savage and reflections of such speculation in poetry, and finally the relationship between nature and culture in ancient thought is investigated. (shrink)

The aim of the paper is to investigate, from the point of view of philosophy of science and philosophy of social science, the turn in the ape language project as accomplished in the works of Sue Savage- Rumbaugh and her collaborators. In this project took place a highly interesting turn from the orientation of research on natural sciences to that on humanities. We shall analyze all the relevant works of Savage-Rumbaugh from the point of view of the two (...) central levels of ALP: its scientific level and the methodological level. (shrink)

The aim of the paper is to investigate, from the point of view of philosophy of science and philosophy of social science, the turn in the ape language project as accomplished in the works of Sue Savage-Rumbaugh and her collaborators. In this project a highly interesting turn from the orientation of research on natural sciences to that on humanities took place. We shall analyze all the relevant works of Savage-Rumbaugh from the point of view of the three central (...) levels of ALP: its scientific, metascientific and methodological levels. (shrink)

Practical Ethics in Architecture and Interior Design Practice presents the basics of design practice through ethical scenarios, ushering design students into real-world experiential learning. Each chapter begins with a detailed story involving a complicated set of practical and ethical dilemmas, exemplifying those encountered each day in the world of professional practice. Practice-based topics such as contracts and project delivery methods, marketing design services, cross-cultural collaboration, virtual connectivity, social justice and sustainable design, soft skills, and other related professional practice themes are (...) anchored in realistic scenarios. While all the stories are fictional, in writing them the authors drew from over 75 combined years of professional experience in architecture and interior design, as well as many years of academic experience in teaching professional practice and ethics to architecture and interior design students. Each story is followed by discussion questions and suggested additional resources. This book provides a unique integrated perspective into the allied fields of architecture and interior design with topics relevant to both fields as well as specific to each profession. It prepares students of both disciplines for the broad issues of professional practice and encourages them to become ethical practitioners ready to contribute effectively to design teams and to ask the right questions. (shrink)

This book walks us through the process of how artworks eventually get their meaning, showing us how curated exhibitions invite audience members to weave an exhibition's narrative threads, which gives artworks their contents and discursive sense. -/- Arguing that exhibitions avail artworks as candidates for reception, whose meaning, value, and relevance reflect audience responses, it challenges the existing view that exhibitions present “already-validated” candidates for appreciation. Instead, this book stresses the collaborative nature of curatorial practices, debunking the twin myths of (...) autonomous artists and sovereign artistic directors and treating presentation and reception as separate processes. Employing set theory to distinguish curated exhibitions from uncurated exhibitions, installation art and collections, it demonstrates how exhibitions grant spectators access to concepts that aid their capacity to grasp artifacts as artworks. -/- To inform and illuminate current debates in curatorial practice, Spaid draws on a range of case studies from Impressionism, Dada and Surrealism to more contemporary exhibitions such as Maurizio Cattelan “All” (2011) and “Damien Hirst” (2012). In articulating the process that cycles through exploration, interpretation, presentation and reception, curating bears resemblance to artistic direction more generally. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Mothering and the Quest for Certainty Finding Answers to Mothering Questions Both/And Not Either/Or Toward a Pragmatic Approach to Mothering Notes.

Aesthetics, hermeneutics, criticism -- Social Werktreue and the subjectivization of aesthetics -- From musike to metaphysics -- Formalist aesthetics and musical hermeneutics -- Deconstructing the disciplinary divide -- The question of metaphor -- Mimesis and the hermeneutics of music -- Political critique and the politics of music criticism -- Toward a hermeneutics of music criticism.

This chapter engages the problem in Theodor W. Adorno's late work—both in Friedrich Hölderlin and as a general problem of aesthetic theory. The chapter explores questions through a selective reading of “Parataxis: On Hölderlin's Late Poetry”. Polemic and rescue, it will be argued, are the twin poles between which “Parataxis” oscillates and that delimit its field of argumentation. Their relationship generates a ferment in which each term passes imperceptibly into the other. On the one hand, the polemic figures a kind (...) of loving hate that mortifies in order to save: no resurrection without the stench of death. In Gnostic terms, the polemic affords a glimpse of divine truth through its absolute negation of the fallen world of the demiurge, anticipating the rescue of the particular in the universal envisaged by Adorno's regulative “utopia of knowledge”. (shrink)

setting, are warranted. This article details a descriptive study in which patients were interviewed, during hospital stays, about their beliefs and understanding of advanced directions, as well as the processes used in completing them. The study was undertaken in a community hospital located in a rural area in the Midwest. Findings show that many patients were able to clearly articulate what an AD means in terms of making their choices known. However, misconceptions were found in patients' understanding of ADs and (...) only 46% reported discussing their ADs with a physician. Strategies for effective implementation of education programs related to ADs are detailed here. © 1999 Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, Inc.... (shrink)

A biography of the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.