[emil@emilgilliam.com: Puzzled Monkeys Reveal Key Language Step]

[Robin Lee Powell <rlpowell@digitalkingdom.org>]

What I find interesting about this is that the problems they're
talking about seem to be similar to the problems feral children
have.

-Robin

----- Forwarded message from Emil Gilliam <emil@emilgilliam.com> -----

Subject: Puzzled Monkeys Reveal Key Language Step
From: Emil Gilliam <emil@emilgilliam.com>
To: sl4@sl4.org

19:00?15?January?04
NewScientist.com news service

The key cognitive step that allowed humans to become the only animals 
using language may have been identified, scientists say.

A new study on monkeys found that while they are able to understand 
basic rules about word patterns, they are not able to follow more 
complex rules that underpin the crucial next stage of language 
structure.

For example, the monkeys could master simple word structures, analogous 
to realising that "the" and "a" are always followed by another word. 
But they were unable to grasp phrase patterns analogous to "if... 
then..." constructions. ...

http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99994572



----- End forwarded message -----

-- 
Me: http://www.digitalkingdom.org/~rlpowell/  ***   I'm a *male* Robin.
"Constant neocortex override is the only thing that stops us all
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http://www.lojban.org/             ***              .i cimo'o prali .ui