This book proposes a new theory of the origins of human language ability and presents an original account of the early evolution of language. It explains why humans are the only language-using animals, challenges the assumption that language is a consequence of intelligence, and offers a new perspective on human uniqueness. The author draws on evidence from archaeology, linguistics, cognitive science, and evolutionary biology. Making no assumptions about the reader's prior knowledge he first provides an introductory but critical survey of (...) all sources of evidence for language evolution. He then considers what language itself reveals about its own and human origins and evolution. He shows that certain central aspects of language do not, unexpectedly, reflect what they are used for, are maladapted for their function. He considers why this should be, and argues that these odd aspects of language reveal important clues about its evolutionary origin. The Origins of Complex Language fulfils the promise of its title. In doing so it turns upside down conventional theories about the relation between cognition and expression, truth and reference, and the co-evolution of mind and body. Original in conception, brilliantly executed, stylishly written, this book will attract a wide range of readers interested in the evolution and origins of language. (shrink)

At the beginning of Aeneid 12, a truce is agreed so that Aeneas and Turnus can fight each other in single combat. But this truce is violated through the instigation of Turnus’ sister Juturna, who in turn has been instigated by Juno. The Italian Tolumnius casts a spear that kills an Etruscan warrior. Aeneas pleads for calm and the maintenance of the truce, but he in turn is wounded by an arrow. Turnus, seeing the Trojans in disarray, rushes into battle, (...) and a general engagement ensues. So Turnus, even if he did not instigate the breach, does nothing to heal it, and for that reason alone is a criminal, who deserves his ultimate death at the hands of Aeneas. (shrink)

The frame/content theory suggests that chewing was tinkered into speaking. A simple extrapolation of this approach suggests that syllable structure may have been tinkered into syntax. That would explain the widely noted parallels between sentence structure and syllable structure, and also the otherwise mysterious pervasiveness of the grammatical distinction between sentences and noun phrases.

Corballis's claim that the origin of syntax lies in solely gesture is contested. His scenario does not explain why constraints on syntactic “movement” are apparently part of the human biological endowment for language. It also does not pay enough attention to the internal structure of sentences, and how they contrast with other linguistic units such as noun phrases.

In the so-called ‘Iliadic’Aeneid(Books 7–12), Dido is scarcely mentioned. At first sight, Aeneas’ dalliance at Carthage is forgotten when he gets down to the serious business of establishing the Trojans in Italy. But the poem's last mention of Dido (at 11.74, when Aeneas places a tunic made by her on the dead Pallas) is enmeshed in a network of parallel passages elsewhere in theAeneidrelating to tunics and adoption. In the light of similarities between Aeneas and the superficially unimportant Trojan warrior (...) Nisus, these passages bear crucially (I suggest) on the contrast between Aeneas’ public and privatepietas: his obedience to imposed (or public) commitments and to chosen (or private) ones. In this way, Virgil provides guidance on what motivates Aeneas’ fury in Books 10 and 12. (shrink)

Clahsen shows that “combinatorial” inflection is processed differently from “irregular” inflection. However, combinatorially regular affixes need not coincide with “class-default” affixes, that is, affixes shared by more than one inflection class and all of whose rivals are peculiar to one class. This creates a tension that may help to explain the persistence of inflection class systems.

Tool use research has suffered from a lack of consistent theoretical frameworks. There is a plethora of tool use definitions and the most widespread ones are so inclusive that the behaviors that fall under them arguably do not have much in common. The situation is aggravated by the prevalence of anecdotes, which have played an undue role in the literature. In order to provide a more rigorous foundation for research and to advance our understanding of the interrelation between tool use (...) and cognition, we suggest the adoption of Fragaszy and Mangalam's (2018) tooling framework, which is characterized by the creation of a body-plus-object system that manages a mechanical interface between tool and surface. Tooling is limited to a narrower suite of behaviors than tool use, which might facilitate its neurocognitive investigation. Indeed, evidence in the literature indicates that tooling has distinct neurocognitive underpinnings not shared by other activities typically classified as tool use, at least in primates. In order to understand the extent of tooling incidences in previous research, we systematically surveyed the comprehensive tool use catalog by Shumaker et al. (2011). We identified 201 tool use submodes, of which only 81 could be classified as tooling, and the majority of the tool use examples across species were poorly supported by evidence. Furthermore, tooling appears to be phylogenetically less widespread than tool use, with the greatest variability found in the primate order. However, in order to confirm these findings and to understand the evolution and neurocognitive mechanisms of tooling, more systematic research will be required in the future, particularly with currently underrepresented taxa. (shrink)

An assessment is made of Rudolf Otto's criticisms of Friedrich Schleiermacher's claim that religious feeling is to be interpreted as essentially involving a feeling of absolute dependence. Otto's criticisms are divided into two kinds. The first suggest that a feeling a dependence, even an absolute one, is the wrong sort of feeling to locate at the heart of religious consciousness. It is argued that this criticism is based on misinterpretations of Schleiermacher's view, which is in fact much closer to Otto's (...) than the latter appreciated. The second kind of criticism suggests that the feeling of absolute dependence cannot play the foundational role assigned to it by Schleiermacher, since it is itself a secondary response. It is argued not only that Otto provides no justification for this criticism, but that Otto's own position is incoherent unless Schleiermacher's view is accepted. (shrink)

The Problem of Perception offers two arguments against direct realism--one concerning illusion, and one concerning hallucination--that no current theory of ...

A. D. M. Walker; III*—Gratefulness and Gratitude, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 81, Issue 1, 1 June 1981, Pages 39–56, https://doi.org/10.1093.

This paper considers the claim that perceptual experience is “transparent”, in the sense that nothing other than the apparent public objects of perception are available to introspection by the subject of such experience. I revive and strengthen the objection that blurred vision constitutes an insuperable objection to the claim, and counter recent responses to the general objection. Finally the bearing of this issue on representationalist accounts of the mind is considered.

An attempt is made to pinpoint the way in which perception is related to belief. Although, for familiar reasons, it is not true to say that we necessarily believe in the existence of the objects we perceive, nor that they actually have their ostensible characteristics, it is argued that the relation between perception and belief is more than merely contingent.There are two main issues to address. The first is that ‘collateral’ beliefs may impede perceptual belief. It is argued that this (...) still assigns an essential role to belief in perception, though the belief may be of an attenuated form. The second is Fred Dretske’s claim that even attenuated belief may be entirely absent from perception. It is argued that ‘non-epistemic’ perception can be understood only by employing the concept of ‘epistemic’ perception; that the former can occur only partially---i.e., within perceptions that are otherwise epistemic; and that by switching attention from the perception of objects to the Phenomenological tradition’s concern with the perception of world, we can see that perception must be entirely permeated with ‘doxastic’ force. (shrink)

Disjunctivism is the focus of a lively debate spanning the philosophy of perception, epistemology, and the philosophy of action. Adrian Haddock and Fiona Macpherson present 17 specially written essays, which examine the different forms of disjunctivism and explore the connections between them.

This paper, which has both a historical and a polemical aspect, investigates the view, dominant throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, that the sense of sight is, originally, not phenomenally three-dimensional in character, and that we must come to interpret its properly two-dimensional data by reference to the sense of 'touch'. The principal argument for this claim, due to Berkeley, is examined and found wanting. The supposedly confirming findings concerning 'Molyneux subjects' are also investigated and are shown to be either (...) irrelevant or disconfirming. Recent investigations on infant and neonatal perception are discussed and are also found to be disconfirming. An innatist version of the theory is then considered and is shown to be undermined by the largely 'Gibsonian' character of early space-perception. Finally three recent arguments in favour of the theory - two from psychologists, one from a philosopher - are considered and answered. (shrink)

Originally published in 1949. Understanding the questions is the major problem when beginning philosophy. This book does not attempt to provide the answers, but defines the questions and shows by example how they should be tackled. Subjects treated include the nature of the objects of thought and judgment; truth and error in belief; perception and knowledge of the material world; the status and function of memory.