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The following are previously unclassified quotes about humans, now classified under that heading, now classified under that heading, and under subheadings alphabetically by author and date, as a temporary intermediate step towards integrating them into my quotes pages proper.
"The human voice box or larynx is like a Swiss watch, with dozens of tiny muscles, nerves and pieces of cartilage working together to produce sounds. Thus, a small change in the structure of the larynx, which lets us pronounce dozens of distinct sounds instead of just a few, may have been the trigger for complex language and hence for the Great Leap Forward, and this may have been the missing prerequisite for the development of human inventiveness. With languages we can invent. For that reason it is almost inconceivable that those uninventive humans of 100,000 years ago could have had language as we know it." (Diamond J.M., "The Evolution of Human Creativity," in Campbell J.H. & Schopf J.W., eds., "Creative Evolution?!: Proceedings of a symposium sponsored by the Center for the Study of Evolution and the Origin of Life at the University of California, Los Angeles, in March, 1993," Jones & Bartlett: London, 1994, p.79)
"These convergent parallels suggest some genetic hard wiring of a universal grammar inside our brains. We fall back on that genetically hardwired universal grammar if we do not hear another complex grammatical language being spoken around us when we are growing up as children. If, however-like most people-we grow up hearing a normal complex language around us, we learn that language and its grammar, which override our genetically hard-wired universal grammar available under conditions of default." (Diamond J.M., "The Evolution of Human Creativity," in Campbell J.H. & Schopf J.W., eds., "Creative Evolution?!: Proceedings of a symposium sponsored by the Center for the Study of Evolution and the Origin of Life at the University of California, Los Angeles, in March, 1993," Jones & Bartlett: London, 1994, p.81)
"There can be no doubt that the difference between the mind of the lowest man and that of the highest animal is immense. An anthropomorphous ape, if he could take a dispassionate view of his own case, would admit that though he could form an artful plan to plunder a garden- though he could use stones for fighting or for breaking open nuts, yet that the thought of fashioning a stone into a tool was quite beyond his scope. Still less, as he would admit, could he follow out a train of metaphysical reasoning, or solve a mathematical problem, or reflect on God, or admire a grand natural scene. Some apes, however, would probably declare that they could and did admire the beauty of the coloured skin and fur of their partners in marriage. They would admit, that though they could make other apes understand by cries some of their perceptions and simpler wants, the notion of expressing definite ideas by definite sounds had never crossed their minds. They might insist that they were ready to aid their fellow-apes of the same troop in many ways, to risk their lives for them, and to take charge of their orphans; but they would be forced to acknowledge that disinterested love for all living creatures, the most noble attribute of man, was quite beyond their comprehension." (Darwin C.R., "The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex," [1871], Modern Library, bound in one volume with "The Origin of Species, Random House: New York NY, no date, p.494)
"We seem to be left with a question that has no imaginable answer: How is it possible for finite beings like us to think infinite thoughts and even if they take priority over any possible outside view of them, what outside view can we take that is at least consistent with their content? The constant temptation toward reductionism-the explanation of reason in terms of something less fundamental-comes from treating our capacity to engage in it as the primary clue to what it is. ... The problem then will be not how, if we engage in it, reason can be valid, but how, if it is universally valid, we can engage in it. There are not many candidates for an answer to this question. Probably the most popular nonsubjectivist answer nowadays is an evolutionary naturalism: we can reason in these ways because it is the consequence of a more primitive capacity of belief formation that had survival value during the period when the human brain was evolving. This explanation has always seemed to me laughably inadequate. ... The other well-known answer is the religious one: The universe is intelligible to us because it and our minds were made for each other." (Nagel T., "The Last Word," Oxford University Press: New York NY, 1997, pp.74-75).
"I admit that this idea-that the capacity of the universe to generate organisms with minds capable of understanding the universe is itself somehow a fundamental feature of that universe - has a quasi-religious `ring' to it ... Here, as elsewhere, the idea of God serves as a placeholder for an explanation where something seems to demand explanation and none is available; that is why so many people welcome Darwinist imperialism. But there is really no reason to assume that the only alternative to an evolutionary explanation of everything is a religious one. However, this may not be comforting enough, because the feeling that I have called the fear of religion may extend far beyond the existence of a personal god, to include any cosmic order of which mind is an irreducible and nonaccidental part. I suspect that there is a deep-seated aversion in the modern `disenchanted' Weltanschauung to any ultimate principles that are not dead-that is, devoid of any reference to the possibility of life or consciousness." (Nagel T., "The Last Word," Oxford University Press: New York 1997, pp.132-133).
"I suppose it is possible that rationality-the capacity to recognize objectively valid reasons and arguments-is a distinctively accessible member of the set of biological possibilities, one that becomes likely at sufficiently high levels of biological complexity-much more likely than would be predictable on the basis of random mutation and natural selection alone. Like the possibility of molecules or the possibility of consciousness, the possibility of rationality could be a fundamental feature of the natural order. ... But as Mark Johnston has said to me, if one asks, `Why is the natural order such as to make the appearance of rational beings likely?' it is very difficult to imagine any answer to the question that is not teleological." (Nagel T., "The Last Word," Oxford University Press: New York NY, 1997, p.138).
"Instead of being the product of an evolutionary trend throughout the Old World, modern humans are seen in the alternative model as having arisen in a single geographical location. Bands of modern Homo sapiens would have migrated from this location and expanded into the rest of the Old World, replacing existing premodern populations. This model has had several labels, such as the `Noah's Ark' hypothesis and the `Garden of Eden' hypothesis. Most recently, it has been called the `Out of Africa' hypothesis, because sub-Saharan Africa has been identified as the most likely place where the first modern humans evolved. Several anthropologists have contributed to this view, and Christopher Stringer, of the Natural History Museum, London, is its most vigorous proponent. The two models could hardly be more different: the multiregional-evolution model describes an evolutionary trend throughout the Old World toward modern Homo sapiens, with little population migration and no population replacement, whereas the `Out of Africa' model calls for the evolution of Homo sapiens in one location only, followed by extensive population migration across the Old World, resulting in the replacement of existing premodern populations. Moreover, in the first model, modern geographical populations (what are known as `races') would have deep genetic roots, having been essentially separate for as much as 2 million years; in the second model, these populations would have shallow genetic roots, all having derived from the single, recently evolved population in Africa." (Leakey R.E., "The Origin of Humankind," [1994], Phoenix: London, 1995, reprint, pp.86-88)
"In short, the evolution of `cognition', or intelligence and self-awareness of the human type, is most unlikely even in the primate lineage. As C.O. Lovejoy puts it: `... man is not only a unique animal, but the end product of a completely unique evolutionary pathway, the elements of which are traceable at least to the beginnings of the Cenozoic. We find, then, that the evolution of cognition is the product of a variety of influences and preadaptive capacities, the absence of any one of which would have completely negated the process, and most of which are unique attributes of primates and/or hominids. Specific dietary shifts, bipedal locomotion, manual dexterity, control of differentiated muscles of facial expression, vocalization, intense social and parenting behaviour (of specific kinds), keen stereoscopic vision, and even specialized forms of sexual behaviour, all qualify as irreplaceable elements. It is evident that the evolution of cognition is neither the result of an evolutionary trend nor an event of even the lowest calculable probability, but rather the result of a series of highly specific evolutionary events whose ultimate cause is traceable to selection for unrelated factors such as locomotion and diet.." (Lovejoy C.O., in Billingham J., ed, "Life in the Universe", MIT Press: Cambridge MA, 1981, p326, in Barrow J.D. & Tipler F.J., "The Anthropic Cosmological Principle," [1986], Oxford University Press: Oxford UK, 1996, reprint, pp.131-132)
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Created: 18 July, 2003. Updated: 7 July, 2005.