- Series
- Mortimer Adler lectures
- Air Date
- 1966-07-28
- Duration
- 00:29:21
- Episode Description
- This program presents the first part of Mortimer Adler's lecture, "Man and Brute."
- Series Description
- Series of five lectures by Dr. Mortimer J. Adler, Director of the Institute for Philosophic Research in Chicago. Title of lecture series: "The Difference of Man and the Difference It Makes."
- Subject(s)
- Creator(s)
- University of Chicago (Producer)Adler, Mortimer Jerome, 1902-2001. (Writer)
- Contributors
- Adler, Mortimer Jerome, 1902-2001. (Speaker)
- Genre(s)
- Geographic Region(s)
- regions
- Time Period
- 1961-1970
[00:05 - 00:09]
How does man differ from everything else on earth.
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The University of Chicago presents the 1966 Britannica lecture series.
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The difference of man and the difference it makes. Our guest speaker for this
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series of five lectures about the position of man in the natural world is Mortimer J
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Adler director of the Institute for philosophical research. Today's
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lecture the second of the series is titled The Man and the brute.
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Mr. Adler begins by briefly restating an important point carried over from the first lecture
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in The Descent of Man Darwin repeatedly repeatedly asserts that man differs only in
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degree only in degree from other primates and mammals. He
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concedes that he concedes in several places that man and man
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alone has what he calls rational language but he qualifies this by saying
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that incipient and rudimentary speech is to be found in other animals
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and with regard to language he quite explicitly opposes the position of Max Mueller
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that man's unique linguistic performances imply that he possesses
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intellectual powers in general are abstract concepts not present in other animals.
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Quite on the contrary Darwin attributes the difference between the highly developed speech of man
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and the rudimentary speech of other animals to the difference in size and complexity of the human
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brain as compared with the brains of all the other animals in sharp
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contrast to dollar. Is the position of contemporary biologists and
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anthropologists who are concerned with the evolution of man and with man's place in the
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evolutionary picture. We say for brevity of reference letters let me refer to them
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as the paleoanthropologists since the position they take stems from their
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effort to interpret the fossil evidence is and to classify fossil species
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as belonging either to the family of a minute I or the family of the punch or die.
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Darwin remembered a few fossil remains did not face this problem.
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Now the paleoanthropologists are almost unanimous in asserting
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that the difference is the difference between man living of fossil species of hominid
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I and other of the higher primates is a real difference in color.
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This is the action involves two related propositions. First
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man does certain things not done at all in any degree
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by other animals. When we are dealing with fossil species of man
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the man's unique behavioral characteristics are evidenced by certain
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products associated with his bone. That is tools the remains of fire and so forth.
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Second the things the things that man and man alone does and the
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things that man and man alone produces implied mental powers not
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possessed by other animals. While there is no question that the
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paleoanthropologists are asserting a real difference in kind on the basis of
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the evidence to which they point. There is also no question that they regard this
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real difference in kind as superficial rather than radical.
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Again it must be said they are almost unanimous in attributing this real difference in
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kind to the much greater magnitude and complexity not just magnitude not just
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size complexity as well of man's brain as compared with the brains of living
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chimpanzees gorillas and orangutans. The same comparison
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holds for the brain plans of the fossil species which they classify as minute
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I call upon to die. Though they are seldom explicit on this point it is
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clear that they regard the phylogenetic series as involving a
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continuum of degrees of brain magnitude with a critical threshold
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above which the unique behavioral characteristics of man first make their
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appearance. Hence the real difference in kind between man and other primates
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though real is superficial for it is based upon an underlying
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continuum of degrees with a threshold point not on an underlying
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difference in the Constitution or makeup of man and of the
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primacy of the primates. Only in the latter case where the real difference in
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kind between man and the other primates the radical rather than superficial.
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This brings us to the materials of the present lecture.
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The opposition that we found in the preceding lecture between Darwin on the one
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hand. And the contemporary paleoanthropologists of the who is now the current
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ones we shall find that same opposition which will find repeated here in the
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opposition between the paleoanthropologists on the one hand and the psychologists on the other
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especially the animal comparative psychologists the
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paleoanthropologists reject the view that man is. I quote
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nothing but an animal or the view that man is I quote just a superior ape.
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The comparative psychologist defend this view with few exceptions they hold that
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man differs only in degree from other animals. The opposed positions
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I take they take are in part at least the function of the kind of evidences the
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kind of data they are looking at. The paleoanthropologists comparing
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living species play almost exclusive attention to human products the
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products of technology and of culture as differentiating man's mother animals
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and they infer distinctive human powers from the distinctive works of man.
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The comparative psychologists studying human and animal behavior pay
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almost exclusive attention to the processes of learning problem solving
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generalisation and so forth processes that can be studied objectively and
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experimentally by observing the behavior of men and animals under
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controlled laboratory conditions. I shall deal with the
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laboratory results but in answer to a question I was asked last time I should certainly also
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consider the works of such students of animal behavior as Conrad
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Lorenz and Shahla who have a great non laboratory students with a
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Grade 9 laboratory examinations of animal behavior more or less in the
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natural condition. Curiously enough both Lorenz and
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Shahla as opposed to the laboratory psychologist tend to favor a real difference in kind
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not just difference in degree. In this lecture I will therefore
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proceed as follows. I will first summarize the
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position taken by the paleoanthropologists by reviewing the data to which they
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appeal and the analysis they make of it. I'm doing this because I did not
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quote at length from them last time and I have a feeling that some of you may think I have
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not properly represented their position when I say they assert real difference in kind.
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Many people think that no scientist does that but I want you to listen to the language so that you know that I'm not
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making it up. I will next summarize the position of the
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comparative psychologists again with quotations dealing with their data their
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interpretations of it and of the data and in general their hypotheses or
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theories. This will lead to the one point on which there is
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almost universal agreement namely that man and man
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alone has true language propositional OSS and tactical speech.
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Now I pause for a moment. To comment on my use of the word universal I will
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say from you'll hear me say from time on this there is universal agreement on this is the unanimous
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agreement I sometime to put the word almost in that I need not because I say what I mean by
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universal and unanimous I only mean that I have
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found no exceptions in the literature. I am not asserting that none
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exist. I simply have not found when anyone will bring forth a
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reputable exception. I will be grateful for though there is agreement
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on this point. As between the paleoanthropologists and the comparer the point about man's language
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and the comparative psychologist. There are differences of interpretation of it. In other
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words agreement about the fact that man and man alone possess is propositional
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and syntactical speech does not solve the problem of how man differs from other
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animals. The position one takes and how man differs depends on how one
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interprets man's unique linguistic behavior both
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psychologically and neurologically.
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And I'm going to deal with these at least present begin to present these diverse interpretations.
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In the last section of the present lecture I turn at once to the position of
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the pallium paleoanthropologists. As I pointed out earlier the
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leading contemporary students of human evolution maintain that man really differs
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in kind from other animals and express this view strikingly in one of two way.
[09:05 - 09:09]
On the one hand we find Simpson
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and men rejecting the view that man though an animal is
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nothing but an animal that is not really and that's an unfortunate phrasing
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what if I would make that a little more explicit what they mean as you'll see is what that man though an
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animal is nothing is forced to say that man is nothing but a brute animal.
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Because of that nothing but exclude something on the other hand we
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find that chance Kay and Julian Huxley rejecting the view that man though descended
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from a common ancestor with the anthropoid apes is just a superior way.
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I think it would be profitable to examine in more detail and with quotations the views of these
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scientists and then find confirmation and concurrence in the opinions expressed by
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others. Here are some telling passages from George Gaylord
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Simpson is the meaning of evolution. I quote to say that man is nothing but an
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animal is to deny by implication that he has essential attributes other than those
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of all all out of all animals that are NOT say that is to deny my implication that he has
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essential attributes other than those of other animals. I quote again as
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applied to man the nothing but fallacy. And here Simpson gives credit to
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Huxley for naming the fallacy.
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The nothing but fallacy is more thorough going in than an application to any other sort of animal
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because man is an entirely new kind of animal in ways altogether
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fundamental for understanding his nature. It is important to realize that man is an animal. But it is
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even more important to realize the essence of his unique nature lies precisely in
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those characteristics that are not shared with any other animal
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not shared not possessed by the other.
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Is the meaning of difference in kind. Simpson then mix
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surprisingly into the movie The Day of consultation my office when the
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members of mice. My colleagues and I worried about the meaning
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of this.
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Simpson makes what appears a people paradoxical statement that man is both unique
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in degree and also unique in cause I say this is
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paradoxical because the strict meaning of the least my strict meaning of the word unique
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and entails the possession by one of two things being compared have
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characteristics not possessed at all by the other. Neither specifically rogered generically.
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Where is the difference in degree entails that the two things being compared both possess
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the same trait. One more of a and the other less of it as I was first startled by
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having Simpson talk about man being both unique in kind and unique in degree.
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We look almost like uniqueness and we would almost look like a contradiction in terms. But since not only
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Simpson but also many other scientists refer to man's uniqueness as in part at
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least a uniqueness in degree. It is important to understand what they mean by this
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mode of speech. I think the meaning is as follows. The statement that
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only man has a brain large or complex enough to function linguistically
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like a sage the unique degree of man's brain as compared with the
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degrees of brain capacity in other animals on the other hand the statement that only
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man is a maker of sentences are the only man as a maker of tools. The sense
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uniqueness in kind as contrasted with uniqueness and degree for points to
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something that man does which no other animal does at all in any degree.
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Simpson mentions four things which exist in man to a much
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higher degree than other animals intelligence
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flexibility individualization and socialization
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in each of these four respects Simpson considers man unique in the
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degree of his capacities or attainments. But there are many things man is clearly the
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highest animal in all these respects the highest in degree. He
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also maintains that I quote. It is still forced to conclude
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that man is nothing but the highest animal. His reason being
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that there are other respects in which man is unique enchain. For example I numerate
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his perspex speech moral sense accumulative cultural development
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self-awareness. Ernst Mayr in animal
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species never aloof and expresses quite similar views. Considering the evidence of evidences
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of man's evolution he speaks of the gradual emergence of man's being
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not merely an animal. And he goes on to say I quote No more tragic
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mistake could be made than to consider man merely an animal man as you make
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what man means is plainly unique income fari refers to the distinctive
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properties of man properties possessed by man alone that have been pointed out by
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Huxley hald and Simpson dop chancy and other recent writers that was his list
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not mine. The properties he mentions are such things as
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speech to making cultural traditions to which he had one property
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that is not directly observed to preserve all the ability of abstract thinking.
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I turn next to the great geneticist at Columbia. They are Duchess drops Lansky who
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in two recent books mankind evolving and evolution genetics and man
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takes again the same positions I quote. Man is not simply a very clever
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ape on the contrary he possesses some faculties that occur in other animals
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only as rudiments. If at all and he goes on to say I
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quote human intellectual abilities seem to be not only quantitatively but also
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qualitatively different from those of other animals from those of animals other men and then
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he goes on to say Man In other words is not just a period in the degree to which he possesses the same
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abilities but also unique in kind because he possesses traits not
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possessed by other animals. As examples of these dubs hands he cites man
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symbolic language mans tool making and man's simulated transmission of
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culture. Finally the strongest expression of these views
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is be found in Julian Huxley. Two books again. Evolution in action
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and evolution. A modern synthesis. Huxley says again and again
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I quote That man is in many respects unique among animals that he means
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unique in common is plain from such passages as I quote.
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Man is the only organism with the power of abstraction and generalization.
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He alone can have a sense of right and wrong in the abstract or any notion of values.
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I quote in man's mental organisation the two crucial novelties
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novelties are speech and the creation of a common pool of organized experience for
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the group. Though we hear mentions of the unique properties of man he
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regards these two as man's two major unique this is that Huxley thinks of
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man as both unique in degree and unique in kind. You see in the following
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passage I quote the last step yet taken in
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evolutionary progress is the degree of intelligence. Degree of intelligence which
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involves True Speech and conceptual thought. And it is found exclusively in
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man. You've got both. Uniqueness and degree and uniqueness
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and kind in that one passage. Other evolutionists and paleo
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by the way for those who want to look at more literature the the most telling us I have all those I
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have all I'll be glad to requote from it this time in the question period is an essay the period
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in 1903 by Huxley called the uniqueness of man. Other
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evolutionists and paleoanthropologist can car in whole a pot with slightly
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different emphasis for example a bear not wrench in evolution above the species level
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says I quote That man has reached a unique evolutionary
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position in the realm of organisms which he attributes to man's acquirement of a
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fundamentally new evolutionary faculty. Rational speech
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others Washburn Oakley Le Gros clock dot
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stress not just speech but the conjunction in Man of both sentence making and
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tool making and of these authors Washburn and Oakley hold the view that
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these two distinct properties of man implies exclusive possession of the
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power of abstract or conceptual thought. This last point is
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confirmed by two observers of the behavior of apes. One outside
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the laboratory. George Scholler book that many of you may read the year of the gorilla that
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only distinguishes between man's tool making and the tool using of gorillas as
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as a play dot Leakey and others but also asserts that the absence of
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language on the part of gorillas implies the absence of concepts on their
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part with the consequence that they make no reference to past and future
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they live with the now enclosed present moment. That's his observation.
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Living with gorillas for a year or more. I didn't know it was here that was
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passing. Both can clearly get a book that many of you I know know the
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mentality of apes. This is now more of a laboratory studies done on the island of
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Teneriffe. Makes a similar point about chimpanzees. Here are some shapes the
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narrow limits of time within which they live largely the immediate present. With their lack of
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speech I quote the size like of speech it is in the extremely narrow
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limits of time that the chief difference is be found between anthropoids and even the
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most primitive human beings and it is this limitation that prevents the chimpanzees from
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attaining even the smallest beginnings of cultural development.
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Let me now summarize from the literature that we are engaged in reviewing the various things of a set
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to be distinctive of human behavior and I made the basis for saying that man differs in kind
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from other around with the one exception of language sentence making
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behavior as the one exception. There are minority descends on all these and
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monarch might there are minority dissents on all of these indications of man's uniqueness and
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kind to sense the treat these indications as signifying only
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superiority or uniqueness and degree and will divide them into two groups
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one the group of plainly overt and observable behavior the other.
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This fear of interpreted behavior involving a mixture of inference with observation
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in the stare of plainly overt or observable behavior. The falling
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only man employs a propositional language. Only man uses verbal
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symbols make sentences. Say this another way. Only man is a discursive animal
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to only man makes tools makes fires builds shelters makes clothing
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only men as a technological level free only man constitutes his social
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life and organizes association with his fellows in a variety of ways.
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Only man is a political not just a gregarious only man as a political a
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constituting animal. Thought only a man has in the course of
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generations a cumulative cultural tradition the transmission of which
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constitutes human history. Only man is a historical animal
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and in the spirit interpreted behavior involving a mixture of inference with observation the
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following. Only man and gauges in magic magical and ritualistic
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practices. Only man is a religious animal only man has a moral conscience and a
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sense of value. Only man is an ethical animal and only man decorates are a
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daunce himself or his artifacts and makes pictures of statues for the
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non-utilitarian purpose of enjoyment. Only a man isn't a static animal.
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On this last point the most glaring exception perhaps is cited
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by the biologists thought that among the bowerbirds in Australia I
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quote some paint the walls of the power with fruit pulp with charcoal or with
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dried grass and at least one. I don't know what that means one bird or one group of birds.
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At least one and then thought allows himself a misuse of the word manufacture has
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at least one manufactures a painting tool out of a small wad of spongy
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bock.
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I've heard about those bar birds of Australia for a long time ago when some time.
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Now of these wholly or partly overt forms of behavior
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said by the majority of scientists in this group just in this group a paleoanthropologist to be distinctive
[21:45 - 21:49]
of man are interpreted as implying the presence in Man
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of interior psychological processes or abilities that are not present in other animals.
[21:56 - 22:01]
Distinguishing between what they call perceptual and conceptual thought between
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percept and conceptual thought or between generalization are
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abstraction on the sensory level and the formation of concepts they
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attribute conceptual processes or the ability to form concepts to
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man and man alone. They ground this
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attribution this inference to unobserved processes or
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abilities and the fact that propositional speech to
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making and cumulative cultural transmission all
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involve a transcendence of the immediate environment. As that is
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momentarily present to the senses and so in their view these
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distinctively human performances must have their basis in psychological
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processes or abilities that go beyond sense perception and even beyond
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sensory residues such as images.
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From now on I'm going to skip here a
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recitation that I don't take the time but do this.
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I wish I could say that the report of the writers I
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just named and treated is without qualification
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an accurate report of their positions but it is not I just get three pages in which I
[23:21 - 23:26]
was reporting the inconsistency is in me where they take it back and there are
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sentences that they tend to wear with seem to be inconsistent with other sentences.
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This always leaves the problem of interpretation which does the scientific right when he says two things in a
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consistent mean. In view I'm going
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to I'm not going to bother to read you all the inconsistency it will only confuse you I think.
[23:45 - 23:50]
But I sure there in the view of the foregoing recitation of descents
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inconsistency isn't qualifications. How can we formulate the
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minimum clear concurrence of the group of scientists that we've been considering.
[23:59 - 24:04]
I think we can do with his followers if they all agree. But
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only in this this is not that they don't they don't assent to this they don't take this back that
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only man makes sentences and possesses propositional awesome tactical
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language. This by itself everything else can be dropped suffices to
[24:18 - 24:23]
warrant the assertion that man really defense in kind from other animals. They all
[24:23 - 24:28]
agree that there is real difference in kind of superficial not radical for
[24:28 - 24:33]
they all carry lighted with man's superiority in degree of brain
[24:33 - 24:38]
size and complexity. But some like ranch at one extreme
[24:38 - 24:43]
makes man's brain capacity the direct source of his linguistic ability
[24:43 - 24:48]
and his possession of language in turn becomes the source of his verbal or
[24:48 - 24:53]
abstract concepts. Brain size linguistic ability linguistic ability
[24:53 - 24:58]
concepts whereas some others like Carrington at the other extreme make man's
[24:58 - 25:02]
brain capacity the direct sauce of his power of abstract or conceptual
[25:02 - 25:07]
thought and that in turn the source of his having propositional language that is not
[25:07 - 25:12]
just one man makes language the basis of the cause of the source of thought. The other
[25:12 - 25:17]
man makes thought the causal bases of language most of the others are
[25:17 - 25:22]
indecisive on this question of the causal sequence. For the most part however they
[25:22 - 25:26]
agree that it is man's possession of speech and of the psychological
[25:26 - 25:31]
powers associated with either as cause or effect that underlie all
[25:31 - 25:36]
his other distinctive achievements his technological productions his
[25:36 - 25:40]
accumulated transmission of culture and his modes of social organization.
[25:40 - 25:46]
After a brief pause we will turn to another group of authors the comparative
[25:46 - 25:51]
psychologists the behavioral scientists whose major interest is not in man's distinctive
[25:51 - 25:55]
achievements but on the underlying psychological processes or abilities in both
[25:55 - 26:00]
men and animals. Let us look now at the position taken by the comparative
[26:00 - 26:05]
psychologists and the behavioral scientists. The
[26:05 - 26:10]
comparative study of human animal behavior owes its rise in development
[26:10 - 26:15]
to the influence of the theory of evolution and especially the Darwin's Ascent of Man.
[26:15 - 26:20]
That book as Professor Hill got of Stanford points out is it set
[26:20 - 26:25]
itself essentially a comparative psychology that it is. And I want to read the Descent of Man and see that it is the
[26:25 - 26:29]
first bringing together of all the evidence comparing human animal behavior.
[26:29 - 26:36]
In the years mediately following the descent of man to opposite
[26:36 - 26:41]
tendencies manifested themselves on the one hand we have the writings of J.G.
[26:41 - 26:45]
Ramani is animal intelligence in 1882 Metal Evolution animals
[26:45 - 26:50]
1883 Metal Evolution and man 1888 which followed Darwin in
[26:50 - 26:54]
arguing for the cut nobody of animal and human intelligence along a scale of degrees
[26:54 - 27:00]
but tended to exaggerate the powers of animals by collecting anecdotes about their
[27:00 - 27:03]
remarkable functions. You've all heard such anecdotes
[27:03 - 27:09]
and wonderful essay by Montane apology for Raymond discipline which is full of such anecdotes
[27:09 - 27:14]
from plenty on the other hand
[27:14 - 27:19]
the work of Lloyd Morgan introduction to comparative psychology 1894
[27:19 - 27:24]
animal behavior in 1900 based on empirical of the investigations rather than
[27:24 - 27:29]
anecdotes tended in the opposite direction no less than Romanies Morgan
[27:29 - 27:33]
insisted upon continuity and difference only in degree. But whereas
[27:33 - 27:38]
Romanies in trying to close the gap between men and animals raised animals up
[27:38 - 27:42]
almost the human level. Lloyd Morgan lowered man almost
[27:42 - 27:48]
down to the animal level. Morgan laid
[27:48 - 27:53]
down the methodological principle that I cope with listen to this in
[27:53 - 27:57]
his words. In no case may we interpret an action
[27:57 - 28:03]
as the outcome of the exercise of a higher psychical faculty. If it can be
[28:03 - 28:07]
interpreted as the outcome of the exercise of one which stands lower in the
[28:07 - 28:11]
psychological scale that has become the cannon the basic
[28:11 - 28:16]
procedural rule of comparative psychology.
[28:16 - 28:22]
Morgan's principles methods and conclusions greatly influence the next generation of
[28:22 - 28:26]
American investigators notably Edwin Edward Alfon Dyke animal
[28:26 - 28:31]
intelligence 1898 and John B Watson behavior and
[28:31 - 28:36]
their direction to comparative psychology 914 which when I first tried to teach psychology at
[28:36 - 28:41]
Columbia 19 21 23 rather with my textbook and psychology from the
[28:41 - 28:46]
standpoint of behaviorist in 1900. Animal Experimentation was begun at Harvard at the
[28:46 - 28:51]
beginning of the century by Thorndyke and your teachers and animal laboratories
[28:51 - 28:55]
quickly multiplied other institutions the name of Hobhouse small Jennings and Huldah
[28:55 - 29:00]
should also be mentioned among the early experimentalists in this field of animal behavior.
[29:00 - 29:05]
Nevertheless most of the critical work in this field has been done in
[29:05 - 29:10]
the last forty years in the best of it. Work done with really painstaking
[29:10 - 29:15]
laboratory controls has been done in the last twenty years by investigators too
[29:15 - 29:19]
numerous to measure. I will in what follows name only the scientists
[29:19 - 29:24]
the literature is too vast. I leave only the scientists whose books are the
[29:24 - 29:28]
sources of my summary of the findings and conclusions in this field of research.
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