From hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu Thu Jan 3 15:10:27 2002 From: hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu (H.M. Hubey) Date: Thu, 3 Jan 2002 10:10:27 -0500 Subject: [language] [Fwd: [evol-psych] Baby talk] Message-ID: <><><><><><><><><><><><>--This is the Language List--<><><><><><><><><><><><><> The three vowels were the Trubetkoy vowels /uia/, and the ee (i.e. /i/) that was recognized is the "supervowel" (so-named by Nearey). Isn't that interesting? -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [evol-psych] Baby talk Date: Thu, 03 Jan 2002 12:13:28 +0000 From: Ian Pitchford Reply-To: Ian Pitchford Organization: http://human-nature.com/ To: evolutionary-psychology at yahoogroups.com Public release date: 2-Jan-2002 Contact: Claire Bowles claire.bowles at rbi.co.uk 44-207-331-2751 New Scientist http://www.newscientist.com Baby talk BABY talk sounds silly, but it makes sense to babies. The reason? It's easier to understand than normal English-at least to the ears of a new speech-recognition software system. Patricia Kuhl and her team at the University of Washington in Seattle-who invented the system-had already studied the carefully articulated vowel sounds adults use to talk to babies and toddlers. They found that these baby-talk vowels are not just spoken more clearly but are phonetically different to their adult equivalents. People seem to speak in this way whatever their language, so the researchers wondered if baby talk helps children to learn to speak. But they could not test the idea directly. "You can't do the experiment because you would need to take one group of children and prevent them being exposed to infant-directed speech," says Bart de Boer, a researcher in Kuhl's group. So de Boer has simulated the experiment by writing a simple computer program that picks out key vowels in English. He chose "o", "oo" and "ee" because the sounds are very distinctive. De Boer played the computer recordings of 10 mothers saying the words "sock", "shoe" and "sheep" in two different ways. In one set, the mothers were talking to another adult, while in the other they were talking to their babies. The computer's task was to distinguish between the three vowel sounds. After analysing about 200 infant-directed words, the computer could easily tell the sounds apart. But when it listened to the same number of recordings of the words as spoken to adults, it recognised only "ee" correctly. De Boer does not claim that his program learns in the same way as a child. But he says that, like the computer, babies probably understand baby talk better than grown-up speech because of its more distinct vowels. He hopes his program could also help computer language systems recognise different dialects. But Deb Roy, of MIT's Media Lab in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is not so sure. "This is really telling you more about what adults are doing in talking to their infants than telling you how to build a computer system," he says. ### Author: Eugenie Samuel New Scientist issue: 5th January 2002 PLEASE MENTION NEW SCIENTIST AS THE SOURCE OF THIS STORY AND, IF PUBLISHING ONLINE, PLEASE CARRY A HYPERLINK TO: http://www.newscientist.com To view archive/subscribe/unsubscribe/select DIGEST go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/evolutionary-psychology Read The Human Nature Daily Review every day http://human-nature.com/nibbs Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ---<><><><><><><><><><><><>----Language----<><><><><><><><><><><><><> Copyrights/"Fair Use": http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html The "fair use" exemption to copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's important so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to express other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations. You are currently subscribed to language as: language at listserv.linguistlist.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-language-4283Y at csam-lists.montclair.edu From hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu Sat Jan 5 18:05:09 2002 From: hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu (H.M. Hubey) Date: Sat, 5 Jan 2002 13:05:09 -0500 Subject: [language] [Fwd: [evol-psych] Individual neurons reveal complexity of memory within thebrain] Message-ID: <><><><><><><><><><><><>--This is the Language List--<><><><><><><><><><><><><> -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [evol-psych] Individual neurons reveal complexity of memory within thebrain Date: Sat, 05 Jan 2002 17:53:50 +0000 From: Ian Pitchford Reply-To: Ian Pitchford Organization: http://human-nature.com/ To: evolutionary-psychology at yahoogroups.com Public release date: 3-Jan-2002 Contact: Walter Neary wneary at u.washington.edu 206-685-3841 University of Washington http://www.washington.edu/ Individual neurons reveal complexity of memory within the brain An investigation of the activity of individual human nerve cells during the act of memory indicates that the brain’s nerve cells are even more specialized than many people think – no pun intended. Although nerve cells that change activity during the use of memory are widely distributed in the brain, individual neurons generally respond to specific aspects of memory. "For the first time, we’ve been able to show differences within regions of the temporal lobe in the way individual neurons respond to memory. Everything we’ve done to this point was to show that there are individual neurons that change activity --but we hadn’t been able to sort them out in any meaningful way. Now we can," says Dr. George Ojemann, professor of neurological surgery at the University of Washington. The findings appear in the January 2002 issue of Nature Neuroscience. Ojemann is an internationally renowned neurosurgeon who has developed surgical techniques for treating epilepsy, brain tumors and Parkinsonism, and ways to explore the detailed organization of the human brain for language, memory, thought and learning. He has co-authored two books for lay readers on the higher functions of the brain: Inside the Brain and Conversations with Neil's Brain. This research involves patients with epilepsy who were awake during surgery and agreed to respond to requests to recall words, names of pictures and sounds. The recordings were from relatively healthy brain tissue that must be removed in order to reach problematic parts of the brain responsible for epileptic seizures. In a typical procedure, surgeons insert four microelectrodes and record the electrical activity as neurons communicate with other cells. After the microelectrodes are in place, patients are asked questions that measure stages of memory. The microelectrodes, sharpened tungsten wire about the thickness of a human hair, identify electric impulses from neurons. There are only a few programs worldwide that have investigated neuronal activity changes with human cognition. Given the size and complexity of neurons and their interconnections, it is difficult to measure the activity of any given neuron for a given time. The electrodes pick up discharges of a pool of neurons that are then separated into activity of individual neurons based on the shape of their individual discharges. The latest study was able to identify the behavior of 105 neurons at 57 sites in 26 patients; before, Ojemann says, his team’s largest sample was about 25 neurons. The findings reinforce the message that neurons are very specialized. For example, researchers identified 16 of the 105 neurons that significantly changed activity with different stages of memory – encoding, storage and retrieval – and found that in 13 of those, changes were observed in only one modality (auditory, six; text, four; objects, three). "We just don’t find neurons that are generic memory neurons. What we find are neurons that show statistically significant relationships to memory for a particular thing," Ojemann says. There are three regional differences in brain activity that have not been noted before: There is a cluster of neurons that changes activity from encoding, to storage, to retrieval, in the basal temporal area, below the temporal lobe. Neurons that may help people recall something quickly after they have seen it earlier in the day – what scientists call ‘implicit memory’ -- seem very active in the superior temporal gyrus of the temporal lobe. There are neurons in the language-dominant hemisphere that respond to more than one modality – memory of both visual and auditory material. At this point, the research is helping to illuminate the vast mysteries of the human brain. Someday, scientists may be able to use this knowledge to assist ailing brains. For example, it may be possible to externally activate neurons related to memory encoding in order to enhance memory. ### TELEVISION PROGRAM: Dr. Ojemann’s work will be featured on the Discovery Health cable channel during a documentary on brain surgery. The program airs 6 p.m. P.T., 9 p.m. E.T., on Sunday, Jan. 6. These studies are supported by a grant from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, and are a collaborative project with Professor David Corina of the UW Department of Psychology. http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2002-01/uow-inr010302.php To view archive/subscribe/unsubscribe/select DIGEST go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/evolutionary-psychology Read The Human Nature Daily Review every day http://human-nature.com/nibbs Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ---<><><><><><><><><><><><>----Language----<><><><><><><><><><><><><> Copyrights/"Fair Use": http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html The "fair use" exemption to copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's important so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to express other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations. You are currently subscribed to language as: language at listserv.linguistlist.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-language-4283Y at csam-lists.montclair.edu From hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu Sat Jan 5 18:09:52 2002 From: hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu (H.M. Hubey) Date: Sat, 5 Jan 2002 13:09:52 -0500 Subject: [language] Re: [Fwd: [evol-psych] Individual neurons reveal complexity ofmemory within thebrain] Message-ID: <><><><><><><><><><><><>--This is the Language List--<><><><><><><><><><><><><> > > There is a cluster of neurons that changes activity from encoding, to > storage, > to retrieval, in the basal temporal area, below the temporal lobe. > .... > There are neurons in the language-dominant hemisphere that respond to > more than > one modality – memory of both visual and auditory material. These parts seem to be significant, and of special interest to linguists, especially those that really wanted to be psychologists. ---<><><><><><><><><><><><>----Language----<><><><><><><><><><><><><> Copyrights/"Fair Use": http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html The "fair use" exemption to copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's important so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to express other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations. You are currently subscribed to language as: language at listserv.linguistlist.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-language-4283Y at csam-lists.montclair.edu From hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu Mon Jan 7 16:34:01 2002 From: hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu (H.M. Hubey) Date: Mon, 7 Jan 2002 11:34:01 -0500 Subject: [language] [Fwd: [evol-psych] Neanderthals clever enough to make 'superglue'] Message-ID: <><><><><><><><><><><><>--This is the Language List--<><><><><><><><><><><><><> -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [evol-psych] Neanderthals clever enough to make 'superglue' Date: Mon, 07 Jan 2002 07:13:41 +0000 From: Ian Pitchford Reply-To: Ian Pitchford Organization: http://human-nature.com/ To: evolutionary-psychology at yahoogroups.com Neanderthals clever enough to make 'superglue' Researchers say Neanderthals had considerable technical and intellectual skills and were as ingenious as modern humans. German scientists say they have found Neanderthals mixed a kind of superglue to make tools. It had to be made at a precise temperature and means the race had considerable technical and manual skills in comparison to their dullard image. Neanderthals are thought to have first appeared around 230,000 to 300,000 years ago. Professor Chris Stringer, head of human origins at the Natural History Museum in London, said the discovery is potentially very important: "It would further show that the behaviour gap between us and Neanderthals is narrower than we thought. Some may say there isn't a gap." Independent reports that the research centres on a new analysis of two 80,000-year-old samples of blackish-brown pitch discovered in a lignite mining pit in the Harz mountains in Germany. One of the pitch pieces bears the print of a finger and there are also imprints of a flint stone tool and wood, suggesting the pitch had served as a sort of glue to secure a wooden shaft to a flint stone blade. The research, carried out at the Doerner-Institut in Munich, found the pitch was a birch pitch, which can be only be produced at temperatures of 300-400C. The team, led by Professor Dietrich Mania of Freidrich-Schiller University in Jena, said: "This implies the Neanderthals did not come across these pitches by accident but must have produced them with intent." "The pitch finds demonstrate that the Neanderthals must have possessed a high degree of technical and manual abilities, comparable to those of modern Homo sapiens.'' Story filed: 12:45 Sunday 6th January 2002 http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_488461.html?menu=news.scienceanddiscovery _____ Independent Neanderthals were a lot more intelligent than they looked By Roger Dobson 06 January 2002 Neanderthals were not dumb, lumbering idiots after all. New evidence suggests that they had considerable technical and intellectual skills, as well as ingenuity, to put them on a par with modern humans. A team of archaeologists and scientists has discovered that Neanderthals, thought to have first appeared around 230,000 to 300,000 years ago, were capable of a sophisticated tool manufacturing process using prehistoric superglue that had to be made at a precise temperature. Full text http://www.independent.co.uk/story.jsp?story=113056 To view archive/subscribe/unsubscribe/select DIGEST go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/evolutionary-psychology Read The Human Nature Daily Review every day http://human-nature.com/nibbs Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ---<><><><><><><><><><><><>----Language----<><><><><><><><><><><><><> Copyrights/"Fair Use": http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html The "fair use" exemption to copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's important so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to express other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations. You are currently subscribed to language as: language at listserv.linguistlist.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-language-4283Y at csam-lists.montclair.edu From hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu Tue Jan 8 15:26:44 2002 From: hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu (H.M. Hubey) Date: Tue, 8 Jan 2002 10:26:44 -0500 Subject: [language] [Fwd: [evol-psych] Genes Help Identify Oldest Human Population] Message-ID: <><><><><><><><><><><><>--This is the Language List--<><><><><><><><><><><><><> -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [evol-psych] Genes Help Identify Oldest Human Population Date: Tue, 08 Jan 2002 08:29:38 +0000 From: Ian Pitchford Reply-To: Ian Pitchford Organization: http://human-nature.com/ To: evolutionary-psychology at yahoogroups.com New York Times January 8, 2002 Genes Help Identify Oldest Human Population By NICHOLAS WADE Peering deep into the archive of population history that is stored in the human genome, a Stanford University biologist believes he has picked up a genetic signature of the ancestral human population. The signature, a pattern of genetic changes on the male or Y chromosome, is apparent in some present- day Ethiopians and in the Khoisan, click language speakers who now live in South Africa. The researcher, Dr. Peter A. Underhill of Stanford University, believes these people may include descendants of the ancestral human population that occupied the eastern region of Africa in the Paleolithic era. Full text http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/08/science/08ORIG.html To view archive/subscribe/unsubscribe/select DIGEST go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/evolutionary-psychology Read The Human Nature Daily Review every day http://human-nature.com/nibbs Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ---<><><><><><><><><><><><>----Language----<><><><><><><><><><><><><> Copyrights/"Fair Use": http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html The "fair use" exemption to copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's important so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to express other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations. You are currently subscribed to language as: language at listserv.linguistlist.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-language-4283Y at csam-lists.montclair.edu From hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu Fri Jan 11 16:25:41 2002 From: hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu (H.M. Hubey) Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2002 11:25:41 -0500 Subject: [language] [Fwd: [evol-psych] South African cave reveals the world's oldest works of art] Message-ID: <><><><><><><><><><><><>--This is the Language List--<><><><><><><><><><><><><> -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [evol-psych] South African cave reveals the world's oldest works of art Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2002 10:11:48 +0000 From: Ian Pitchford Reply-To: Ian Pitchford Organization: http://human-nature.com/ To: evolutionary-psychology at yahoogroups.com Independent South African cave reveals the world's oldest works of art By Steve Connor Science Editor 11 January 2002 Archaeologists have unearthed the oldest works of art in the world – two slivers of rock on which Stone Age artists etched symbolic patterns about 77,000 years ago. The rock art, found in a cave in South Africa, is twice as old as Stone Age cave paintings in southern France and demonstrates that humans living at this time possessed "modern" patterns of thought. Scientists believe that the cross-hatched engravings were carefully etched on to the red ochre stones, which are a form of pigmented iron ore that had been prepared by rubbing to create a smooth surface. Stone Age societies used red ochre symbolically as a body paint, and possibly also for skin protection and for tanning hides, but this is the first known example of the ochre being used to depict art. Full text http://www.independent.co.uk/story.jsp?story=113869 To view archive/subscribe/unsubscribe/select DIGEST go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/evolutionary-psychology Read The Human Nature Daily Review every day http://human-nature.com/nibbs Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ---<><><><><><><><><><><><>----Language----<><><><><><><><><><><><><> Copyrights/"Fair Use": http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html The "fair use" exemption to copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's important so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to express other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations. You are currently subscribed to language as: language at listserv.linguistlist.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-language-4283Y at csam-lists.montclair.edu From hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu Wed Jan 23 00:42:23 2002 From: hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu (H.M. Hubey) Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 19:42:23 -0500 Subject: [language] Algorithm makes tongue tree] Message-ID: <><><><><><><><><><><><>--This is the Language List--<><><><><><><><><><><><><> -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [evol-psych] Algorithm makes tongue tree Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 10:16:02 +0000 From: Ian Pitchford Reply-To: Ian Pitchford Organization: http://human-nature.com/ To: evolutionary-psychology at yahoogroups.com Nature Science Update Algorithm makes tongue tree New computer programme could settle literary debates. 22 January 2002 PHILIP BALL To date, unlike us, computers have struggled to differentiate a page of Jane Austen from one by Jackie Collins. Now researchers in Italy have developed a program that can spot enough subtle differences between two authors' works to attribute authorship1. The program can tell a text by Machiavelli from one by Pirandello, Dante or a host of other great Italian writers. It constructed a language tree of the degree of affinity between 50 different tongues. The tree identifies all the main linguistic groups, such as Romance, Celtic, Slavic and so forth and highlights Maltese (an Afro-Asiatic language) and Basque as anomalies. Full text http://www.nature.com/nsu/020121/020121-2.html Refs Benedetto, D., Caglioti, E. & Loreto, V. Language trees and zipping. Physical Review Letters, 88, 048702, (2002). http://publish.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v88/e048702/ ---<><><><><><><><><><><><>----Language----<><><><><><><><><><><><><> Copyrights/"Fair Use": http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html The "fair use" exemption to copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's important so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to express other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations. You are currently subscribed to language as: language at listserv.linguistlist.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-language-4283Y at csam-lists.montclair.edu From hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu Thu Jan 3 15:10:27 2002 From: hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu (H.M. Hubey) Date: Thu, 3 Jan 2002 10:10:27 -0500 Subject: [language] [Fwd: [evol-psych] Baby talk] Message-ID: <><><><><><><><><><><><>--This is the Language List--<><><><><><><><><><><><><> The three vowels were the Trubetkoy vowels /uia/, and the ee (i.e. /i/) that was recognized is the "supervowel" (so-named by Nearey). Isn't that interesting? -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [evol-psych] Baby talk Date: Thu, 03 Jan 2002 12:13:28 +0000 From: Ian Pitchford Reply-To: Ian Pitchford Organization: http://human-nature.com/ To: evolutionary-psychology at yahoogroups.com Public release date: 2-Jan-2002 Contact: Claire Bowles claire.bowles at rbi.co.uk 44-207-331-2751 New Scientist http://www.newscientist.com Baby talk BABY talk sounds silly, but it makes sense to babies. The reason? It's easier to understand than normal English-at least to the ears of a new speech-recognition software system. Patricia Kuhl and her team at the University of Washington in Seattle-who invented the system-had already studied the carefully articulated vowel sounds adults use to talk to babies and toddlers. They found that these baby-talk vowels are not just spoken more clearly but are phonetically different to their adult equivalents. People seem to speak in this way whatever their language, so the researchers wondered if baby talk helps children to learn to speak. But they could not test the idea directly. "You can't do the experiment because you would need to take one group of children and prevent them being exposed to infant-directed speech," says Bart de Boer, a researcher in Kuhl's group. So de Boer has simulated the experiment by writing a simple computer program that picks out key vowels in English. He chose "o", "oo" and "ee" because the sounds are very distinctive. De Boer played the computer recordings of 10 mothers saying the words "sock", "shoe" and "sheep" in two different ways. In one set, the mothers were talking to another adult, while in the other they were talking to their babies. The computer's task was to distinguish between the three vowel sounds. After analysing about 200 infant-directed words, the computer could easily tell the sounds apart. But when it listened to the same number of recordings of the words as spoken to adults, it recognised only "ee" correctly. De Boer does not claim that his program learns in the same way as a child. But he says that, like the computer, babies probably understand baby talk better than grown-up speech because of its more distinct vowels. He hopes his program could also help computer language systems recognise different dialects. But Deb Roy, of MIT's Media Lab in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is not so sure. "This is really telling you more about what adults are doing in talking to their infants than telling you how to build a computer system," he says. ### Author: Eugenie Samuel New Scientist issue: 5th January 2002 PLEASE MENTION NEW SCIENTIST AS THE SOURCE OF THIS STORY AND, IF PUBLISHING ONLINE, PLEASE CARRY A HYPERLINK TO: http://www.newscientist.com To view archive/subscribe/unsubscribe/select DIGEST go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/evolutionary-psychology Read The Human Nature Daily Review every day http://human-nature.com/nibbs Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ---<><><><><><><><><><><><>----Language----<><><><><><><><><><><><><> Copyrights/"Fair Use": http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html The "fair use" exemption to copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's important so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to express other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations. You are currently subscribed to language as: language at listserv.linguistlist.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-language-4283Y at csam-lists.montclair.edu From hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu Sat Jan 5 18:05:09 2002 From: hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu (H.M. Hubey) Date: Sat, 5 Jan 2002 13:05:09 -0500 Subject: [language] [Fwd: [evol-psych] Individual neurons reveal complexity of memory within thebrain] Message-ID: <><><><><><><><><><><><>--This is the Language List--<><><><><><><><><><><><><> -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [evol-psych] Individual neurons reveal complexity of memory within thebrain Date: Sat, 05 Jan 2002 17:53:50 +0000 From: Ian Pitchford Reply-To: Ian Pitchford Organization: http://human-nature.com/ To: evolutionary-psychology at yahoogroups.com Public release date: 3-Jan-2002 Contact: Walter Neary wneary at u.washington.edu 206-685-3841 University of Washington http://www.washington.edu/ Individual neurons reveal complexity of memory within the brain An investigation of the activity of individual human nerve cells during the act of memory indicates that the brain?s nerve cells are even more specialized than many people think ? no pun intended. Although nerve cells that change activity during the use of memory are widely distributed in the brain, individual neurons generally respond to specific aspects of memory. "For the first time, we?ve been able to show differences within regions of the temporal lobe in the way individual neurons respond to memory. Everything we?ve done to this point was to show that there are individual neurons that change activity --but we hadn?t been able to sort them out in any meaningful way. Now we can," says Dr. George Ojemann, professor of neurological surgery at the University of Washington. The findings appear in the January 2002 issue of Nature Neuroscience. Ojemann is an internationally renowned neurosurgeon who has developed surgical techniques for treating epilepsy, brain tumors and Parkinsonism, and ways to explore the detailed organization of the human brain for language, memory, thought and learning. He has co-authored two books for lay readers on the higher functions of the brain: Inside the Brain and Conversations with Neil's Brain. This research involves patients with epilepsy who were awake during surgery and agreed to respond to requests to recall words, names of pictures and sounds. The recordings were from relatively healthy brain tissue that must be removed in order to reach problematic parts of the brain responsible for epileptic seizures. In a typical procedure, surgeons insert four microelectrodes and record the electrical activity as neurons communicate with other cells. After the microelectrodes are in place, patients are asked questions that measure stages of memory. The microelectrodes, sharpened tungsten wire about the thickness of a human hair, identify electric impulses from neurons. There are only a few programs worldwide that have investigated neuronal activity changes with human cognition. Given the size and complexity of neurons and their interconnections, it is difficult to measure the activity of any given neuron for a given time. The electrodes pick up discharges of a pool of neurons that are then separated into activity of individual neurons based on the shape of their individual discharges. The latest study was able to identify the behavior of 105 neurons at 57 sites in 26 patients; before, Ojemann says, his team?s largest sample was about 25 neurons. The findings reinforce the message that neurons are very specialized. For example, researchers identified 16 of the 105 neurons that significantly changed activity with different stages of memory ? encoding, storage and retrieval ? and found that in 13 of those, changes were observed in only one modality (auditory, six; text, four; objects, three). "We just don?t find neurons that are generic memory neurons. What we find are neurons that show statistically significant relationships to memory for a particular thing," Ojemann says. There are three regional differences in brain activity that have not been noted before: There is a cluster of neurons that changes activity from encoding, to storage, to retrieval, in the basal temporal area, below the temporal lobe. Neurons that may help people recall something quickly after they have seen it earlier in the day ? what scientists call ?implicit memory? -- seem very active in the superior temporal gyrus of the temporal lobe. There are neurons in the language-dominant hemisphere that respond to more than one modality ? memory of both visual and auditory material. At this point, the research is helping to illuminate the vast mysteries of the human brain. Someday, scientists may be able to use this knowledge to assist ailing brains. For example, it may be possible to externally activate neurons related to memory encoding in order to enhance memory. ### TELEVISION PROGRAM: Dr. Ojemann?s work will be featured on the Discovery Health cable channel during a documentary on brain surgery. The program airs 6 p.m. P.T., 9 p.m. E.T., on Sunday, Jan. 6. These studies are supported by a grant from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, and are a collaborative project with Professor David Corina of the UW Department of Psychology. http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2002-01/uow-inr010302.php To view archive/subscribe/unsubscribe/select DIGEST go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/evolutionary-psychology Read The Human Nature Daily Review every day http://human-nature.com/nibbs Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ---<><><><><><><><><><><><>----Language----<><><><><><><><><><><><><> Copyrights/"Fair Use": http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html The "fair use" exemption to copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's important so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to express other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations. You are currently subscribed to language as: language at listserv.linguistlist.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-language-4283Y at csam-lists.montclair.edu From hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu Sat Jan 5 18:09:52 2002 From: hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu (H.M. Hubey) Date: Sat, 5 Jan 2002 13:09:52 -0500 Subject: [language] Re: [Fwd: [evol-psych] Individual neurons reveal complexity ofmemory within thebrain] Message-ID: <><><><><><><><><><><><>--This is the Language List--<><><><><><><><><><><><><> > > There is a cluster of neurons that changes activity from encoding, to > storage, > to retrieval, in the basal temporal area, below the temporal lobe. > .... > There are neurons in the language-dominant hemisphere that respond to > more than > one modality ? memory of both visual and auditory material. These parts seem to be significant, and of special interest to linguists, especially those that really wanted to be psychologists. ---<><><><><><><><><><><><>----Language----<><><><><><><><><><><><><> Copyrights/"Fair Use": http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html The "fair use" exemption to copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's important so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to express other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations. You are currently subscribed to language as: language at listserv.linguistlist.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-language-4283Y at csam-lists.montclair.edu From hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu Mon Jan 7 16:34:01 2002 From: hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu (H.M. Hubey) Date: Mon, 7 Jan 2002 11:34:01 -0500 Subject: [language] [Fwd: [evol-psych] Neanderthals clever enough to make 'superglue'] Message-ID: <><><><><><><><><><><><>--This is the Language List--<><><><><><><><><><><><><> -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [evol-psych] Neanderthals clever enough to make 'superglue' Date: Mon, 07 Jan 2002 07:13:41 +0000 From: Ian Pitchford Reply-To: Ian Pitchford Organization: http://human-nature.com/ To: evolutionary-psychology at yahoogroups.com Neanderthals clever enough to make 'superglue' Researchers say Neanderthals had considerable technical and intellectual skills and were as ingenious as modern humans. German scientists say they have found Neanderthals mixed a kind of superglue to make tools. It had to be made at a precise temperature and means the race had considerable technical and manual skills in comparison to their dullard image. Neanderthals are thought to have first appeared around 230,000 to 300,000 years ago. Professor Chris Stringer, head of human origins at the Natural History Museum in London, said the discovery is potentially very important: "It would further show that the behaviour gap between us and Neanderthals is narrower than we thought. Some may say there isn't a gap." Independent reports that the research centres on a new analysis of two 80,000-year-old samples of blackish-brown pitch discovered in a lignite mining pit in the Harz mountains in Germany. One of the pitch pieces bears the print of a finger and there are also imprints of a flint stone tool and wood, suggesting the pitch had served as a sort of glue to secure a wooden shaft to a flint stone blade. The research, carried out at the Doerner-Institut in Munich, found the pitch was a birch pitch, which can be only be produced at temperatures of 300-400C. The team, led by Professor Dietrich Mania of Freidrich-Schiller University in Jena, said: "This implies the Neanderthals did not come across these pitches by accident but must have produced them with intent." "The pitch finds demonstrate that the Neanderthals must have possessed a high degree of technical and manual abilities, comparable to those of modern Homo sapiens.'' Story filed: 12:45 Sunday 6th January 2002 http://www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_488461.html?menu=news.scienceanddiscovery _____ Independent Neanderthals were a lot more intelligent than they looked By Roger Dobson 06 January 2002 Neanderthals were not dumb, lumbering idiots after all. New evidence suggests that they had considerable technical and intellectual skills, as well as ingenuity, to put them on a par with modern humans. A team of archaeologists and scientists has discovered that Neanderthals, thought to have first appeared around 230,000 to 300,000 years ago, were capable of a sophisticated tool manufacturing process using prehistoric superglue that had to be made at a precise temperature. Full text http://www.independent.co.uk/story.jsp?story=113056 To view archive/subscribe/unsubscribe/select DIGEST go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/evolutionary-psychology Read The Human Nature Daily Review every day http://human-nature.com/nibbs Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ---<><><><><><><><><><><><>----Language----<><><><><><><><><><><><><> Copyrights/"Fair Use": http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html The "fair use" exemption to copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's important so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to express other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations. You are currently subscribed to language as: language at listserv.linguistlist.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-language-4283Y at csam-lists.montclair.edu From hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu Tue Jan 8 15:26:44 2002 From: hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu (H.M. Hubey) Date: Tue, 8 Jan 2002 10:26:44 -0500 Subject: [language] [Fwd: [evol-psych] Genes Help Identify Oldest Human Population] Message-ID: <><><><><><><><><><><><>--This is the Language List--<><><><><><><><><><><><><> -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [evol-psych] Genes Help Identify Oldest Human Population Date: Tue, 08 Jan 2002 08:29:38 +0000 From: Ian Pitchford Reply-To: Ian Pitchford Organization: http://human-nature.com/ To: evolutionary-psychology at yahoogroups.com New York Times January 8, 2002 Genes Help Identify Oldest Human Population By NICHOLAS WADE Peering deep into the archive of population history that is stored in the human genome, a Stanford University biologist believes he has picked up a genetic signature of the ancestral human population. The signature, a pattern of genetic changes on the male or Y chromosome, is apparent in some present- day Ethiopians and in the Khoisan, click language speakers who now live in South Africa. The researcher, Dr. Peter A. Underhill of Stanford University, believes these people may include descendants of the ancestral human population that occupied the eastern region of Africa in the Paleolithic era. Full text http://www.nytimes.com/2002/01/08/science/08ORIG.html To view archive/subscribe/unsubscribe/select DIGEST go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/evolutionary-psychology Read The Human Nature Daily Review every day http://human-nature.com/nibbs Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ---<><><><><><><><><><><><>----Language----<><><><><><><><><><><><><> Copyrights/"Fair Use": http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html The "fair use" exemption to copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's important so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to express other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations. You are currently subscribed to language as: language at listserv.linguistlist.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-language-4283Y at csam-lists.montclair.edu From hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu Fri Jan 11 16:25:41 2002 From: hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu (H.M. Hubey) Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2002 11:25:41 -0500 Subject: [language] [Fwd: [evol-psych] South African cave reveals the world's oldest works of art] Message-ID: <><><><><><><><><><><><>--This is the Language List--<><><><><><><><><><><><><> -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [evol-psych] South African cave reveals the world's oldest works of art Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2002 10:11:48 +0000 From: Ian Pitchford Reply-To: Ian Pitchford Organization: http://human-nature.com/ To: evolutionary-psychology at yahoogroups.com Independent South African cave reveals the world's oldest works of art By Steve Connor Science Editor 11 January 2002 Archaeologists have unearthed the oldest works of art in the world ? two slivers of rock on which Stone Age artists etched symbolic patterns about 77,000 years ago. The rock art, found in a cave in South Africa, is twice as old as Stone Age cave paintings in southern France and demonstrates that humans living at this time possessed "modern" patterns of thought. Scientists believe that the cross-hatched engravings were carefully etched on to the red ochre stones, which are a form of pigmented iron ore that had been prepared by rubbing to create a smooth surface. Stone Age societies used red ochre symbolically as a body paint, and possibly also for skin protection and for tanning hides, but this is the first known example of the ochre being used to depict art. Full text http://www.independent.co.uk/story.jsp?story=113869 To view archive/subscribe/unsubscribe/select DIGEST go to http://groups.yahoo.com/group/evolutionary-psychology Read The Human Nature Daily Review every day http://human-nature.com/nibbs Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ---<><><><><><><><><><><><>----Language----<><><><><><><><><><><><><> Copyrights/"Fair Use": http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html The "fair use" exemption to copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's important so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to express other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations. You are currently subscribed to language as: language at listserv.linguistlist.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-language-4283Y at csam-lists.montclair.edu From hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu Wed Jan 23 00:42:23 2002 From: hubeyh at mail.montclair.edu (H.M. Hubey) Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 19:42:23 -0500 Subject: [language] Algorithm makes tongue tree] Message-ID: <><><><><><><><><><><><>--This is the Language List--<><><><><><><><><><><><><> -------- Original Message -------- Subject: [evol-psych] Algorithm makes tongue tree Date: Tue, 22 Jan 2002 10:16:02 +0000 From: Ian Pitchford Reply-To: Ian Pitchford Organization: http://human-nature.com/ To: evolutionary-psychology at yahoogroups.com Nature Science Update Algorithm makes tongue tree New computer programme could settle literary debates. 22 January 2002 PHILIP BALL To date, unlike us, computers have struggled to differentiate a page of Jane Austen from one by Jackie Collins. Now researchers in Italy have developed a program that can spot enough subtle differences between two authors' works to attribute authorship1. The program can tell a text by Machiavelli from one by Pirandello, Dante or a host of other great Italian writers. It constructed a language tree of the degree of affinity between 50 different tongues. The tree identifies all the main linguistic groups, such as Romance, Celtic, Slavic and so forth and highlights Maltese (an Afro-Asiatic language) and Basque as anomalies. Full text http://www.nature.com/nsu/020121/020121-2.html Refs Benedetto, D., Caglioti, E. & Loreto, V. Language trees and zipping. Physical Review Letters, 88, 048702, (2002). http://publish.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v88/e048702/ ---<><><><><><><><><><><><>----Language----<><><><><><><><><><><><><> Copyrights/"Fair Use": http://www.templetons.com/brad/copymyths.html The "fair use" exemption to copyright law was created to allow things such as commentary, parody, news reporting, research and education about copyrighted works without the permission of the author. That's important so that copyright law doesn't block your freedom to express your own works -- only the ability to express other people's. Intent, and damage to the commercial value of the work are important considerations. You are currently subscribed to language as: language at listserv.linguistlist.org To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-language-4283Y at csam-lists.montclair.edu