Religion, Language and the Human Brain

Did you know that the latest theory regarding the development of languages is that not only did human brain regions come to develop to deal with itm but that languages have developed in ways that accomodate themselves to the human brain?

Babels Dawn Blog

Neither did I.

Some of the evidence for this comes from a study in which a new rule-less language, consisting simply of "words", the sounds of which had been randomly generated by a computer, with meanings based on simple associations is taught to one person. Partly because there is no established syntax, it is rather difficult to learn, but given enough time and effort, eventually the learner manages to say things. This is where the fun start. A second person learns the language entirely by copying the first person's way of using it. Then a third person learns through the second person's use of the language, and so on.

Somewhere along the line, "magic" happens. By the time the 10th person begins to learn it, the language has become much simpler to learn, the sound of it has developed regularities, and it has syntax.

Very interesting. I wonder if any kind of similar approach could be taken to the development of religion.

Religion comes to mind because of another article, this time in the Economist.

EU tackles religion via science

It seems that the EU will be using two million € to study the biological bases for religious belief.

I'm not sure whether that amount of money would be sufficient, but I'm wondering whether a study similar to the study on the development of languages could be done. It seems to me that since religion and language are two of the basic behavioral markers of humanness there might well be commonalities in the way they developed.

There are differences, of course. In general, people don't fight over languages, though sometimes some folks in the US seem to come close to it. And there are a number of instances in history when an ethnic minority clung at considerable risk to their language. Barcelona and the rest of the Catlan region of Spain during the Franco years was such a place. And let's add dance to the list, because the cultural folk dance is another cultural marker closely held. Ask any Barcelonan about the Sardana.

Also, dance and religion have in common the characteristic of not bestowing any obvious benefits, as language does, to those practising them.

The EU research efforts will be "designed to look at the mental mechanisms needed to represent an omniscient deity, whether (and how) belief in such a “surveillance-camera” God might improve reproductive success to an individual's Darwinian advantage, and whether religion enhances a person's reputation—for instance, do people think that those who believe in God are more trustworthy than those who do not? The researchers will also seek to establish whether different religions foster different levels of co-operation, for what reasons, and whether such co-operation brings collective benefits, both to the religious community and to those outside it."

I'm tired now, so I'll stop, but the rest of the Economist article is very interesting indeed. If what I have said interests you, do read it.

The Post-Turtle Post

I'd give credit for this where it was due if I knew who originated this. Let me know if you know.

In Texas, now and then, you'll come across a post-turtle. A post-turtle is a turtle that someone has picked up and put on top of a fence post.

Now, when you see one of these, you know four things:

1. He didn't get there by himself.
2. He doesn't belong there.
3. He can't do anything while he's there.
4. The only thing to do is to get him out of this situation and send him on his way.

Don't look now, but we've got ourselves a post-turtle in the White House.

I'm not Telling You in the Title

Why won't I tell you in the title what this blog entry is about?

You might steal my idea.

I'm not sure it 's really a profitable idea. I just hatched it. It's late. It may be something nobody in their right mind would pay for. But right now it feels pretty good to me, so I'm writing it down in the most convenient place, which happens to be my blog.

Because my interests are so broad, and because I like doing research, and because I like helping people along whatever path they really want to follow, I must have one of the most extensive sets of favorites files that exists. And because sometimes folks don't have time or want to make the effort to hunt up all the things on the web that might be useful to them, they might actually be willing to pay someone to do it. So it just occurred to me to set up a business doing just that.

So, if you read this blog (I never know if anyone does because I don't have a counter on it.), let me know what you think. Is it so good that you have already stolen it? Can you not imagine anything more boring? Are you going to say that all a person has to do is track down the right blog to have exactly that work done for them for free?

Hey, it's just an idea.

Stones with Holes, the Little People, and Dragons

I used to be a scientist. A real honest-to-goodness write-my-own-grants, do-my-own-research, run-my-own-lab scientist at a major medical school. And yet...

I never ever really stopped believing in magic and in the little people.

The way I always looked at it is that if a mythical concept reappears over and over in the folklore of many different cultures, then there must be an element of truth to it. Probably, many of us, when first finding out about dinosaurs, thought "Of course! Dragons!"

In 1995 I moved to Krakow, Poland. It's a magical place. Of all the cities of Poland, Krakow alone has remain untouched from the 14th century. In the chronicles of history, it has worked sort of like this: Every time Poland got invaded and conquered, enemies sweeping across the country and taking over, eventually they entered Krakow, looked around and thought "This is a really neat place. Let's set up our headquarters here." And so they let it be because that made it more pleasant for the conquerers.

But the people of Krakow, even now, at least half believe another explanation. In Krakow, there is a castle, and under the castle lives a dragon who magically protects the city. i find this very charming.

But what about other common myths, such as the one of little people. A few years ago, a scientific group announced finding a group of very small, yet adult, human-like skeletons. At first, it seemed that these literal "little people" lived a very long time ago, far beyond the range of recorded history (though not so far back as the dinosaur/dragons). But a new report says that further research has revealed that they may have lived just 2000 years ago, well within the range of recorded history.

The Little People

I am delighted at this news.

So you should not be surprised that I have adopted one of the folk beliefs of my new country, England. When I first heard of self-drilled stones and how they protected a home or brought good dreams if hung on a bed in the fantasy books that are my favorite reads, I began to look for them. For months I looked and found nothing. Then last October, my very lucky sister came for a visit and we went walking along the Peddlar's way between Sheringham and Cromer on the Norfolk north coast. As we walked, I told her about the stones with natural holes in them, called self-drilled but found in or near water. Within about 10 minutes of my telling her the story, she found four. One for each of my family's households, my own, my sister's, my brother's, and my dad's. I put mine by the bottom of my front door where it remains. The next week, I won £10 in the lottery, the only time I've ever won anything. I get a certain feeling of serenity every time I see it there, as if it ties me more firmly to this new land than I might be otherwise.

I also read that if you look through one of these stones when I full moon is up, you can see the fairies. I admit, I tried once, but I haven't seen one yet. I do intend to keep trying, though. What a magical thing it would be to see one, even if I never told a single living soul.

Saving Gays and Beached whales

First, I want to add my voice to any others regarding the gay teenager who sought asylum in the UK when his boyfriend in Iran was executed, lost his appeal, fled to Holland, and has been sent back to the UK, which says he's run out of appeals and is scheduled to be deported back to Iran.

Gay Iranian Asylum Seeker

In the name of all that is the best of humanity, DO NOT deport this boy to his death!

On a lighter note, continuing the theme of yesterday's post, I have come upon another piece of evidence that there will be intelligent life remaining on earth even if we humans succeed, eventually, in wiping ourselves out.

Apparently dolphins and whales can communicate with each other. The evidence comes from Australia where a group of people had been trying their best, unsuccessfully, to save two beached whales. Up came a dolphin, one of those who often came to that place to play with the swimmers. The dolphin somehow communicated with the whales, calming them down, and excorting them out to open seas.

Dolphin Saves Whales

What we might learn if we really did ever learn to communicate with the other creatures of the world.

And the Hippos Shall Lie Down With the...

giant tortoise.

Are we humans really the most advanced species on this earth? Sometimes it seems very obvious that we are not.

I cam across this link to a baby hippo who has claimed a huge old tortoise as it's momma. The tortoise doesn't seem to mind at all.

Hippo and momma tortoise



And here we humans are, treating so many minor differences as reason enough to reject those of our own species. Pretty pitiful, huh?

Don't Destroy Those Fakes

I'm watching a TV program about fakes, all those fake designer goods etc. They showed a vast room of fakes that had been intercepted and were due to be destroyed.

DESTROYED?!!!!!

Well, the fake drugs, if they really are fake, and not just unauthorized generics. Of course those should be destroyed.

But the goods that are useful goods, just with fake branding?!!! While there are people in the world living in horrible poverty who simply need decent clothing and other goods, shouldn't there be a place where companies can sign up to have confiscated fakes with their branding donated to international aid organizations to be distributed to those that need them?

Live like a Sea Cucumber

I know what you're thinking:

Why would I want to?

Well, actually, you might not want to LIVE like one, but you might want to use the sea cucumber's house-building techniques. Their method is rather like erecting a tent and then freezing it, making it non-flexible. What's even better is that they can de-solidize it, too. Sure would make moving easier, right? It's all done with nanofibers forming a sort of web of segments connected rather like the segments of a carpenter's rule.

sea cucumber's house

Right now, scientists are using their understanding of the technique to try to figure a way to make tiny little brain implants that are not rigid and thus more compatible with brain tissue. But it could be upscaled, right? Just a matter of a few orders of magnitude, right?

I know who they should call upon to help them understand the sea cucumber's methods. I ran across him just yesterday via a link to an archived article in one of my favorite blogs,

Fashion Incubator

, which is about everything you need to know to set up and run your own fashion business but sometimes ranges as far afield as my own interests.

He's a mathematician whose specialty is wrinkling, crinkling, really intricate origami-type structures, and carpenter's rule-like constructions. I kid you not. He's one of those boffins (That's the word the English have for the folks in your class who break the curve. Isn't it great?) who got a Ph.D. at 20, immediately became MIT's youngest professor ever, and got a MacArthur "Genius" fellowship in 2003. His name is

Erik Demaine

Keep reading all three pages of that link and you'll read that he's presently using what he knows about these things to understand and possibly predict protein folding and, since he's interested in architecture, to figure out how to build a building around an internal carpenter's rule structure.

So, if those professors in the first link were to get together with Dr. Demaine, a whole new transportable architecure might be the result....

Which would be a great thing for all those folks who live near the seaside in this age of global warming and super storms as is happening in the UK, where I am, today.