Posted by anthonynorth on December 14, 2007
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Okay, things just keep happening in the world to monkey about with our mind. The latest is a series of tests with three chimps who seem to have better memories than humans.
The tests, carried out by Kyoto University, Japan, consisted of random positioning of the numbers 1 to 9, flashed briefly on a screen, to be replaced by blank squares. Chimps correctly touched the squares in numerical order far quicker than humans.
Do such tests suggest human-like intelligence in chimps?
I don’t think so. Rather, they highlight the central difference between humans and other animals. And it is all to do with thought processes.
To me, the defining point of our uniqueness is that we can put everything to the back of the mind in order to concentrate on a task in hand. This seems innocuous, but could have been the defining point of the human.
We are tool-users, but this is often mis-understood.
It doesn’t mean we pick up things to use as tools, but fashion tools for future use. This requires the ability to concentrate above the instinctual drives of nature.
I suggest other animals do not concentrate in this way, but have a more ‘holistic’ mind-set, taking in a bigger picture than us. Essential for survival, this allows those chimps to ‘see’ the entire pattern, whereas we have to concentrate on each number at a time, and then work out the pattern the hard way.
But I guess that’s just us – always doing things the hard way.
© Anthony North, December 2007
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Posted by anthonynorth on December 14, 2007
THOUGHTS FROM A COMMON MAN
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A MIRACLE HEALING?
A rather marvelous story has been going round some elements of the UK media this week. It concerns a 56 year old woman who, after six years in a wheelchair, got up and walked, due, so she believed, to the power of prayer.
Now, I’m not interested in the actual ‘truth’ of her claims, as such. Of more interest are her claims for state benefits during this period. And I don’t mean whether she was entitled to them – in my mind she clearly was.
The interest comes, it seems, when she went to the benefits agency and told them she no longer needed them. And here we meet the total rigidity of the system, for it seems they continued to pay a further £3,500 before they were finally stopped.
It seems they didn’t have a button to press for ‘miracles’.
© Anthony North, December 2007
DISGRACEFUL CONDUCT
British forces in Afghanistan have played a leading role in retaking Musa Qala in the last few days. In Taliban hands since February, this strategic town will now be garrisoned by the British Army. It is a spectacular victory …
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THE POLICE ARE ANGRY
British police are enraged. After the Home Secretary decided to back-date an already pitiful, but agreed, pay rise, they have called for her resignation after expressing no confidence in their boss …
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