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Not sure if it's the case with whales, bit as far as I know there is no recorded use of questions in the animal kingdom - all communication seems to be enunciat

Not sure if it's the case with whales, bit as far as I know there is no recorded use of questions in the animal kingdom - all communication seems to be enunciative, or orders. Questions are exclusive to humans...

jd115 5y ago
This is because humans are the only living thing which feels inadequate enough to ask questions. No other creature feels like it lacks knowledge. And yes, I'll take it a step further: the reason science glorifies questions is because science is human beings systematically mass-hypnotising each other into greater and greater inadequacy. You ever notice how you never get enough answers in science? Every "answer" you get scientifically only seems to bring about more and more questions? We call it "scientific curiosity" and pretend to marvel at it, but come on, how shallow is that. What every other living creature (and every newborn human) intrinsically knows is that it knows all it needs to know. And that whenever it needs to know more, it will know it. That's it. There is no scientific process, no philosophical inquiries, no questioning. No doubt. No lack.
- rsj_hn 5y ago
  You must not have a dog waiting for you when you come home late
  - jd115 5y ago
    Yes, great point - but this is only because the animals we domesticate have been brainwashed by us humans into feeling (almost, but never quite) as inadequate as we do.
- glogla 5y ago
  To ask questions, you have to 1) understand that others have minds 2) understand that there are things you don't know 3) understand that others might know things you don't 4) understand that you may ask them and they will tell you. That's actually a lot of advanced cognition, even if it doesn't look that way to us.
  - jd115 5y ago
    1) This is universal. Everything understands this. I'd argue adult humans actually have the least developed (or, more accurately, the most diluted) understanding of this. 2) Irrelevant. You know everything you need to know at any given moment. 3) Irrelevant. Nobody knows anything you care about. 4) False. Yes, you may ask, but nobody can transfer their knowledge to you, because their knowledge is of no use to you. Your questions can only be answered with your knowledge. Which makes questioning obsolete (which is where I started). Its not a lot of advanced cognition. It's a lot of misunderstanding of how life works.
PeterisP 5y ago
TIL - I expected that the chimpanzee sign language experiments would be a counterexample, but apparently the (IMHO surprising) lack of question usage was one of their outcomes.
- torben-friis 5y ago
  Yup. I knew it because I fell in a Wikipedia rabbit hole about animal intelligence not long ago. It was very intriguing to me, as someone with no previous knowledge, how this was assumed to be an only human trait yet the fact was pretty much glossed over. I find fascinating the idea of a step between being stuck with the information that others emit and being able to and request arbitrary information at will, being part of what made us what we are. Once you think about it, it really is an amazing advantage.
  - IIAOPSW 5y ago
    I'm working on a sort-of language as a side project and have fallen down many of the same rabbit holes that you have. I don't think questions are one of the key features that make language special because in the language I'm working on questions are an emergent property. There are two structural words in my language, "propose" and "tell". From these words you can build complicated ideas such as lying ("I propose to you: you propose to him: [malicious plan]. [real plan]."). Asking a question can be done with "I propose you tell me ...". Instead of saying "I think", you say something like "I tell myself". The feature of language that seems the most surprisingly powerful is placeholder words. The words like "someone", "somewhere", "somehow". I call these the entropy words because they are the words for the information you don't have. They represent sets of possible things rather than a literal specific thing. "someone moved to Silessia". In fact you can generally substitute a set of things anywhere you would use a literal thing. Any set will do. For example "John/George/Ringo/Paul played in the Beatles." Adjectives can be understood as just specifying a set using set-builder notation. For example "short man" is "{x in Men such that short(x)}". Just from set builder notation, first order logic comes along for free. I originally thought my language would need logic words, but this is not the case.
    - 5y ago
glogla 5y ago
Allegedly the famous parrot Alex asked what color he is. But the whole line of research is doubted by a lot of people.
stubish 5y ago
There seems to be a lot of wishful thinking in the research. The article mentions the Great Tits having 2 calls for alarm, which if made out of order have no effect, and calling that grammar. You could also call it a single call. Grammar to me means being able to construct new meaning from parts. While interesting and maybe useful, if this sort of research bears fruit I believe lots of people waxing lyrical over how amazing it will be to talk with the animals are going to be rather disappointed. Basic conversation requires a vocabulary in the hundreds, and so far it seems we are looking at word-equivalents maybe in the dozens, in the more capable species. And then you have all the concepts we take for granted except in infants, such as 'I' and 'you' and self awareness.

jd115 5y ago

This is because humans are the only living thing which feels inadequate enough to ask questions. No other creature feels like it lacks knowledge. And yes, I'll take it a step further: the reason science glorifies questions is because science is human beings systematically mass-hypnotising each other into greater and greater inadequacy. You ever notice how you never get enough answers in science? Every "answer" you get scientifically only seems to bring about more and more questions? We call it "scientific curiosity" and pretend to marvel at it, but come on, how shallow is that. What every other living creature (and every newborn human) intrinsically knows is that it knows all it needs to know. And that whenever it needs to know more, it will know it. That's it. There is no scientific process, no philosophical inquiries, no questioning. No doubt. No lack.

rsj_hn 5y ago
You must not have a dog waiting for you when you come home late
- jd115 5y ago
  Yes, great point - but this is only because the animals we domesticate have been brainwashed by us humans into feeling (almost, but never quite) as inadequate as we do.
glogla 5y ago
To ask questions, you have to 1) understand that others have minds 2) understand that there are things you don't know 3) understand that others might know things you don't 4) understand that you may ask them and they will tell you. That's actually a lot of advanced cognition, even if it doesn't look that way to us.
- jd115 5y ago
  1) This is universal. Everything understands this. I'd argue adult humans actually have the least developed (or, more accurately, the most diluted) understanding of this. 2) Irrelevant. You know everything you need to know at any given moment. 3) Irrelevant. Nobody knows anything you care about. 4) False. Yes, you may ask, but nobody can transfer their knowledge to you, because their knowledge is of no use to you. Your questions can only be answered with your knowledge. Which makes questioning obsolete (which is where I started). Its not a lot of advanced cognition. It's a lot of misunderstanding of how life works.

PeterisP 5y ago

TIL - I expected that the chimpanzee sign language experiments would be a counterexample, but apparently the (IMHO surprising) lack of question usage was one of their outcomes.

torben-friis 5y ago
Yup. I knew it because I fell in a Wikipedia rabbit hole about animal intelligence not long ago. It was very intriguing to me, as someone with no previous knowledge, how this was assumed to be an only human trait yet the fact was pretty much glossed over. I find fascinating the idea of a step between being stuck with the information that others emit and being able to and request arbitrary information at will, being part of what made us what we are. Once you think about it, it really is an amazing advantage.
- IIAOPSW 5y ago
  I'm working on a sort-of language as a side project and have fallen down many of the same rabbit holes that you have. I don't think questions are one of the key features that make language special because in the language I'm working on questions are an emergent property. There are two structural words in my language, "propose" and "tell". From these words you can build complicated ideas such as lying ("I propose to you: you propose to him: [malicious plan]. [real plan]."). Asking a question can be done with "I propose you tell me ...". Instead of saying "I think", you say something like "I tell myself". The feature of language that seems the most surprisingly powerful is placeholder words. The words like "someone", "somewhere", "somehow". I call these the entropy words because they are the words for the information you don't have. They represent sets of possible things rather than a literal specific thing. "someone moved to Silessia". In fact you can generally substitute a set of things anywhere you would use a literal thing. Any set will do. For example "John/George/Ringo/Paul played in the Beatles." Adjectives can be understood as just specifying a set using set-builder notation. For example "short man" is "{x in Men such that short(x)}". Just from set builder notation, first order logic comes along for free. I originally thought my language would need logic words, but this is not the case.
  - 5y ago

glogla 5y ago

Allegedly the famous parrot Alex asked what color he is. But the whole line of research is doubted by a lot of people.

stubish 5y ago

There seems to be a lot of wishful thinking in the research. The article mentions the Great Tits having 2 calls for alarm, which if made out of order have no effect, and calling that grammar. You could also call it a single call. Grammar to me means being able to construct new meaning from parts. While interesting and maybe useful, if this sort of research bears fruit I believe lots of people waxing lyrical over how amazing it will be to talk with the animals are going to be rather disappointed. Basic conversation requires a vocabulary in the hundreds, and so far it seems we are looking at word-equivalents maybe in the dozens, in the more capable species. And then you have all the concepts we take for granted except in infants, such as 'I' and 'you' and self awareness.