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They could also be simply idle doodling or decorations.
by WalterBright 8mo ago
They could also be simply idle doodling or decorations.
- bryanlarsen 8mo agoToo bad we don't have a paper that applies information theory techniques to answer that question. Oh wait...
- WalterBright 8mo agoI remain skeptical. Pictures in clouds.
- djtango 8mo agoWhat are you skeptical about? 40k years ago humans were just as we the humans of today, but they also faced harsher environments to survive in. Technology has enabled us to compound advanced intergenerationally but I don't really believe we're actually that special when compared to our forebears...
- chmod775 8mo agoGiven that pressure from natural selection has lessened a lot, chances are that we are less special now. Our intellect evolved for survival, but now it's very much optional - has been for many generations. It and may now even be inversely correlated with having offspring. I would be unsurprised if we're noticably dumber now than we used to be.
- WalterBright 8mo agoTake a look at Fig 1. A grid of dots. A sequence of X's. Does it mean "Property of Thag?" "Happy Birthday, Mom"? Are the X's there to improve one's grip on the object? Are they just idle doodling around the campfire? Hunter-gatherers have little use for writing. We'll never know. When I was young I was fascinated by drawing 5 pointed stars. It meant nothing.
- card_zero 8mo agoPictures in clouds, face on mars, pareidolia, I Want To Believe. That's what's to be skeptical about.
- cindyllm 8mo ago[dead]
- KevinMS 8mo agoconsidering there are so many of them I think you are right.
- coldtea 8mo agoYes, the specialist researchers didn't think of that.
- card_zero 8mo agoThe researchers were not invested in thinking of that.
- dash2 8mo agoBut they explicitly discuss it!
- card_zero 8mo agoI wouldn't mind a quote, because the paper was incredibly hard to read, full of hedging, and never seemed to get to the point. OK, there's this section: > The Question of Decoration. > Recent studies have measured the regularity of notches on bones to determine whether they are more or less visually striking as a decoration. Increasing the regularity of distances between notches—up to the differences just about perceivable by humans—is argued to enhance the decorative value. Such technological and experimental analyses are useful to thoroughly understand the production processes behind a given mobile artifact. On the other hand, categories such as “decoration” and “numerical system,” or “decoration” and “writing system” are not mutually exclusive. Rather, sign systems can be used as decoration without losing their information value. This is exemplified in historic times by calligraphy, inscriptions on pottery and temples, tattoos of graphemes on human bodies, and many other artistic expressions. “Information density” in an information-theoretic sense is a fundamental property of a sign sequence, irrespective of whether there is a human present to interpret it—or merely find it aesthetically pleasing. So what are they saying: yes it looks like decoration, but maybe that's because it's calligraphy, and it's less than completely random. That means it's proto-writing because there's a scientific theory we can use to cloud the question of what it is exactly that we're claiming. The BBC article on this quotes a researcher saying "The Stone Age sign sequences are an early alternative to writing." Fucking hell, "alternative to writing". We're not going out on a limb and saying its writing, but we want to heavily imply that without risking being wrong.
- adzm 8mo agoIt's probably both, each lending to the existence of the other.
- Netcob 8mo agoFor that they used their Warhammer 80k figurines