One could respond by saying that language is a specific human instinct, and if we were all elephants we would be talking about how no other species has anything like our uniquely elephant trunk, etc. etc. (I think I took that example from a Steven Pinker book?) There are certainly cognitive tasks that other animals can do that we can’t at all or as well, like dragonflies predicting the trajectories of their prey (although we could eventually program a computer to do that, I imagine). Anyway, to the larger point, I actually don’t have a strong opinion about the intelligence of “humans without human culture”, and don’t see how it’s particularly relevant to anything. “Humans without human culture” might or might not have language; I know that groups of kids can invent languages from scratch (e.g. Nicaraguan sign language) but I’m not sure about a single human.
There are certainly cognitive tasks that other animals can do that we can’t at all or as well, like dragonflies predicting the trajectories of their prey
That’s fine, but those aren’t nearly as powerful. Language was a big factor in humans taking over the world, predicting the trajectory of whatever dragonflies eat wasn’t and couldn’t be.
Anyway, to the larger point, I actually don’t have a strong opinion about the intelligence of “humans without human culture”, and don’t see how it’s particularly relevant to anything. “Humans without human culture” might or might not have language; I know that groups of kids can invent languages from scratch (e.g. Nicaraguan sign language) but I’m not sure about a single human.
The point is that it is possible to teach a human language, and it seems to be impossible to teach a non-human animal language.
One could respond by saying that language is a specific human instinct, and if we were all elephants we would be talking about how no other species has anything like our uniquely elephant trunk, etc. etc. (I think I took that example from a Steven Pinker book?) There are certainly cognitive tasks that other animals can do that we can’t at all or as well, like dragonflies predicting the trajectories of their prey (although we could eventually program a computer to do that, I imagine). Anyway, to the larger point, I actually don’t have a strong opinion about the intelligence of “humans without human culture”, and don’t see how it’s particularly relevant to anything. “Humans without human culture” might or might not have language; I know that groups of kids can invent languages from scratch (e.g. Nicaraguan sign language) but I’m not sure about a single human.
That’s fine, but those aren’t nearly as powerful. Language was a big factor in humans taking over the world, predicting the trajectory of whatever dragonflies eat wasn’t and couldn’t be.
The point is that it is possible to teach a human language, and it seems to be impossible to teach a non-human animal language.