Taida

Internet Biosemiotics Resources台大演講網 「展望」系列演講

人是萬物之靈？- 看我們和動物有多相近！ 杜銘章 教授 (國立師範大學生命科學系)

人之異於禽獸幾希？ - 從基因組看人的演化 周成功 教授

大開眼界 - 動物的視覺與行為 國立清華大學 焦傳金 教授

生物訊號溝通的管道 - 人為干擾的負面效應 嚴宏洋 研究員 (中研院細胞與個體生物學研究所)

大腦如何控制動物行為？- 基因與神經網路的可塑性 江安世 所長 (國立清華大學生物科技研究所)

由基因看演化 - 從果蠅的複眼談發育的演化歷程 孫以瀚 研究員

誰才是贏家？- 病毒與宿主間的戰爭與妥協 羅竹芳 教授

令人「又怕又愛」的新科技 - 從動物之生殖技術、基因轉殖、與複製科技談起 鄭登貴 教授 (國立臺灣大學動物科學技術學系)

追瘤計畫 - 偵搜與追殺流竄轉移之癌細胞的新科技 白果能 博士 (中研院生物醫學科學研究所)

追夢計畫-談資訊工程在睡眠醫學的應用 陽明大學腦科研究所 郭博昭教授

Grey Matters

UCSD TV Grey Matters: From Molecule to Mind

Music and the Mind

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The Origin of the Human Mind: Insights from Brain Imaging and Evolution

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Bee Communication

Communication in Bees

Discover how bees communicate by sounds and dances and how these mechanisms have evolved.

"What do Bees Say to Other Bees?"

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"See and Hear Bees Dance"

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Overview

Aside from humans, the highly social bees (honey bees and stingless bees) are the only animals that use sophisticated symbolic communication. Honey bees can communicate the distance and direction to a good food source by using sounds and "dances" inside the nest. Honey bees cannot communicate height. Thus the discovery of a stingless bee that can symbolically communicate distance and height provides an exciting new opportunity to explore sophisticated symbolic communication.

Why This Science Matters

Basic Research

There are many levels at which this type of research has a broader significance. At one level, I believe that it appeals to anyone who has ever wondered what animals may be thinking and what they may be communicating. At another level, research into the evolution of sophisticated representational communication (the ability to abstractly encode and transmit information) approaches the giant goal of understanding the evolution of cognition and communication.

I will not claim that stingless bees can ever tell us how we think and how human communication evolved. However, we are not alone in the world and to understand how other sophisticated animal societies, namely the highly social bees, perceive and communicate information about their world may enable us to understand some of the possibilities that exist for the evolution of symbolic communication. Especially intriguing is the question of why symbolic communication is so rare. Only humans and highly social bees possess sophisticated symbolic communication. However, there is relatively little variation that can help us understand the evolution of symbolic communication in humans or honey bees. Stingless bees are a great group to explore because only some stingless bees possess symbolic communication. In other words, we can use the variation found in stingless bees to learn the advantages and disadvantages of symbolic communication.

Conservation Biology

At the level of biological conservation, stingless bees are keystone species. They are the most important native pollinator in Central and South America. Although Africanized honey bees have invaded many of these habitats, stingless bees occupy important niches. Understanding the role of stingless bees in their diverse ecosystems is therefore vital for our effort to preserve biodiversity and the study of stingless bee foraging and communication systems is an essential part of understanding their pollination strategies. In Brazil, researchers are already analyzing pollen and nectar gathered by stingless bees to understand how many species they effect, and how their pattern of pollination changes throughout the seasons. By decoding the symbolic communication of some species, we will also be able to learn where food sources are located, how their foraging range changes seasonally. In the future, we will be able to take a colony and have the researcher simply observe what is going on inside the nest, "decoding" the communication system to find out where the bees have gone for food. Imagine having thousands of probes scouting out the location of even the smallest flowers and inflorescences and reporting back to you!

Sustainable "Green" Economic Development

At an economic level, stingless bees have an important role to play in maintaining a sustainable livelihood that is intimately linked to protection of the forest environment. In the Amazon region, stingless bee honey that is made from natural nectar sources is highly prized. The cost of such honey is similar to the cost of fine French champagne! Stingless bee honeys are believed to be medically beneficial and many types contain interesting compounds, including Alkaloids. In fact, stingless bee honey has interesting antibiotic effects that appear to derive from secondary compounds. Unlike the honey produced by honey bees, stingless bee honeys are usually not sweet enough to resist the development of bacteria and mold. Yet stingless bee honey is able to stay unspoiled in extremely humid, tropical environments.

Because such valuable honey can only be obtained from natural forests, stingless bee apiculture is a natural, sustainable way of harvesting resources that encourages forest preservation and can provide a source of income for local people. However before stingless bee "farming" can become widespread, it is essential that we learn more about their foraging system-what range they need, what types of nectar they collect, and how any artificial manipulations to improve honey harvests affect their recruitment communication systems.

Science Matters

UCSD TV Science Matters

Communication in Bees

The Code of Life

Mind

How the Mind Works

Christopher deCharms scans the brain in real time

Vilayanur Ramachandran on your mind

Keith Barry does brain magic

Jill Bolte Taylor's powerful stroke of insight

Al Seckel says our brains are mis-wired

Susan Savage-Rumbaugh on apes that write

Jeff Hawkins on how brain science will ch ...

Steven Pinker on language and thought

Susan Blackmore on memes and "temes"

Dan Dennett on dangerous memes

Martin Seligman on positive psychology

Helen Fisher studies the brain in love

Helen Fisher tells us why we love, cheat

Sugata Mitra shows how kids teach themselves

Daniel Goleman on compassion

Arthur Benjamin does "Mathemagic"

Sherwin Nuland on electroshock therapy

Howard Rheingold on collaboration

Peter Donnelly shows how stats fool juries

Michael Shermer on believing strange things

Dan Gilbert asks, Why are we happy?

Ken Robinson says schools kill creativity

Murray Gell-Mann on the ancestor of language

Brain Magic

Brain Magic

Bird Brains

Bird Brains Play Video (12:47)

Ofer Tchernichovski Laboratory of Animal Behavior Dept. of Biology CCNY

Neuroplasticity

Neuroplasticity

It's a Brain Thing: Brain Development & Neuroplasticit y Pt 1

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Brain Fitness Program

Brain Fitness Program

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The Brain Fitness Program PBS 4x3 NEW Trailer

Posit Science: The Brain Fitness Program

Brain Fitness Software - Word From Posit Science

Brain Fitness Software - ABC News Report

Brain and Sex

Brain and Sex

Mark Gungor - Men's Brain Women's Brain - EXTENDED Tale of Two Brains

Mark Gungor || Laugh Your Way to a Better Marriage

Male and Female Brains are Different - fMRI

Differences Between the Male and Female Brain

Sex on the Brain

The difference between men and women's brains

Difference Between the Male and Female Brain

Male and Female Brains are Different

Men are STILL from Mars and Women are STILL from Venus!

The Differences Between Men and Women

The View: Dr Daniel Amen

Women Brains

Gay Brains vs Straight; TIME Article

NLP

NLP

NLP Anchoring Explained

NLP Anchoring in Action

Why you should Master NLP

Remain in your power with NLP techniques

NLP Anchoring- A Technique For Building Attraction With Girl

How to Succeed With Women- Use NLP Cognitive Reframing

Language Evolution Theory

bonobo apes in pan-homo culture

Primatologist Susan Savage-Rumbaugh's TEDTalk

Savage-Rumbaugh asks whether uniquely human traits, and other animals' behaviors, are hardwired by species. Then she rolls a video that makes you think: maybe not. The bonobo apes she works with understand spoken English. One follows her instructions to take a cigarette lighter from her pocket and use it to start a fire. Bonobos are shown making tools, drawing symbols to communicate, and playing Pac-Man -- all tasks learned just by watching. Maybe it's not always biology that causes a species to act as it does, she suggests. Maybe it's cultural exposure to how things are done.

Speakers Susan Savage-Rumbaugh: Primate authority

Susan Savage-Rumbaugh has made startling breakthroughs in her lifelong work with chimpanzees and bonobos, showing the animals to be adept in picking up language and other "intelligent" behaviors.

Why you should listen to her:

Into the great debate over intelligence and instinct -- over what makes us human -- Susan Savage-Rumbaugh has thrown a monkey wrench. Her work with apes has forced a new way of looking at what traits are truly and distinctly human, and new questions about whether some abilities we attribute to "species" are in fact due to an animal's social environment. She believes culture and tradition, in many cases more than biology, can account for differences between humans and other primates.

Her bonobo apes, including a superstar named Kanzi, understand spoken English, interact, and have learned to execute tasks once believed limited to humans -- such as starting and controlling a fire. They aren't trained in classic human-animal fashion. Like human children, the apes learn by watching. "Parents really don't know how they teach their children language," she has said. "Why should I have to know how I teach Kanzi language? I just act normal around him, and he learns it."

Sue Savage-Rumbaugh

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Sue Savage-Rumbaugh is a primatologist most famous for her work with two bonobos, Kanzi and Panbanisha, investigating their apparent use of "Great Ape language" using lexigrams and computer-based keyboards. Until recently based at Georgia State University's Language Research Center in Atlanta, Georgia, she has now moved to the Great Ape Trust of Des Moines, Iowa.

Savage-Rumbaugh's view of language - that it is not confined to humans and is learnable by other ape species - is very controversial within linguistics, psychology and other sciences of the brain and mind. For example, the cognitive scientist Steven Pinker strongly criticised the position of Savage-Rumbaugh and others in his award-winning The Language Instinct, arguing that Kanzi and other non-human primates failed to grasp the fundamentals of language.

Books

Savage-Rumbaugh, E.S. 1986. Ape Language: From Conditioned Response to Symbol. New York: Columbia University Press. ASIN B000OQ1WIY

Savage-Rumbaugh, E.S., and Roger Lewin. 1996. Kanzi: The Ape at the Brink of the Human Mind. Wiley. ISBN 047115959X

Savage-Rumbaugh, E.S., Stuart G. Shanker, and Talbot J. Taylor. 2001. Apes, Language, and the Human Mind. Oxford. ISBN 019514712X

External links

• Savage-Rumbaugh, Sue. 2004. Apes that write, start fires and play Pac-Man. Accessed online video: July 18, 2007. Monterey, California. TED Talks.
• Interview with Sue Savage-Rumbaugh
• Biographical Sketch
• My Hero Project
• Great Ape Trust of Iowa