Humans favor speech as the primary means of linguistic communication. Spoken languages are so common many think language and speech are one and the same. But the prevalence of sign languages suggests otherwise. Not only can ...
Apr 03, 2013
not rated yet
1
(Phys.org)—Homer's great masterpieces, The Iliad and The Odyssey, have been dated to around 762 BCE by new research based on the statistical modelling of language evolution.
Feb 26, 2013
4.5 / 5 (2)
0
"The sounds uttered by birds offer in several respects the nearest analogy to language," Charles Darwin wrote in "The Descent of Man" (1871), while contemplating how humans learned to speak. Language, he ...
Feb 21, 2013
5 / 5 (1)
1
|
Territorial song sparrows use increasingly threatening signals to ward off trespassing rivals. First an early warning that matches the intruder's song, then wing waving – a bird's version of "flipping the bird" – as the ...
Feb 12, 2013
not rated yet
0
|
Scientists at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden have made a large step towards the understanding of how human genes are regulated. In a new study, published in the journal Cell, they identified the DNA sequences that bind t ...
Jan 17, 2013
not rated yet
0
Scientists have taken a step forward in helping to solve one of life's greatest mysteries – what makes us human?
Nov 14, 2012
4.3 / 5 (12)
99
|
The Internet is awash with text. Databases swell larger and larger by the minute. How can the vast amount of textual data be systematically analysed and managed, as the number of languages, domains, styles ...
Nov 09, 2012
4 / 5 (3)
1
(Phys.org)—Unlike other species, humans speak to each other in remarkably diverse ways. Some of our 6,000 to 8,000 languages use clicks (!Kung). Others don't differentiate between nouns and verbs (Straits Salish). Still ...
Nov 06, 2012
4 / 5 (1)
4
|
When learning a new language, we automatically organize words into sentences that will be both clearly understood and efficient (quick) to communicate. That's the finding of a new study reported today in the Proceedings of ...
Oct 15, 2012
4.4 / 5 (5)
2
|
Guys who imitate Luciano Pavarotti or Justin Bieber to get the girls aren't alone. Male mice may do a similar trick, matching the pitch of other males' ultrasonic serenades. The mice also have certain brain ...
Oct 10, 2012
5 / 5 (2)
1
|
(Phys.org)—Dr Gillian Forrester, a visiting fellow in psychology at the University of Sussex and a senior lecturer in psychology at the University of Westminster, analysed hand actions directed towards ...
Oct 09, 2012
5 / 5 (1)
2
|
Scientists from The University of Manchester were part of a European team of researchers who concluded that digital assistance for 21 of the 30 languages investigated is 'non-existent' or 'weak' at best.
Sep 25, 2012
3.5 / 5 (8)
1
Baby songbirds learn to sing by imitation, just as human babies do. So researchers at Harvard and Utrecht University, in the Netherlands, have been studying the brains of zebra finches—red-beaked, white-breasted ...
Aug 24, 2012
not rated yet
1
|
Could the word for mother prove that Turkey was the birthplace of hundreds of languages as diverse as Hindi, Russian, Dutch, Albanian, Italian and English?
Aug 23, 2012
3.9 / 5 (16)
9
Perhaps Hal from "2001: A Space Odyssey" may not have been wrong when he said: "I'm sorry, Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that." Machines—even Apple's Siri—cannot yet completely understand our natural language, a Cornell ...
Jul 24, 2012
2 / 5 (1)
4
