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Content provided by Quanta Magazine, Steven Strogatz, and Janna Levin. All podcast content including episodes, graphics, and podcast descriptions are uploaded and provided directly by Quanta Magazine, Steven Strogatz, and Janna Levin or their podcast platform partner. If you believe someone is using your copyrighted work without your permission, you can follow the process outlined here https://podcastplayer.com/legal.
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What Can Birdsong Teach Us About Human Language?

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Manage episode 451299176 series 3328067
Content provided by Quanta Magazine, Steven Strogatz, and Janna Levin. All podcast content including episodes, graphics, and podcast descriptions are uploaded and provided directly by Quanta Magazine, Steven Strogatz, and Janna Levin or their podcast platform partner. If you believe someone is using your copyrighted work without your permission, you can follow the process outlined here https://podcastplayer.com/legal.

It’s fair to say that enjoyment of a podcast would be severely limited without the human capacity to create and understand speech. That capacity has often been cited as a defining characteristic of our species, and one that sets us apart in the long history of life on Earth. Yet we know that other species communicate in complex ways. Studies of the neurological foundations of language suggest that birdsong, or communication among bats or elephants, originates with brain structures similar to our own. So why do some species vocalize while others don’t? In this episode, Erich Jarvis, who studies behavior and neurogenetics at the Rockefeller University, chats with Janna Levin about the surprising connections between human speech, birdsong and dance.

  continue reading

62 episodes

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iconShare
 
Manage episode 451299176 series 3328067
Content provided by Quanta Magazine, Steven Strogatz, and Janna Levin. All podcast content including episodes, graphics, and podcast descriptions are uploaded and provided directly by Quanta Magazine, Steven Strogatz, and Janna Levin or their podcast platform partner. If you believe someone is using your copyrighted work without your permission, you can follow the process outlined here https://podcastplayer.com/legal.

It’s fair to say that enjoyment of a podcast would be severely limited without the human capacity to create and understand speech. That capacity has often been cited as a defining characteristic of our species, and one that sets us apart in the long history of life on Earth. Yet we know that other species communicate in complex ways. Studies of the neurological foundations of language suggest that birdsong, or communication among bats or elephants, originates with brain structures similar to our own. So why do some species vocalize while others don’t? In this episode, Erich Jarvis, who studies behavior and neurogenetics at the Rockefeller University, chats with Janna Levin about the surprising connections between human speech, birdsong and dance.

  continue reading

62 episodes

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