New language/cooperation paper by Bickerton and Szathmáry today. What a dream team. The best news is that it’s open access. WOO! GO OPEN ACCESS!
Here’s the abstract:
The emergence of language and the high degree of cooperation found among humans seems to require more than a straightforward enhancement of primate traits. Some triggering episode unique to human ancestors was likely necessary. Here it is argued that confrontational scavenging was such an episode. Arguments for and against an established confrontational scavenging niche are discussed, as well as the probable effects of such a niche on language and co-operation. Finally, several possible directions for future research are suggested.
Here’s a link:
http://www.biomedcentral.com/content/pdf/1471-2148-11-261.pdf
Thank you for this news and the link. The paper strikes me as interesting but also somewhat speculative – I’d be interested in hearing some comments on it?