Behavioral and Brain Sciences

Table of Contents - August 2012 - Volume 35, Issue 04  

Open Peer Commentary

Evidence of recursion in tool use

Lluís Barceló-Coblijna1 and Antoni Gomilaa1

a1 Human Evolution and Cognition Group, University of the Balearic Islands, 07122 Palma. toni.gomila@uib.cat lluis.barcelo@uib.cat http://evocog.org/

Abstract

We discuss the discovery of technologies involving knotted netting, such as textiles, basketry, and cordage, in the Upper Paleolithic. This evidence, in our view, suggests a new way of connecting toolmaking and syntactic structure in human evolution, because these technologies already exhibit an “infinite use of finite means,” which we take to constitute the key transition to human cognition.

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