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Geometry may be hard-wired into brain, study shows
Reuters ^ | Thu Jan 19, 2006 | Anon

Posted on 01/20/2006 3:11:23 AM PST by Pharmboy

Amazonian hunter-gatherers who lack written language and who have never seen a math book score highly on basic tests of geometric concepts, researchers said on Thursday in a study that suggests geometry may be hard-wired into the brain.

Adults and children alike showed a clear grasp of concepts such as where the center of a circle is and the logical extension of a straight line, the researchers report in this week's issue of the journal Science.

Stanislas Dehaene of the College de France in Paris and colleagues tested 14 children and 30 adults of an Amazonian group called the Munduruku, and compared their findings to tests of U.S. adults and children.

"Munduruku children and adults spontaneously made use of basic geometric concepts such as points, lines, parallelism, or right angles to detect intruders in simple pictures, and they used distance, angle, and sense relationships in geometrical maps to locate hidden objects," they wrote.

"Our results provide evidence for geometrical intuitions in the absence of schooling, experience with graphic symbols or maps, or a rich language of geometrical terms."

Geometry is an ancient field and Dehaene's team postulated that it may spring from innate abilities.

"Many of its propositions -- that two points determine a line, or that three orthogonal axes localize a point -- are judged to be self-evident and yet have been questioned on the basis of logical argument, physical theory, or experiment," the researchers wrote.

There was no way the Munduruku could have learned these ideas, they added.

"Most of the children and adults who took part in our experiments inhabit scattered, isolated villages and have little or no schooling, rulers, compasses, or maps," they wrote.

"Furthermore, the Munduruku language has few words dedicated to arithmetical, geometrical, or spatial concepts, although a variety of metaphors are spontaneously used."

They designed arrays of six images, each of which contained five conforming to a geometric concept and one that violated it.

"The participants were asked, in their language, to point to the weird or ugly one," the researchers wrote.

"All participants, even those aged 6, performed well above the chance level of 16.6 percent," they found. The average score was nearly 67 percent correct -- identical to the score for U.S. children.

"The spontaneous understanding of geometrical concepts and maps by this remote human community provides evidence that core geometrical knowledge, like basic arithmetic, is a universal constituent of the human mind," they concluded.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Foreign Affairs; Front Page News; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: brain; cognition; crevolist; hardwired; hunting; math; southamerica
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To: Netheron
Relativity is counterintuitive, an intellectual contract on the same order as atomic theory. Kant was right to say that we can only perceive three dimensions. Science as a whole has gone beyond our ability to imagine in the original sense of the word. It has become a code, and only the code-breakers can interpret it.
41 posted on 01/20/2006 8:34:10 AM PST by RobbyS ( CHIRHO)
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To: Pharmboy

Fascinating article. Thanks for posting it.


42 posted on 01/20/2006 8:34:52 AM PST by RightWingAtheist (Creationism Is Not Conservative!)
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To: tertiary01

It could be you were mistaught. Many math teachers really don't understand their subject.


43 posted on 01/20/2006 8:36:12 AM PST by RobbyS ( CHIRHO)
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To: Old Professer
What is better displayed here is the seeming fact that not all children come equipped with the same ability to intuit the obvious and that is a phenomenon for social study, not the science of mathematics, per se.

Just as some people have a great sense of direction and others seemingly don’t. For some math comes easy, others have to struggle. I think much of it has to do, not with the wiring of the brain but with upbringing – nurture, not nature.
But my opinion might be a result of having a degree in Sociology.
44 posted on 01/20/2006 8:48:45 AM PST by R. Scott (Humanity i love you because when you're hard up you pawn your Intelligence to buy a drink.)
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To: RobbyS

But Kant didn't say that we could only perceive three dimensions. Kant said that there WERE only three dimensions. He was directly saying that the existence of four or more dimensions was absolutely impossible. Kant made specific statements about the actual structure of the universe which have been proven false.

Anyhow, there are two refutations to the perceiving three dimensions issue.

1) Many mathematicians, who spend a long time working with four (and higher) dimensional objects, actually do develop the ability to perceive them in the same way that people normally perceive three dimensonal ones.

2) Physics experiments are perception, that's why we do them.


45 posted on 01/20/2006 8:49:12 AM PST by Netheron
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To: RobbyS

I took that into account. Maybe it was due to a difference in textbooks, but I think most explain Geometry in the same linear fashion.


46 posted on 01/20/2006 9:10:20 AM PST by tertiary01 (Dems ..the party that repeats history's mistakes over and over and....)
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To: tertiary01

>> I think most explain Geometry in the same linear fashion. <<

Well...


47 posted on 01/20/2006 9:45:33 AM PST by dangus
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To: Pharmboy
Geometry may be hard-wired into brain, study shows

Personally, I have always had a thing for nice curves and shapes. It almost seems programmed into me...

48 posted on 01/20/2006 11:54:17 AM PST by Onelifetogive (* Sarcasm tag ALWAYS required. For some FReepers, sarcasm can NEVER be obvious enough.)
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To: Junior
["All participants, even those aged 6, performed well above the chance level of 16.6 percent," they found. The average score was nearly 67 percent correct -- identical to the score for U.S. children.]

So, primitive hunter-gatherers who have never been inside a classroom score as high on geometry as American children who are being "educated" at $10,000 per head per year.

To be fair, the comparison was for 6-year-olds. Not many 6-year-olds are getting any kind of "education" beyond how to sit at their desks, color within the lines, and playing well with others. The "$10,000 per head" education comes when they get older.

Now let's compare the abilities of the US students versus the hunter-gathers on, say, trigonometry when they're 18.

49 posted on 01/20/2006 11:58:01 AM PST by Ichneumon
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To: Junior
So, primitive hunter-gatherers who have never been inside a classroom score as high on geometry as American children who are being "educated" at $10,000 per head per year.

The $10,000 figure is because someone has to cosine for those under 18.

50 posted on 01/20/2006 12:31:37 PM PST by Ken H
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To: Netheron
He said that three dimensions(and Euclidean geometry) are a priori but that has to do with us, not the universe except as we are part of it. It was his concession to realism, so I should have said that even the idealists like him made that concession. Any scientists has to be a realist. Some people are capable of great flights of imagination. Wasn't it Michaelangelo was could like a stone and visualize the figure within?
51 posted on 01/20/2006 1:15:28 PM PST by RobbyS ( CHIRHO)
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To: Ichneumon

I didn't get that the U.S. students were six; I understood it to include hunter-gatherers from the age of six on.


52 posted on 01/20/2006 1:23:13 PM PST by Junior (Identical fecal matter, alternate diurnal period)
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To: xzins

LOLOLOL! Thank you oh so very much for the encouragements!


53 posted on 01/20/2006 2:12:36 PM PST by Alamo-Girl
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To: Pharmboy

I was just horrible at algebra and suffered through it with C's during high school. Meanwhile, I aced geometry and actually tutored some of the A+ algebra students suffered horribly with C's in geometry. I just loved doing proofs.
I wonder what that says about how my mind is wired?


54 posted on 01/20/2006 2:15:09 PM PST by hispanarepublicana (Chuck Cooperstein is a tool.)
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To: hispanarepublicana
I wonder what that says about how my mind is wired?

Sounds like all the right connections are there...

55 posted on 01/20/2006 2:58:31 PM PST by Pharmboy (The stone age didn't end because they ran out of stones.)
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To: PatrickHenry

A math ping list sounds good!


56 posted on 01/21/2006 6:52:32 PM PST by phantomworker (Nothing is foolproof to a sufficiently talented fool.)
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To: phantomworker

Do it!


57 posted on 01/21/2006 7:18:41 PM PST by PatrickHenry (Virtual Ignore for trolls, lunatics, dotards, scolds, & incurable ignoramuses.)
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To: PatrickHenry

OK, but maybe I'll need some coaching. Never owned a ping list before.

Does that mean I need to start reading more math articles then? LOL! I guess that would be a good excuse to start. Thanks!


58 posted on 01/21/2006 7:29:06 PM PST by phantomworker (Nothing is foolproof to a sufficiently talented fool.)
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To: phantomworker

I can give you a few names to start off with, and a template for a logo. Or you can experience the joy of doing it all by yourself.


59 posted on 01/21/2006 7:31:27 PM PST by PatrickHenry (Virtual Ignore for trolls, lunatics, dotards, scolds, & incurable ignoramuses.)
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To: PatrickHenry

Sounds good. LOL. I have enough joy in my life, thanks. When I find a good article, I would appreciate your help. Thanks!


60 posted on 01/21/2006 7:41:01 PM PST by phantomworker (Nothing is foolproof to a sufficiently talented fool.)
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