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Aaron
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Joined: July 23rd, 2001, 3:46 pm

British study finds monkeyswith typewriters can't match

May 9th, 2003, 5:32 pm

QuoteOriginally posted by: rcohenHow do we know that these monkeys were trying to reproduce Shakespeare's works. Maybe they've been trying to forecast the markets. Has anyone checked into that?Hmmm. I think they were desperately trying to tell experimenters to Short Sears (S). It fell from $60 to $18 over the period of this study. What are they typing now?Another possibility is they were making the sound of a fuse burning toward an explosion. A prediction of the Iraq war?Or perhaps they are arguing for more pluralism, adding "s" to everything. Maybe experimenters should open themselves up to greater variety.
 
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WaaghBakri
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Joined: March 21st, 2002, 4:07 am

British study finds monkeyswith typewriters can't match

May 11th, 2003, 5:35 am

A quote by E.M. Cioran, Rumanian–born French philosopher, from "The Trouble with Being Born." Plucked off a quotation site.....QuoteA zoologist who observed gorillas in their native habitat was amazed by the uniformity of their life and their vast idleness. Hours and hours without doing anything. Was boredom unknown to them? This is indeed a question raised by a human, a busy ape. Far from fleeing monotony, animals crave it, and what they most dread is to see it end. For it ends, only to be replaced by fear, the cause of all activity. Inaction is divine; yet it is against inaction that man has rebelled. Man alone, in nature, is incapable of enduring monotony, man alone wants something to happen at all costs—something, anything.... Thereby he shows himself unworthy of his ancestor: the need for novelty is the characteristic of an alienated gorilla.
 
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WaaghBakri
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British study finds monkeyswith typewriters can't match

May 11th, 2003, 5:43 am

Okay, I'm going to murder a good quote by Honoré De Balzac by leaving out the first word. So, our monkey's rivulet of Sssss's ......Quote..........is like some fresh spring, first a stream and then a river, changing its aspect and its nature as it flows to plunge itself in some boundless ocean, where restricted natures only find monotony, but where great souls are engulfed in endless contemplation.
 
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WaaghBakri
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British study finds monkeyswith typewriters can't match

May 11th, 2003, 5:57 am

By the end of the month the macaques had partially destroyed the machine, using it as a lavatory, and filling five pages of text, primarily with the letter S. .....and once again responding to the monotony of the Sssss's ..... Baroness Orczy Emmuska (The Scarlet Pimpernel) quotes....QuoteIt is only when we are very happy that we can bear to gaze merrily upon the vast and limitless expanse of water, rolling on and on with such persistent, irritating monotony, to the accompaniment of our thoughts, whether grave or gay.........Perhaps the expt. was too short and our pal had to still emerge from much contemplation .... surely Shaky Spear had more time than a month!
 
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WaaghBakri
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British study finds monkeyswith typewriters can't match

May 11th, 2003, 6:14 am

Like orient pearls at random strung - Sir William Jones ("A Persian Song of Hafiz").
 
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WaaghBakri
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British study finds monkeyswith typewriters can't match

May 11th, 2003, 6:28 am

QuoteTo dare every day to be irreverent and bold. To dare to preserve the randomness of mind which in children produces strange and wonderful new thoughts and forms. To continually scramble the familiar and bring the old into new juxtaposition.Gordon Webber, Advertising Age, 31 Oct 60.------------------All the quotes courtesy bartleby.com
 
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Aaron
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Joined: July 23rd, 2001, 3:46 pm

British study finds monkeyswith typewriters can't match

May 11th, 2003, 1:07 pm

QuoteOriginally posted by: WaaghBakriA quote by E.M. Cioran, Rumanian–born French philosopher, from "The Trouble with Being Born." Plucked off a quotation site....QuoteA zoologist who observed gorillas in their native habitat was amazed by the uniformity of their life and their vast idleness. Hours and hours without doing anything. Was boredom unknown to them? This is indeed a question raised by a human, a busy ape. Far from fleeing <b>monotony</b>, animals crave it, and what they most dread is to see it end. For it ends, only to be replaced by fear, the cause of all activity. Inaction is divine; yet it is against inaction that man has rebelled. Man alone, in nature, is incapable of enduring monotony, man alone wants something to happen at all costs—something, anything.... Thereby he shows himself unworthy of his ancestor: the need for novelty is the characteristic of an alienated gorilla.<hr>Cioran was actually born in Transylvania, and we know what that means. My favorite quote is: "Each time you find yourself at a turning point, the best thing is to lie down and let hours pass. Resolutions made standing up are worthless: they are dictated either by pride or by fear. Prone, we still know these two scourges, but in a more attenuated, more intemporal form." (from the same work you cite). I always imagine him with a coffin in the basement of his Paris flat, so he could lie down and make decisions.This theory, that animals seek minimum stimulation, was productive in the early days of cognitive psychology. You can imagine a brain composed of negative stimulus centers: hunger, pain, thirst and so on. A central processor search engine would manipulate outputs to minimize total stimulation. This model does a surprisingly good job of explaining a lot of behavior and experimental results.But it was soon discarded as too simple. You cannot build good models using univariate minimization only. You need to postulate either pleasure centers or multivariate objectives or both.
 
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imdx80
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Joined: October 18th, 2002, 10:23 am

British study finds monkeyswith typewriters can't match

May 12th, 2003, 12:30 pm

I liked ntks write up of the experiment, 'artists confused over difference between "infinite"and 6'
 
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chiral3
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Joined: November 11th, 2002, 7:30 pm

British study finds monkeyswith typewriters can't match

May 12th, 2003, 12:32 pm

This is off the topic, but imdx80, I must compliment you on your icon. good movie.
 
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Nonius
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Joined: January 22nd, 2003, 6:48 am

British study finds monkeyswith typewriters can't match

May 13th, 2003, 3:46 am

that reminds me of a good Simpson's episode....Burns..."Look Simpson, a room full of monkeys typing the Great American Novel....." grabs a sheet from a monkey...."It was the best of times, it was the blurst of times....you idiot!" slaps the monkey.
 
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WaaghBakri
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British study finds monkeyswith typewriters can't match

May 13th, 2003, 3:55 am

but imdx80, I must compliment you on your icon. good movieWhat movie? Looks like a bruised energizer bunny to me, rather mauled, ravaged ....
 
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WaaghBakri
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Joined: March 21st, 2002, 4:07 am

British study finds monkeyswith typewriters can't match

May 13th, 2003, 5:47 am

Would anyone recommend E.M. Cioran, "The Trouble with Being Born" ? The title intrigues me ......