Nothing is more fascinating to us than, well, us. Where did we come from? What makes us human? Researchers discovered all three of these distinguishing human talents by observing human and ape behavior, sometimes with solid, carefully controlled experiments. But what's going on under the biological hood? What brain mechanisms are responsible for the mental and behavioral differences between them and us? Biologically inclined researchers are starting to answer these questions, and the clues they are finding, while still patchy and nascent, are tantalizing.
The mind-reading skill, it turns out, appears to have its own particular region of the human brain. In , Rebecca Saxe of MIT ran studies using functional magnetic resonance imaging, or fMRI, a non-invasive technology that creates a kind of movie of brain activity. The studies revealed an area perhaps half the volume of a sugar cube above and behind the right ear. This brain region appears to have a remarkably specific function.
When I am thinking about who a friend believes will be the next American president, this area in my brain is highly active. But when I am thinking about whether my friend is thirsty—another internal state, but not a belief —this brain region is quiet. Saxe's discovery—one of the most surprising in cognitive science in the last decade—begs a question: Do the other great apes have their own version of this brain area, and if so, what is it doing?
Clearly, for anyone interested in the gap between us and our nearest living relatives, these are exciting times. With fMRI, a conscious person lies still inside a scanner. Why not use the same technique with apes? Apes, not surprisingly, are strong, impulsive animals with little inclination to hold still inside a big, noisy cylinder. So the prospect of scanning apes to see what's on their minds seemed dim, until primatologist Lisa Parr and colleagues at the Yerkes National Primate Center at Emory University solved the problem in Using a different kind of scanning—positron emission tomography, or PET—Parr's team showed chimps pictures after injecting them with a fast-decaying radioactive agent.
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Thank you for helping us improve PBS Video. Sloan Foundation. Skip to Main Content. Use System Theme. Dark Theme. Light Theme. Continue Watching. Watch Now. Report this resource to TpT. Description This set of video questions guides students through the concept of early man's evolution. There are 13 questions and 31 fill in the blanks answers. This activity includes an answer key. Below is a description of the video. Video not included, but can be streamed from pbs.
What Makes Us Human? David Pogue explores the traits we once thought were uniquely ours—language, tool-making, even laughter—to uncover their evolutionary roots. He'll trace some of the crucial steps that transformed cave men to accountants, and find out if any of his own DNA came from a Neanderthal ancestor.
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