29 January 2009

The real human uniqueness is ...

... rhythm. Apparently. Newborn Infants Detect The Beat In Music: "This phenomenon - termed ‘beat induction’ - is likely to have contributed to music’s origin. It enables such actions as clapping, making music together and dancing to a rhythm. Beat induction is also considered to be uniquely human. Even our closest evolutionary relatives, such as the chimpanzee and bonobo, do not synchronise their behaviour to rhythmic sounds." Which I think probably also means that collective ritual is fairly unique too ...

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"Spend and tax" not "tax and spend"

 I got a response from my MP which got me kind of mad. You'll see why as I reproduce it here. Apologies for the strange changes in types...