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Babies Begin Learning Language In the Womb
Hugh Pickens writes "Science Daily reports findings from a new study which suggest that infants begin picking up elements of what will be their first language in the womb, long before their first babble or coo, and are able to memorize sounds from the external world by the last trimester of pregnancy, with a particular sensitivity to melody contour in both music and language. Newborns prefer their mother's voice over other voices and perceive the emotional content of messages conveyed via intonation contours in maternal speech (a.k.a. 'motherese'). 'The dramatic finding of this study is that not only are human neonates capable of producing different cry melodies, but they prefer to produce those melody patterns that are typical for the ambient language they have heard during their fetal life, within the last trimester of gestation,' said Kathleen Wermke of the University of Würzburg in Germany. Wermke's team recorded and analyzed the cries of 60 healthy newborns, 30 born into French-speaking families and 30 born into German-speaking families, when they were three to five days old. The recordings of 2,500 cries as mothers changed babies' diapers, readied babies for feeding or otherwise interacted with the youngsters show an extremely early impact of native language, with analysis revealing clear differences in the shape of the newborns' cry melodies, based on their mother tongue."
Surely teaching languages like French and German to poor, defenseless, not even yet born babies breaks some law.
Discussed here by someone who actually knows about this stuff:
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=1869
Aberrations have appeared in my destiny prognostication engine!
In hindsight, all scientific findings are "obvious" and "just common sense". What people forget to mention is that before the finding, there were about 200 competing, equally obvious and common sense based theories on what was happening.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
This study doesn't show it, but there are ways of testing for that. For example, I know someone who was born in China and adopted by American parents. Genetically she's 100% Chinese, but culturally 100% American. Now, let's say she marries a guy who's also genetically Chinese but speaks English, and they have kids. Their children will not be exposed to Chinese language prior to birth. I would expect that the babies, while genetically 100% Chinese, will cry like Americans (insert joke here).
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
Uh...... hate to break it to you, but that chart is wrong. In at least the US, on-Demand abortions come with severe restrictions. Notably, they don't happen after the third-trimester.
I'm pretty sure that site isn't an authoritative source, if for no other reason that it refers to "pro-lifers" and "pro-abortionists". The chosen terminology by each group is pro-life and pro-choice. Respect it.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
I remember when my daughter was born. She was 9 weeks early, so she spent several weeks in the neonatal ICU. What was interesting (and maybe somewhat relevant) is that quite often when my wife spoke, our daughter would seem to turn her head towards the sound. My voice didn't seem to have the same effect, nor did the voices of the medical staff.
The nurses at the hospital thought it was "cute" and didn't seem all that surprised - so I guess I am rather surprised this stuff is apparently new info and not settled science.
#DeleteChrome
There's a difference between being pro-abortion rights and being pro-abortion. I support the right of assholes to have freedom of speech, even if it is hate speech against blacks, jews, or gays. That doesn't make me a KKK Nazi Republican.
This country is founded on the fundamental premise that we have freedom of religion, speech, etc., up to the point at which it directly harms others. The abortion debate is about the very complicated question of whether it harms another person or not. That's not an easy philosophical question to answer, and before anyone is qualified to answer that question, he or she must free himself or herself from the tendency to reply, "That's easy, my parents said..." or "That's easy, my preacher said..." or any other answer that comes easily. Such easy answers are almost always the wrong ones, as they are generally the end of thought on the subject rather than the beginning.
For example, the easy (but wrong) answers for how to fight abortion are: 1. sue to make it illegal, and 2. try to convince people not to have them. Suing, however, is unlikely to make any real progress. Convincing people not to have abortions is slightly better; it may save a few individual children while you are actively doing this work, but it is an extremely inefficient way to improve things because it requires eternal vigilance by a fairly large number of people to be effective to any significant degree.
By contrast, a much smarter answer is to contribute money to medical research to make it possible to sustain a fetus at progressively younger ages, eventually resulting in abortion being unnecessary, and eliminating any possible justification for abortion in the minds of even the staunchest abortion rights advocates. By answering in this way, your actions are the start of further thought and discussion instead of being dogmatic roadblocks to further thought. Further, instead of just reducing abortions, you're also doing something that helps humanity outside the context of abortion. Women who can't have kids could have kids, fetuses whose mothers die would not necessarily die, mothers who are diagnosed with cancer would no longer have to choose between chemotherapy and the lives of their children, women who are victims of rape or incest could give up their children for adoption and never have to endure childbirth for a child that was forced upon them, women who get pregnant when they are too young to safely bear a child would no longer be at serious risk, etc.
Think bigger. Don't think of abortion as a problem to be solved. Think of it as a bad solution to a wide range of problems that could be solved in other ways, then try to find other ways.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
I have had exposure to this situation. My wife and her family are native Cantonese speakers but live in an English speaking country. In her brothers family there was a huge fight over whether their two kids would be raised as Cantonese or Mandarin speakers (their mother speaks Mandarin).
When I went to their place the kids would approach me and ask me to take them to the park, speaking in broken English. So I would take them out and as soon as we got out of earshot their English would become perfect and they would explode with conversation. More recently their mother took her daughter to swimming lessons. She apologised to the teacher about the poor state of her childs English. After the lesson the teacher told her that actually there is nothing wrong with that girls english.
Children soak up the language which is being used around them, regardless of their parents origin, native language or what is being used in the home. If a western family moved to Japan and hardly let the kids out of the house the kids would still become perfect Japanese speakers. I don't think genes have anything to do with it.
But the children often hide their language ability from their parents. They don't want their parents to feel bad about their children learning from sources outside the home.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
Actually I will unconsciously start speaking in broken English if Im around other people who do it for long enough... so I dont think thats a phenomenon limited to childhood.
People have been playing music to babies in the womb for years. Many parents are encouraged to speak to their baby while in the womb so the baby learns the sounds of mommy's and daddy's voice. Not new, but it puts some more scientific evidence to what any parent with a kid under 20 (or more?) could have already told you.
Babies get excited and kick when there's commotion outside too -- loud noises and such. They are listening, and with fairly developed infant brains, it's no surprise that they begin getting accustomed to common sounds and tones they hear going on around them.
The only thing stopping this from being painfully obvious is the fact that people don't seem to believe that the baby exists in any real form until it's born. Academically, sure, but for 40 years liars and idiots have tried to tell us that it's not a baby until it's born. "Revelations" like this story will always surprise people who have bought into such intellectual dishonesty. There's no switch that says to the baby brain, "Okay, you're born now, start acting like a real brain." By birth, it's been working like that for many months, and doing what brains do: learning.
"I know that every word that man just said is true, because it's EXACTLY what I wanted to hear." -- Space Ghost
...Actually I will unconsciously start speaking in broken English...
I once consciously spoke in broken English, while visiting Germany, even though I can speak German without any accent. The reason was that I wanted to get out of a traffic ticket and it worked.
All theory is gray
Legality of abortion has nothing to do with the fetus being able to feel pain or hear words. From ultrasounds I think everyone can clearly see many behaviors we associate with being alive or being human. The question is weather anyone is willing to take responsibility for life, health and future of both the mother or the baby. Do we keep a mentally disturbed teenager in chains until she gives birth so that she can not possibly jump of the bridge or otherwise harm herself or the baby? Will anyone make sure that a severally mentally disabled child doesn't spend decades being abused and neglected in an institution after his/her parents pass away? Is government more qualified than prospective parents to decide what constitutes a quality of life worth winning.
Thus, although I believe that abortion (where there is otherwise a possibility of a life with happiness, dignity and without constant suffering) is a horrible thing, I also do not believe that a legal ban is any more humane. We need many solutions that will require others in the society to make sacrifices at least by paying taxes. For example, families with Down's child will often have their marriage and future of other children screwed if they don't have some part time place to drop off the child once in a while and get a break. Even with multitude of options, a few parents may still decide on abortion and they should be allowed to.