31.05.2022 Rafael Nuñez

Where do numbers come from? Some mathematicians have pointed to formal definitions and axiomatic systems, other scholars have claimed that some numbers are Godgiven. Ultimately, these accounts do not provide answers that are consistent with what we know today about the natural world (which includes the human brain and mind). In the natural sciences, a widely accepted view in cognitive neuroscience, child psychology, and animal cognition posits that in humans (and many nonhuman animals) there is a biologically endowed capacity specific for number and arithmetic. However, data from various sources —humans from non-industrialized cultures, trained nonhuman animals in captivity, and the neuroscience of symbol processing in schooled participants— do not support this view. The use of loose and misleading technical terminology in the field of "numerical cognition" has facilitated the elaboration of teleological arguments which underlie the above view. To understand this, a crucial distinction between quantical and numerical cognition is necessary: Biologically evolved preconditions (BEPs) for quantification do exist (quantical cognition), but the emergence of exact symbolic quantification and arithmetic proper (numerical cognition) – absent in nonhuman animals – has materialized via human cultural preoccupations and practices that, supported by language and symbolic reference – are crucial dimensions that lie largely outside natural selection. In this talk I’ll discuss the biological enculturation hypothesis, which attempts to explain the complex passage from quantical to numerical cognition in (some) humans, and in the process, gain insight into where numbers come from.