Humans and other species have biologically endowed abilities for discriminating quantities. A widely accepted view sees such abilities as an evolved capacity specific for number and arithmetic. This view, however, is based on an implicit teleological rationale, builds on inaccurate conceptions of biological evolution, downplays human data from non-industrialized cultures, overinterprets results from trained animals, and is enabled by loose terminology that facilitates teleological argumentation. A distinction between quantical (e.g., quantity discrimination) and numerical (exact, symbolic) cognition is needed: quantical cognition provides biologically evolved preconditions for numerical cognition but it does not scale up to number and arithmetic, which require cultural mediation. The argument has implications for debates about the origins of other special capacities - geometry, music, art, and language.

中文翻译：

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真的有进化的数字能力吗？

人类和其他物种具有生物赋予的辨别数量的能力。一种被广泛接受的观点认为，这种能力是一种特定于数字和算术的进化能力。然而，这种观点基于隐含的目的论原理，建立在不准确的生物进化概念之上，淡化来自非工业化文化的人类数据，过度解释来自训练有素的动物的结果，并且由促进目的论论证的松散术语启用。需要区分数量（例如，数量辨别）和数值（精确、符号）认知：数量认知为数值认知提供了生物进化的先决条件，但它没有扩展到需要文化中介的数字和算术。