{"version":1,"type":"rich","provider_name":"Libsyn","provider_url":"https:\/\/www.libsyn.com","height":90,"width":600,"title":"The primeval soil of play","description":"Puppies wrestling and mock-biting each other. Toddlers playing hide and seek. Kittens pouncing\u2014repeatedly\u2014on a toy mouse. You've no doubt looked on at scenes like this with amusement. And you've no doubt seen some of those viral videos\u2014of ravens sledding down hills, of bumble bees playing with balls. All these moments make us smile, maybe even giggle. But the scientific questions they raise merit serious attention. Where do we see play in the animal kingdom? Where do we not? What functions does play serve? Do we\u2014and many other creatures\u2014have an elemental need for play? My guest today is Dr. Gordon Burghardt. Gordon is a longtime Professor in the Department of Psychology and the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Tennessee. For decades now, Gordon has been a pioneer in the study of animal play, with a particular focus on play in reptiles and other animals not usually considered playful. His 2005 book, The Genesis of Animal Play, remains a landmark in the field. Here, Gordon and I talk about the major types of play: locomotor play, object play, and social play. We discuss the five criteria he has proposed for recognizing play across animal taxa. We survey several of the functions of play that have been proposed over the decades, and discuss how\u2014in the end\u2014play doesn't seem to have just one function. We also talk about human play\u2014about what sets it apart, and about the possibility that play lies at the root of many of the capacities and institutions we think of as distinctively, impressively human. Along the way, Gordon and I touch on play in bears, pythons, turtles, fruit flies, and octopuses. We consider play between members of taxonomically distant species. We talk about \u201cself-handicapping\u201d; the surplus resource theory of play; the importance of "risky play" and "free play"; the immersive quality of play; bodily and vocal play signals in mammals; and whether human play is increasingly endangered.  Without further ado, here's my conversation with Dr. Gordon Burghardt. Enjoy!   A transcript of this episode is available here.   Notes and links 3:00 \u2013 A news article on the finding of \u201cplay-like\u201d behavior in fruit flies. The original study. 4:30 \u2013 For recent reviews of play by Dr. Burghardt and colleagues, covering the three major types of play, the five criteria for recognizing play, and many other topics, see here, here, and here. 12:00 \u2013 For more on Dr. Burghardt\u2019s early research and hand-rearing of black bears, see here. 23:30 \u2013 For the recent study on ball play in bumble bees, see here.  26:00 \u2013 For an example of studies examining self-handicapping, see this study on belugas.  27:00 \u2013 For a video of a bull and goat butting heads, see here. For more on cross-species play, see this recent paper by Dr. Burghardt and a colleague. 31:00 \u2013 For more on the \u201crelaxed open mouth expression\u201d and \u201cplay face,\u201d see our previous episode on the origins of the smile.  For a recent study about such expressions possibly attested in dolphins, see here. 44:00 \u2013 For the book by Johan Huizinga, see here. For some of Dr. Burghardt\u2019s ideas about the connections between play and certain aspects of human culture, see here.  54:00 \u2013 For research on the value of \u201crisky play,\u201d see work by Dr. Ellen Sandseter. For an article connecting \u201cfree play\u201d and children\u2019s mental health, see here.   Recommendations Kingdom of Play, by David Toomey   Many Minds is a project of the Diverse Intelligences Summer Institute, which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by Kensy Cooperrider, with help from Assistant Producer Urte Laukaityte and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by Ben Oldroyd. Our transcripts are created by Sarah Dopierala. Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter here! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com.  For updates about the show, visit our website or follow us on Twitter (@ManyMindsPod) or Bluesky (@manymindspod.bsky.social). ","author_name":"Many Minds","author_url":"https:\/\/disi.org\/manyminds\/","html":"