If by "symbols" we just mean "something that points beyond itself," a sign (not to get into semiology), I think that their use is very common among nonhumans. A smell points to the source of the smell. A bared grin points to "oh crap the alpha dog is pissed off." An event points to a future event. Animals don't live in the solipsism of the moment. It's hard to imagine any but the most rudimentary form of stimulus-response behavior that doesn't use them.
--- On Tue, 8/11/09, Jeffrey Fisher <jeff.jfisher at gmail.com> wrote:
> on the other hand, i admit it's not entirely clear to me
> (IAmNotAnAntrhopologist--although i admit i play one in
> class, sometimes),
> that imitation doesn't require a certain use of symbols, if
> only in a very
> rudimentary way. seeing someone else do something and then
> seeing how that
> might be something you yourself could
> do? doesn't this require at least a modicum of abstraction
> from the
> event to the possibility of a future event, and further,
> the use of
> the observed behavior as a model of one's own behavior?
>
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