The dating of linguistic beginnings

Tobias, Phillip V.

doi:10.1017/s0140525x00044083

Cited by 3 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 53 publications

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“…Wilkins & Wakefield (1995) have tried to relate the evolution of the language centres to prior, non-linguistic, motor activities, especially skilled, manipulative control mechanisms. They may be right that Broca's area and the parieto-occipitotemporal region emerged at a pre-linguistic phase among some australopithecines, but without earlier (6.0-3.0 myr) endocasts or tools, it is impossible for us to confirm or refute their hypothesis (Tobias 1996b). Jerison (1977; sees the initial evolution of language, not as a communication system, but as a supersensory system, the building of a world image.…”

Section: Natural Selection and The Speech Centresmentioning

confidence: 97%

The Origins of Speech

1998

CAJ

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Spoken language is one of the defining human characteristics — the crucial accomplishment which makes us human and separates us from other species. Naturally enough, the origins of this accomplishment — which must lie somewhere back in the Palaeolithic — have been the subject of lively and often heated debate, not least since speech leaves no direct material residues. Many people have sought to resolve the question by careful analysis of the material remains of early hominids. But do patterns of tool-making or evidence of sophisticated subsistence strategies really provide an adequate base from which to deduce the presence of linguistic ability? Furthermore, is language inextricably bound up with the ability to vocalize and to speak? Are studies of the vocal tract of Neanderthals or Homo erectus really relevant to the question of language origins?The wide diversity of view on the antiquity of human spoken language is very clear from the brief contributions which make up this feature. On the one hand is the evidence for the presence of Broca's and Wernicke's areas in the brain of Homo habilis around 2 million years ago. Does this provide grounds for believing that Homo habilis could speak? Did the use of tools as icons by Homo erectus play a key role in the development of human spoken language? Or should we instead go along with the growing consensus — supported by many linguists —that spoken language is a late addition to the range of human abilities, originating along with fully modern humans only within the last 200,000 years? And dare we go even further, and nominate Africa as the locus of language origin?The time may come when we are able to specify not only when human spoken language first developed, but also where. For the present, however, the debate shows no sign of imminent resolution. In the pages which follow, we bring together the views of archaeologists from a number of different backgrounds; but we begin with a linguist's perspective, and seven propositions to set the scene for the archaeological enquiry.

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Section: Natural Selection and The Speech Centresmentioning

confidence: 97%

The Origins of Speech

1998

CAJ

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“…The orthodox neo-Darwinian narrative, by contrast, requires that a gradual series of steps must have occurred. Bickerton (1981), Deacon (1997), and Tobias (1996) subscribe to that view and propose that ape-like ancestors progressed through a long series of now extinct (highly simplified, pidgin-like) communication systems "superior in power and presumable survival value to that of each prior stage" (D. K. Oller, 2000, p. 27). The question to be addressed here is whether either of these options can be developed in a logically coherent form.…”

Section: A Summary Of the Neo-darwinian Theorymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…W. Oller, , 1988J. W. Oller, , 1997Oller & Omdahl, 1994;Pennock, 2000;Pinker, 1994;Tobias, 1996). Deacon (1997) supposes that the first symbols were formed from "indexical associations," which came to be understood as relations "between words and associated objects" (p. 301).…”

Section: Explaining the Transition(s) Leading To Genes And Languagesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Languages and Genes: Can They be Built up through Random Change and Natural Selection?

Oller

2002

Journal of Psychology and Theology

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Can natural selection operating on random arrangements of material building blocks (i.e., subatomic particles, atoms, molecules, and larger collections and structures of matter), produce the genomes of all living things, the human language capacity, and all of the world's 6000 plus natural languages? There are two polar views on this question that are widely held by practicing scientists. At one extreme there is the neo-Darwinian claim that chance aided by natural selection can arrange dynamic information systems as they are now. At the other end there is the view that a transcendent Intelligence not limited by matter, space, and time is required. Here an argument is presented from logicomathematical proofs developed in theoretical semiotics to show unequivocally that the known symbol systems seen in genomes and in human languages cannot be produced by chance arrangements of any kind of material building blocks. The argument is general. It applies to all possible symbol systems, though the emphasis here is on the genetic system evidently underlying all living organisms and the human language capacity, which is manifested in the multitude of natural languages.

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On the testability of theories of language evolution

Botha

2012

Stellenbosch pap. linguist.

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The dating of linguistic beginnings

Cited by 3 publications

References 53 publications

The Origins of Speech

The Origins of Speech

Languages and Genes: Can They be Built up through Random Change and Natural Selection?

On the testability of theories of language evolution

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