The shades of social. A discussion of "The social origins of language", ed. Daniel Dor, Chris Knight and Jerome Lewis

Wacewicz, Sławomir

doi:10.12775/ths-2014-011

Cited by 8 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 24 publications

(27 reference statements)

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“…A majority of forms of animal communication involve situations of incomplete alignment of interests between the sender and the receiver. In contrast, language has a Gricean nature and operates on the implicit assumption that Speaker and Hearer act as if their interests are aligned (the so-called "platform of trust", Wacewicz, 2015). This is a different way of stating that language is "cooperative", which is in line with the emerging consensus that the evolution of language is intimately related to the evolution of cooperation, and that a successful scenario of language must necessarily take in an evolutionary story about the emergence of cooperation (e.g.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…LP theorists (e.g. Lakoff, 1975;Leech, 1983;Watts, 2003;Eelen, 2001) insist that LP is an essentially linguistic phenomenon; however, its theoretical appeal, and of its models, lies in the fact that it interfaces linguistic behavior and more generally human social behavior (Wacewicz et al, 2015). Currently, the most influential approach to understanding the latter is behavioral game theory, which delivers (i) formal frameworks that allow to model interactive behavior between individuals and (ii) solution concepts -mostly based on rationality assumptions -for explaining particular behavior in specific situations.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The Game Theory of Politeness in Language: A Formal Model of Polite Requests

R¹,

Żywiczyński²,

Wacewicz³

2019

Preprint

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Linguistic Politeness (LP) is a fascinating domain of language, as it directly interfaces with human social behavior. Here, we show how game theory, as a higher-order theory of behavior, can provide the tools to understand and model LP phenomena. We show this for the specific case of requests, where the magnitude of request and the resultant Rate of Imposition are subsumed under a more powerful explanatory principle: alignment of interests. We put forward the Politeness Equilibrium Principle (PEP), whereby the more disalignment there is between the interests of Speaker and Hearer, the more LP Speaker needs to offset the imbalance. In the second part of our paper, we flesh out our ideas by means of a formal model inspired by evolutionary signaling theory, and provide a mathematical proof showing that the model follows the PEP. We see this work as an important first step in the direction of reconciling theories of language with signaling theory, by incorporating language into more general models of communication.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Game Theory of Politeness in Language: A Formal Model of Polite Requests

R¹,

Żywiczyński²,

Wacewicz³

2019

Preprint

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“…Our argument starts from the proposal that pantomime can be framed within the Platform of Trust (PoT; [68,69]), an assumption that Wacewicz & Żywiczyński [70] consider a ‘deep’ design feature of language. In their opinion, human communication is characterizable in terms of ‘information donation’: unlike other animals, humans can flip ‘ the default setting from expecting manipulation to expecting honesty’ [70, p. 170].…”

Section: The Rise Of Modern Language: From Communication To Conversationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Persuasive conversation as a new form of communication inHomo sapiens

Ferretti

Adornetti

2021

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

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The aim of this paper is twofold: to propose that conversation is the distinctive feature of Homo sapiens ' communication; and to show that the emergence of modern language is tied to the transition from pantomime to verbal and grammatically complex forms of narrative. It is suggested that (animal and human) communication is a form of persuasion and that storytelling was the best tool developed by humans to convince others. In the early stage of communication, archaic hominins used forms of pantomimic storytelling to persuade others. Although pantomime is a powerful tool for persuasive communication , it is proposed that it is not an effective tool for persuasive conversation : conversation is characterized by a form of reciprocal persuasion among peers; instead, pantomime has a mainly asymmetrical character. The selective pressure towards persuasive reciprocity of the conversational level is the evolutionary reason that allowed the transition from pantomime to grammatically complex codes in H. sapiens , which favoured the evolution of speech. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Reconstructing prehistoric languages’.

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“…The idea that communication is based on a truthful use of language has solid foundations in theoretical reflection (Burge, 1993;Davidson, 1984;Lewis, 1969) and empirical research (Gilbert, Krull, & Malone, 1990;Gilbert, Tafarodi, & Maloine, 1993). Wacewicz andŻywiczyński (2018) consider human communication to be founded on the platform of trust (PoT; Knight, 1998, Wacewicz, 2015: a deep design feature of language, based on a form of "information donation" characterizing humans able to flip "the default setting from expecting manipulation to expecting honesty" (Wacewicz &Żywiczyński, 2018, p. 170). In this perspective, framing human communication in reference to PoT is a way to stress the cooperative and altruistic aspects of communication (Tomasello, 2008).…”

Section: Communication and Argumentationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Human Self‐Domestication and the Evolution of Pragmatics

2021

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As proposed for the emergence of modern languages, we argue that modern uses of languages (pragmatics) also evolved gradually in our species under the effects of human self‐domestication, with three key aspects involved in a complex feedback loop: (a) a reduction in reactive aggression, (b) the sophistication of language structure (with emerging grammars initially facilitating the transition from physical aggression to verbal aggression); and (c) the potentiation of pragmatic principles governing conversation, including, but not limited to, turn‐taking and inferential abilities. Our core hypothesis is that the reduction in reactive aggression, one of the key factors in self‐domestication processes, enabled us to fully exploit our cognitive and interactional potential as applied to linguistic exchanges, and ultimately to evolve a specific form of communication governed by persuasive reciprocity—a trait of human conversation characterized by both competition and cooperation. In turn, both early crude forms of language, well suited for verbal aggression/insult, and later more sophisticated forms of language, well suited for persuasive reciprocity, significantly contributed to the resolution and reduction of (physical) aggression, thus having a return effect on the self‐domestication processes. Supporting evidence for our proposal, as well as grounds for further testing, comes mainly from the consideration of cognitive disorders, which typically simultaneously present abnormal features of self‐domestication (including aggressive behavior) and problems with pragmatics and social functioning. While various approaches to language evolution typically reduce it to a single factor, our approach considers language evolution as a multifactorial process, with each player acting upon the other, engaging in an intense mutually reinforcing feedback loop. Moreover, we see language evolution as a gradual process, continuous with the pre‐linguistic cognitive abilities, which were engaged in a positive feedback loop with linguistic innovations, and where gene‐culture co‐evolution and cultural niche construction were the main driving forces.

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The shades of social. A discussion of "The social origins of language", ed. Daniel Dor, Chris Knight and Jerome Lewis

Cited by 8 publications

References 24 publications

The Game Theory of Politeness in Language: A Formal Model of Polite Requests

The Game Theory of Politeness in Language: A Formal Model of Polite Requests

Persuasive conversation as a new form of communication inHomo sapiens

Human Self‐Domestication and the Evolution of Pragmatics

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