dubois@uwmacc.UUCP (Paul DuBois) (05/24/85)
>>> 12. If languages evolved, the earliest languages should be the >>> simplest. >> Here we have the commonly pointed out but never corrected creationist >> fallacy that evolution must progress from the simple to the complex. Also, >> another point that has nothing to do with evolution. > > [DuBois] > It must have SOMETHING to do with it, since we see all sorts of very > complex organisms living today, and you guys keep telling us how simple > organisms were when they first developed. [Jeff Sonntag] > I have trouble believing that Paul is *really* as dense as he is > pretending here. Pretending? > Whether languages evolved, were taught to us by > aliens, gods, or by 42 cases of walkmen mysteriously transfered back > into time has NOTHING to do with the theory of evolution, which is a > mechanism to explain the origin of *species*, not languages. Got it, > Paul? You were awfully silent when K A Dahlke adduced linguistic "evolution" as evidence in *favor* of evolution. But when a creationist brings up a counter-point favorable to creation, ah! Then it's irrelevant... > And the other point: Yes, the first organisms must have been very > simple. Now there are organisms which are much more complex. That > doesn't mean that this progression was monotonic. Very true. It does mean that there was an increase in complexity at some point, however. And this must be accounted for, no? --- >> 12. If languages evolved, the earliest languages should be the >> simplest. On the contrary, language studies reveal that >> the more ancient the language (for example, Latin, 200 >> B.C.; Greek, 800 B.C.; and Vedic Sanskrit, 1500 B. C., the >> more complex it is with respect to syntax, cases, genders, >> moods, voices, tenses, and verb forms. The best evidence >> indicates that languages DEvolve [a-c]. > [Stanley Friesen] > The problem is these languages are only the oldest *attested* > languages, since writing was only invented about 1500 BC. Homo sapiens > is generally held to have been around at least half a million years, > thus these languages would have a *long* history of prior developement. > Furthermore, individual languages do not evelve in the *biological* > sense, they are all full expressions of the human capacity for language. (i) Begs the question. (ii) 4000 BC, not 1500 BC. (iii) They are indeed "full expressions of the human capacity for language", as you put it. Don't you find it in the least suspicious that language should develop over such a long period of time and then just show up full blown with NO TRACE of prior development? > Thus, this is irrelevant to evolutionary theory, since huamans are > not evolving *biologically* with respect to language ability. I notice that you were awfully silent before also. > Also, I think you will find that most linguists would disagree about > the existance of a general tendency for "devolution" in languages, > all your examples are from the restricted set called Indo-European > languages which share a common heritage, and thus do not form an > independant sample. A wider sample shows much less of a uniform > tendency. Ah! Maybe so. Can you give this more than a handwave so that we have a chance to believe you? --- > [P Samuel Odoms] > Languages are primarily directed by the type of society in which they are > used. Any given language can go from "simple" to "complex" many times > during its life. Examples of such, please. > A language with the gender, mood, case, etc. constructs > could be considered "simpler" than the same one without (Old English and > New English though, of course, the language has gone through enormous > modifications other than lose of gender, mood, etc.) because to get the > correct idea across, we now must use a fairly restricted word order > or a phrase will not mean the correct thing. Therefore, we have more not > less rules governing our language. Proof? --- > > 12. If languages evolved, the earliest languages should be the > > simplest. On the contrary, language studies reveal that > > the more ancient the language (for example, Latin, 200 > > B.C.; Greek, 800 B.C.; and Vedic Sanskrit, 1500 B. C., the > > more complex it is with respect to syntax, cases, genders, > > moods, voices, tenses, and verb forms. The best evidence > > indicates that languages DEvolve [a-c]. > [Keith Doyle] > I doubt this one very much. Have you looked at the asian languages? > Not being a linguist myself, I really couldn't say. It's true for Chinese also. --- None of these responses dealt at all with the sudden appearance of language full blown out of nowhere. I posted an article on this a while ago, but nobody said anything. The conclusion of that article was: the *evidence* does not suggest evolution; the evolutionary framework must *presuppose* evolutionary development of language and fit it in post hoc. Creation is as good an explanation of the ex nihilo nature of the appearance of language as any. -- | Paul DuBois {allegra,ihnp4,seismo}!uwvax!uwmacc!dubois --+-- | |
ethan@utastro.UUCP (Ethan Vishniac) (05/24/85)
> > None of these responses dealt at all with the sudden appearance of > language full blown out of nowhere. I posted an article on this a > while ago, but nobody said anything. The conclusion of that article > was: the *evidence* does not suggest evolution; the evolutionary > framework must *presuppose* evolutionary development of language and > fit it in post hoc. Creation is as good an explanation of the ex > nihilo nature of the appearance of language as any. > Two comments. First, language leaves no fossils in the absence of writing. They also change rapidly, e.g. proto-Indoeuropean was being spoken at a time when writing had already developed in the fertile crescent. Therefore it is difficult, perhaps impossible to say much about the earlier history of languages. This is not equivalent to saying that languages appear "full blown out of nowhere". "Full blown out of the dark past" would be more like it. In the absence of effective evidence *any* hypothesis sounds good. I don't disbelieve in creationism because languages evolve. Second, the reason I (and others) didn't take issue with the original posting on evolution and language is that it takes enough time to respond to incorrect arguments whose conclusions I disagree with. Most of us can't be bothered to respond to incorrect arguments whose conclusions we agree with on other grounds. Third (oops, well make that three comments) there may be some arbitrary element in drawing the boundary between homo sapiens and erectus but 500,000 years sounds a bit long to me. Of course, we know homo erectus made tools, he may have also language. "Don't argue with a fool. Ethan Vishniac Borrow his money." {charm,ut-sally,ut-ngp,noao}!utastro!ethan Department of Astronomy University of Texas
draves@harvard.ARPA (Richard Draves) (05/24/85)
In article <1134@uwmacc.UUCP> dubois@uwmacc.UUCP (Paul DuBois) writes: >> Also, I think you will find that most linguists would disagree about >> the existance of a general tendency for "devolution" in languages, >> all your examples are from the restricted set called Indo-European >> languages which share a common heritage, and thus do not form an >> independant sample. A wider sample shows much less of a uniform >> tendency. > >Ah! Maybe so. Can you give this more than a handwave so that we have >a chance to believe you? If I remember correctly, there was an article on this in Scientific American a while back. It discussed the formation of creole languages from pidgins. The creoles tended to be more complicated syntactically than the parent languages. Rich -- "a picture in the head is a gory murder in an art gallery" -- Stephen Kosslyn
throopw@rtp47.UUCP (Wayne Throop) (05/26/85)
In <1134@uwmacc.UUCP>, Paul DuBois mentioned several things that my companion posting on this subject did not address at all. I do have some specific comments to make, but my previous posting was general background, and I am separating specific points into this posting. > You were awfully silent when K A Dahlke adduced linguistic "evolution" > as evidence in *favor* of evolution. But when a creationist brings up > a counter-point favorable to creation, ah! Then it's irrelevant... Well, in general, weaknesses in evolutionary argument are pointed out PDQ in this newsgroup (public service provided by Paul DuBois, I think :-). More seriously, this article didn't show up on my site. In any event, I support the position that linguistic evolution (if any) doesn't have very much to do with biologic evolution (if any). Nevertheless, I find linguistics an interesting subject, so I'll press on. > > [P Samuel Odoms] > > Languages are primarily directed by the type of society in which they are > > used. Any given language can go from "simple" to "complex" many times > > during its life. > > Examples of such, please. Aren't pidgin languages modern examples? The syntax gets more irregular than the base language, idiom appears, redundancies are added. People normally think of pidgin languages as simplified, but aren't they primarily simplified in terms of vocabulary, while being equally complex or more complex than the 'parent' language in terms of syntax and idiom? This is clearly speculation and can't be used as evidence of anything, but perhaps a listening linguist can shed some light. > > A language with the gender, mood, case, etc. constructs > > could be considered "simpler" than the same one without (Old English and > > New English though, of course, the language has gone through enormous > > modifications other than lose of gender, mood, etc.) because to get the > > correct idea across, we now must use a fairly restricted word order > > or a phrase will not mean the correct thing. Therefore, we have more not > > less rules governing our language. I disagree with the basic notion here. Modern languages *are* simpler than antique ones. However, I don't agree with the "devolved" label often given to the simplified language. > > > 12. If languages evolved, the earliest languages should be the > > > simplest. And of course I disagree with this also. The first stab at developing something like a language seems likely to be complex in structure and simple in vocabulary, and develop towards simplicity in structure and complexity in vocabulary. My other posting on this subject expands on this ad nauseaum. Any time a language is "reinvented from (near) scratch" (such as pidgin languages, or in general language spoken by a new group of non-native speakers) this trend could be reversed for a short time. > None of these responses dealt at all with the sudden appearance of > language full blown out of nowhere. I posted an article on this a > while ago, but nobody said anything. The conclusion of that article > was: the *evidence* does not suggest evolution; the evolutionary > framework must *presuppose* evolutionary development of language and > fit it in post hoc. I missed that article also. In what sense did languages appear "full blown", and "out of nowhere" yet? I was under the impression that language as we know it developed before records, and since it doesn't leave fossils (:-) what evidence could there be for this? (Feel free to mail me the missing posting, but in the meantime, I'll go on.) I can't imagine what evidence for the sudden appearance of *spoken* language there might be, but sudden appearance of *written* language seems to be the most natural thing in the world. Once any bright fellow had figgured out how to write things down, the idea ought to spread like wildfire in dry grass. How could it *not* do so? I can see (sort of) why you would maintain that new species cannot arise from old ones, but surely the notion of written language (or even spoken language) is an idea, and I don't think you mean to maintain that you can't teach humans new ideas. (:-) So, given that language can spread by teaching, why wouldn't it appear "all at once" in a population of humans capable of it? And I can't see what implication it would have, other than that humans learn fast, which we knew already, more or less. In any event, as several folks have said, the sudden advent of language, (if any), neither supports nor contradicts biological evolution (if any). Linguistic evolution is a whole 'nother can of worms. (An interesting can of worms, but a 'nother one nonetheless.) -- Wayne Throop at Data General, RTP, NC <the-known-world>!mcnc!rti-sel!rtp47!throopw
brian@digi-g.UUCP (Merlyn Leroy) (05/29/85)
Paul DuBois: >...Don't you find it in the least suspicious >that language should develop over such a long period of time and then >just show up full blown with NO TRACE of prior development? Do you mean spoken or written language? Spoken language would leave no* evidence of it's developement; written language would leave some, but not much. Written language may have started as a method of labelling pottery jars (number & type of items) since the jars were kept sealed to preserve the contents. I believe this is the earliest known writing (as opposed to, say, cave pictures). Merlyn Leroy Primordial Slime *Actually, some ancient sounds may be preserved in solidified tree sap. Hard to play, though. Ain't science grand?
cjh@petsd.UUCP (Chris Henrich) (05/31/85)
[] Paul Dubois has raised the issue of the appearance of language (or languages) as relevant to the issues of evolution vs. special creation. Here is an extract from his posting: > Don't you find it in the least suspicious > that language should develop over such a long period of time and then > just show up full blown with NO TRACE of prior development? I think we have very little evidence, one way or the other, about the tempo at which language developed. If mainstream paleontologists are right, there have been humans around for several hundred thousand years. Written records of any kind go back about five thousand years at most. So most of the time during which language could have evolved is not open to our scrutiny. I have the impression that historical and comparative linguists push their reconstructions of extinct languages back well beyond the oldest written records, and are fairly confident of their inferences about "proto-Indo-European," for example. But I don't see how they test their ideas. In any case, they do not claim to go all the way back to the first languages. So, maybe language developed slowly, or maybe it burst forth in the twinkling of an eye (that is, in a period of a mere thousand years or so.) Do we know? We don't. Shall we? Not soon. Can we reach sound conclusions from unknown premises? Speech acts are not organisms; though they are connected to one another in various causal ways, they do not reproduce like living things. They are human artifacts, and humans are capable of changing their behavior at a speed which far exceeds that of biological change. Therefore, I think that even if we could answer questions about the origin of language, the answers would not be relevant to the debate about biological change. Regards, Chris -- Full-Name: Christopher J. Henrich UUCP: ..!(cornell | ariel | ukc | houxz)!vax135!petsd!cjh US Mail: MS 313; Perkin-Elmer; 106 Apple St; Tinton Falls, NJ 07724 Phone: (201) 758-7288
friesen@psivax.UUCP (Stanley Friesen) (05/31/85)
In article <1134@uwmacc.UUCP> dubois@uwmacc.UUCP (Paul DuBois) writes: > >--- >>> 12. If languages evolved, the earliest languages should be the >>> simplest. On the contrary, language studies reveal that >>> the more ancient the language (for example, Latin, 200 >>> B.C.; Greek, 800 B.C.; and Vedic Sanskrit, 1500 B. C., the >>> more complex it is with respect to syntax, cases, genders, >>> moods, voices, tenses, and verb forms. The best evidence >>> indicates that languages DEvolve [a-c]. > >> [Stanley Friesen] >> The problem is these languages are only the oldest *attested* >> languages, since writing was only invented about 1500 BC. Homo sapiens >> is generally held to have been around at least half a million years, >> thus these languages would have a *long* history of prior developement. >> Furthermore, individual languages do not evelve in the *biological* >> sense, they are all full expressions of the human capacity for language. > >(i) Begs the question. >(ii) 4000 BC, not 1500 BC. >(iii) They are indeed "full expressions of the human capacity for >language", as you put it. Don't you find it in the least suspicious >that language should develop over such a long period of time and then >just show up full blown with NO TRACE of prior development? > You missed my main point, which is that languages *didn't* show up full blown as you say, it is only *writing* that does so, and even that shows some interesting predecessors in early Mesopatamian accounting systems. *Language* has a long history prior to the *invention* of writing. Just look at Australian Aboriginal languages, which are full-blown languages, yet writing has existed in Australia only since the European settlement! Admittedly my 1500 BC may have been inaccurate, but the point is that the first real writing system only dates back to the early cuneiform system of Mesopatamia. >> Thus, this is irrelevant to evolutionary theory, since huamans are >> not evolving *biologically* with respect to language ability. > >I notice that you were awfully silent before also. Mainly because this is the first time I have seen this argument on the net. If it has been here before, I either missed it during the period I was too busy to read this group, or it was before I started reading the group. > >> Also, I think you will find that most linguists would disagree about >> the existance of a general tendency for "devolution" in languages, >> all your examples are from the restricted set called Indo-European >> languages which share a common heritage, and thus do not form an >> independant sample. A wider sample shows much less of a uniform >> tendency. > >Ah! Maybe so. Can you give this more than a handwave so that we have >a chance to believe you? >--- Well try reading Greenberg's symposium on linguistic universals for a start, or try the 4 volume Stanford Press series on the same subject. This is a *lot* of material and would be hard to summarize other than the general statements I have already made. A common theme through much of this work is the blind alley linguistics was led down by relying too heavily on the Indo-European languages. -- Sarima (Stanley Friesen) {trwrb|allegra|cbosgd|hplabs|ihnp4|aero!uscvax!akgua}!sdcrdcf!psivax!friesen or {ttdica|quad1|bellcore|scgvaxd}!psivax!friesen
friesen@psivax.UUCP (Stanley Friesen) (06/01/85)
In article <126@utastro.UUCP> ethan@utastro.UUCP (Ethan Vishniac) writes: > >Third (oops, well make that three comments) there may be some arbitrary >element in drawing the boundary between homo sapiens and erectus but >500,000 years sounds a bit long to me. Of course, we know homo erectus >made tools, he may have also language. > Actually, half-million years bit was only a rough aproximation of the timing deduced by antropologists, and it was fairly close to the correct value as of the last time I really looked. However the dividing line is not altogether arbitrary, it is based on some rather important morphological differences. In fact there is one set of differences that is of particular importance to this discussion. Analysis of the layngeal anatomy of Homo erectus and comparison of it to modern forms shows that they were physically incapable of the rich, vowel-oriented vocalization so important to speech in Homo sapiens! In short, they could not make as many different syllables as H. sapiens and could not switch from on sound to another nearly as fast as H sapiens. Thus any "speech" that they might have had would have sounded quite crude to modern ears, and would have been significantly less efficient at transfering information. My goodness! Evidence for a functional intermediate state between ordinary animal utterances and what we would recognize as language!! -- Sarima (Stanley Friesen) {trwrb|allegra|cbosgd|hplabs|ihnp4|aero!uscvax!akgua}!sdcrdcf!psivax!friesen or {ttdica|quad1|bellcore|scgvaxd}!psivax!friesen
ethan@utastro.UUCP (Ethan Vishniac) (06/03/85)
[]
Every once in a while I wonder why I bother with this group. Then
I read an article like Stan's and I remember that I learn a lot by
reading this group carefully.
I was, of course, wrong about my comment about the dividing line between
H. Sapiens and H. Erectus. I had in mind the appearance of Homo Sapiens
Sapiens, which event is generally agreed to have occurred about 50,000
years ago. Off hand I would expect the language of any group of
Homo Sapiens Sapiens to be a fully human language. The use of language
and the ability to use language should have evolved in tandem. All bets
are off concerning archaic brands of H. Sapiens. I was fascinated to
read about the anatomical evidence regarding H. Erectus. I had no idea
such details were known.
--
"Don't argue with a fool. Ethan Vishniac
Borrow his money." {charm,ut-sally,ut-ngp,noao}!utastro!ethan
Department of Astronomy
University of Texasberger@aecom.UUCP (Mitchell Berger) (06/04/85)
> Written > records of any kind go back about five thousand years at most. And agriculture begin about then too. Interesting, when we say that the seven days of creation ended about then. Any deistic evolutionists out there? -- Micha Berger 2525 Amsterdam Ave. Suite M406 NY, NY 10033 (212) 781-0756 {philabs|cucard|pegasus|rocky2}!aecom!berger