There is a discussion of language over here, but it is in a different context, so I started a new thread. I have never paid much attention to the philosophy of language, but that thread got me interested. I'm here to learn. I did realize, though, that any evolving language is only culturally relevant in its current state for about a generation or so. For example, on the aforementioned thread I read a quote from Aldus Huxley and was struck by how beautifully he wrote. My sister-in-law, who is much younger than I am, has said the same thing to me about my writing, but she would not be able to understand the Huxley quote without a dictionary and Wikipedia.
While I am honored, I feel I need more of a thesis to work from. Do you have a specific idea or any specific questions on this subject to help drive discussion? I do hope that someday... actually, I think we will... learn to speak to each other without a verbal or symbolic sign language and when we do, we will be able to communicate more effectively. I have the feeling that some of us (at least in the first days) will react in fear and wonder how to control information. It would be excellent to be able to impress exactly what I mean and what I feel, but a worry is how to do that without expressing more information than intended.
Let's start here. Why was language created in the first place? I assume it had to do with small, familial groups of humans with their own internal symbolism beginning to meet and finding a common ground on communication. I guess my question there is why would we evolve in a manner that is destructive? That does not seem like natural selection in the grand scheme of things.
The "children of the future" have decided to simplify our language into abbreviations ie. lol, lmao, ham, etc. I'm interested to see how it works out if it continues. Eventually maybe technology will translate language telepathically or through mental imagery instead of contextually.. Personally I think language evolved from apes undergoing profound experiences (probably influenced by psychoactive chemicals like DMT, cannabinoids and opiates which can now but processed indigenously in the body but are also found in the environment. I also believe these substances are what caused the evolution of mind to self-awareness) and striving to communicate it to its fellow brotheren. It probably began with tools to create pictures which has technology being at the forefront of communication.
I have to work from speculation on that question, so there is a disclaimer. I think that animals can communicate meaning to one another without necessarily having language. Human beings are more complex animals, and learned more complex ways of thinking. But they're also social beings, like their ancestors. No doubt we evolved the ability to communicate more complex thoughts because of the social nature of our ancestors. I also think that it was this very development that truly made us intelligent. When we began communicating, it was probably more intelligent than other primates but still not terribly intelligent. In the process of being able to bounce ideas off one another, we began to have a more complex understanding of even the simplest things. To the question of destructiveness, it may be a holdover from the animal times. When we competed to feed ourselves. So it follows that we competed for territories, and for mates as well. This almost certainly had a biological purpose. Whether it continues to hold that purpose is certainly debatable. We have been compiling ideas for millenia. We will probably evolve beyond it, if we survive our own emerging development. In regard to natural selection, we have begun to disrupt that in our own species and many others. Now we need to begin to respect that. But the question is whether our intellect has developed too much, so that we will not value our environment as much as we value our personal identities. That much is an open question.
Excellent post and, in regards to the last few paragraphs, I think that it's most useful to think of our current situation as more a story of cultural evolution than biological evolution or, perhaps most correctly, as a story of cultural evolution meeting and flatly outpacing biological evolution (though this trend has, in reality, certainly been going on for a few generations by now.) Cultural evolution is the study of ideas and how they interact and undergo their own process of natural selection over time. As communication has gotten exponentially more efficient, so has cultural evolution. Thus, it is able to act in a much shorter time-frame than traditional, biological evolution (which relies upon genetic reproduction/mutation to transmit information.) Cultural evolution is exciting because it is something we can observe and study in our own lifetimes, without having to wait for our childrens' childrens' children to see. What it means for our personal futures......now that's anybody's guess...
Thanks for adding that. I think if I had tried to address it that directly, I'd have written a page turner no one would want to read. It's practically impossible for me to start considering culture without going off into an endless rant about it. In many ways, the cultural evolution is a far more interesting subject to me than biological evolution. Here is a biological form of evolution that is itself a nested element of the existing biological evolution. I'm happy to leave it to anyone else, because I'm afraid of disrespecting it with my personal disgust with many forms of culture. Regardless of how fascinating it is.
This thread has great potential . I know this is far from a satisfactory story, but lots of social creatures have some sort of gestural communication, for example: a wolf averting eyes or tucking its tail between its legs in submission. Early hominids may have done the same, but with our seemingly small survival kit, surviving in the savannas may have called for us to start vocalizing to better work together. There's no doubt selection was involved; the complexity of the brain's language centers certainly implies that our evolution has laid the ground for language and perhaps culture does the rest. I'm no expert, but I've read that a particular area of the brain involved in language, called Broca's area, can be detected in fossil casts of apes as far back as Homo Habilis, who had a brain not much larger than a chimpanzee. Language might be millions of years old.
Language is only a representation of the ideas we wish to impart. In the same way that an artist might have a vision, but cannot quite realise what he sees onto paper. Language is only ever a compromise in communication. Our way of expression needs gesture, movement, facial and visual clues, to accompany it, and is so much less when they're not present. Are there other forms of communication that supersede language? That allow for the whole concept to be felt, perceived, all at once, rather than linearly? I believe so. I also believe we're all doing it far more than we realise anyway, and the more we come to experience clarity, stillness, and real presence, the more likely we are to experience something that reveals this to be true.
I know you're talking on a more spiritual level, and I do believe that there are, but even on a base level a shared hug, or kiss, or glance can impart much more than verbal language ever could. Very good point.
I wonder if language is what created the imagination? Or did the imagination create language? I mean all words require a mental picture/thought process to truly be understood.. but the question is were apes (or whatever you think humans evolved from) capable of this mental process before they began pointing at objects and using tools to communicate? I suppose by the time they could draw images, their minds were well capable, but were these images the first sign of communication, or did they use hands/tools to point to physical objects?
I think imagination must have come before language. Animals can recognize different objects so they must have the ability to store images and associations to those images within their mind. Language arose when those images in the imagination became associated with signs or sounds. However, I think that the ability to communicate expanded the imagination because it allows people to comprehend things that they did not witness personally. The possibilities of the imagination became greater when people began to hear about more things then they could have experienced themselves.
But are those just recognised impulses that are stored in the memory bank? Or does the animal actually picture what its hungry for? It can't think "Oh this sounds good" because its language doesn't work like that.. it's mainly a message from its tummy saying "feed me bitch" and then it eats what it recognises. Something profound must have happened to cause mental imagery, which then caused the ape to strive to communicate it to its friends. Perhaps a little DMT or psilocybin? Or cannabis? (remember a lot of mammals now produce DMT and endo-cannabinoids in there own bodies. Maybe either of these are involved in the imagination in very small doses)
Nietzsche had it right. "I fear we are not getting rid of God because we still believe in grammar." --Twilight of the Idols
I've been watching these lately.. if you have an interest in language and its history around the world, it's a great series. [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fngkvFf2WbI]Stephen Fry's Planet Word. Episode One: Babel Pt 1 of 4 - YouTube[/ame]
If I am correct, and I do not have a source for you, I am certain I have seen studies where apes have been able to describe what they want via charades. And, I am less sure on this one but it is stuck in my memory bank for some reason, but I think some have even drawn rudimentary sketches of their desires.
That's true.. Really makes me wondering why they don't have verbal language now, and why we do. Something caused our neocortex to just explode in evolution compared to theirs.
Do you really think it was that quick of a change? I've always thought of it as being a gradual process. So instead of the neocortex just switching on at some point those processes grew slowly in the brain. Perhaps it started with a simply sign for water. I'm not sure why we are the only species to have made this leap, but their is the possible exceptions of dolphins and whales. Primates will never go through this process. Oh, I'm certain we will teach them to speak at some point (through a mix of the traditional methods and potential genetic engineering), but it will be our languages and core values. They will never evolve it on their own as delphinoidea seem to be.
To quote another thread i read a while back If we evolved from monkeys, how come there's still monkeys?