Re: Why grammar is so complex a subject

On Thu, 29 Dec 2005 15:50, Cian Ross wrote:
> On Wed, 2005-12-28 at 11:35, Gary Shannon wrote:
> > Counter argument: For emerging proto-humans in a
> > rudamentary hunter-gatherer society there are a very
> > limited number of things that need to be discussed,
> > and the ways of putting those things together into a
> > single utterance are mathematically very limited. "Me
> > goat see", "Goat me see", "Me see goat", "Goat see
> > me.", "See goat me.", "See me goat." Which, for
> > reasons of survival, would have to be differentiated
> > in meaning from "Tiger see me.", "See tiger me.", etc.
>
> I'm not quite comfortable with at least one assumption you seem to be
> making here.  Why would language even at a very early stage necessarily
> be limited to matters of immediate physical survival?  Language doesn't
> seem to be necessary for survival at all: AFAIK humans are the only
> species that use syntactic language as such and while we're very
> successful we're not alone in being successful.  I have to wonder if
> language more likely started from interpersonal interactions and then
> later turned "outwards" to deal with other matters?
Most current palaeoanthropology I've read recently regards human language as a
form of grooming.  A form that could groom over a distance, furthermore.

It was only after the "conceptual breakthrough" that simultaneously led to the
development of art, that language-as-grooming, language-as-warning, and
language-as-training, and a heap of other functions of homo sapiens language
coalesced.

Wesley Parish
>
>
> Regards,
> Cian Ross
> cian@cox-internet.com
> http://crlh.tzo.org/~cian/conlang/
--
Clinersterton beademung, with all of love - RIP James Blish
-----
Mau e ki, he aha te mea nui?
You ask, what is the most important thing?
Maku e ki, he tangata, he tangata, he tangata.
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