Confronting Friends and Family

[Aractus]

It wouldn't be identifiable as language in the same way we think of language because our language is specific to our species. The language (if it can be called that) of another species wouldn't be in any way recognizable.

But it would still express and convey the same quantity and quality of information. My point isn't that you could go to an alien world inhabited by humanoids and learn their language, my point is that they will have language, and it will have exactly the same characteristics as ours has (there'll be a verbal or visual form plus a written form, there'll be pragmatics, etc).

We have not taught ASL to gorillas. We have taught a different type of sign to orangutangs and gorillas that is much less complex grammatically and lexically than natural language. It definitely does not meet the criteria that formally define language; therefore, what they've learned is not language.

How does it not meet the criteria that formally defines language?

Linguistics is not physics. I'm not sure what relevance your analogy has to language. Care to elaborate further?

It is derived from physics. So is evolution, so is population growth rates, just about everything is. Given the right starting conditions, language will self develop, just as life itself springs forth from the "right conditions".

That's entirely wrong. First of all, language is dependent on genes.

Then try teaching a language to a feral human.

Again, I'm not exactly sure what you're talking about. Pragmatics is observable in looking at natural language in the context of usage. Pragmatic concepts are derived from empirical observation.

Okay, how do we know the speed of light in a vacuum? We observe it. Can we predict it using calculation? No it's a "fundamental constant". Pragmatics are not a "fundamental constant", thus they are predictable, although we don't know what theory predicts it yet.

[festive1]

That's entirely wrong. First of all, language is dependent on genes.

Then try teaching a language to a feral human.

The human brain has a function called the Language Acquisition Device. It allows for rapid language development, but there is a relatively brief window in early childhood where this is operable. If a child misses this window, they have a much more difficult time acquiring the ability to master language. A feral human would have missed this window. This is why it's recommended that you read to your kids. It's basic developmental psychology.

[Annik]

ITT: A man who think he's very smart and knows little about linguistics trying to argue linguistics with a linguist. Ouch! This is painful.


This might be of interest, though: Gorillas can't use ASL because of their thumb positions are different than humans (and I think a little less flexible), so they have to alter many signs so that gorillas and other species could actually do it.

[Creed of Heresy]

ITT: A man who think he's very smart and knows little about linguistics trying to argue linguistics with a linguist. Ouch! This is painful.

[Hovik]

It wouldn't be identifiable as language in the same way we think of language because our language is specific to our species. The language (if it can be called that) of another species wouldn't be in any way recognizable.

But it would still express and convey the same quantity and quality of information. My point isn't that you could go to an alien world inhabited by humanoids and learn their language, my point is that they will have language, and it will have exactly the same characteristics as ours has (there'll be a verbal or visual form plus a written form, there'll be pragmatics, etc).

You can't know that. You don't know that. Stop acting like that's some take-as-granted idea.

We have not taught ASL to gorillas. We have taught a different type of sign to orangutangs and gorillas that is much less complex grammatically and lexically than natural language. It definitely does not meet the criteria that formally define language; therefore, what they've learned is not language.

How does it not meet the criteria that formally defines language?

A language is a system of communication that is capable of producing an infinite number of possible novel configurations from a finite set of units and rules. That's a very basic, bare-bones definition of what a communicative system needs to be considered a language. Other considerations are displacement, the ability to discuss events and places removed from the speaker and listener both spatially and temporally, as well as a recursiveness, one of the major reasons why language is capable of producing infinite utterances (i.e. we can say "I saw the man next to the table with the book I bought from the store that is next to Walmart on 13th Avenue in New York in The United States on Earth in the Sol System ... etc."). There are more basic requirements, but those are a couple big ones.

Even though sign systems like Koko's or bird mimicking may seem a lot like human language, they unequivocally fall short of these minimum requirements. Gorilla signing does not have a sufficiently complex grammar to produce anything other than a limited set of configurations.

Linguistics is not physics. I'm not sure what relevance your analogy has to language. Care to elaborate further?

It is derived from physics. So is evolution, so is population growth rates, just about everything is. Given the right starting conditions, language will self develop, just as life itself springs forth from the "right conditions".

If you want to be picky, of course language is constrained to physics. Fucking everything is. That doesn't mean it's analyzable in terms of physics. Language is a system that is dependent on so many factors that you're not going to get the same exact development unless everything that led up to it is also absolutely exact. I don't believe in a deterministic universe and therefore reject such a notion.

That's entirely wrong. First of all, language is dependent on genes.

Then try teaching a language to a feral human.

Festive answered this beautifully, so I'll leave it at that.

Again, I'm not exactly sure what you're talking about. Pragmatics is observable in looking at natural language in the context of usage. Pragmatic concepts are derived from empirical observation.

Okay, how do we know the speed of light in a vacuum? We observe it. Can we predict it using calculation? No it's a "fundamental constant". Pragmatics are not a "fundamental constant", thus they are predictable, although we don't know what theory predicts it yet.

I fail to see what relevance that has whatsoever to language. What do you mean pragmatics can be predicted? Are you saying that the existence of pragmatics can be predicted? Of course our language has pragmatics, and I would caution to say that languages of other species would have something like it as well. That doesn't mean its form would be predictable. We figure out pragmatics through empirical observation.

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I actually had a mind to study linguistics a couple years ago. Architecture, linguistics, and culinary arts. I've kind of had to narrow it down to just culinary arts.

Still at least someone here is a linguist.

I like being the token linguist. It's a rough job, but someone's gotta do it.

[Aractus]

You can't know that. You don't know that. Stop acting like that's some take-as-granted idea.

If other people can take for granted that life self-begins when the right conditions arise (a view I agree with), then I also believe that it's true for language.

A language is a system of communication that is capable of producing an infinite number of possible novel configurations from a finite set of units and rules. That's a very basic, bare-bones definition of what a communicative system needs to be considered a language. Other considerations are displacement, the ability to discuss events and places removed from the speaker and listener both spatially and temporally, as well as a recursiveness, one of the major reasons why language is capable of producing infinite utterances (i.e. we can say "I saw the man next to the table with the book I bought from the store that is next to Walmart on 13th Avenue in New York in The United States on Earth in the Sol System ... etc."). There are more basic requirements, but those are a couple big ones.

Even though sign systems like Koko's or bird mimicking may seem a lot like human language, they unequivocally fall short of these minimum requirements. Gorilla signing does not have a sufficiently complex grammar to produce anything other than a limited set of configurations.

So if I'm not mistaking, your argument is that while Gorillas can learn the words (or at least a certain number of them anyway) of ASL but are incapable of using them to the extent required to demonstrate the use and understanding of the language?

If you want to be picky, of course language is constrained to physics. Fucking everything is. That doesn't mean it's analyzable in terms of physics.

No, but there are an infinite set of theories that could describe the origin of Language, and predict how it develops.

Language is a system that is dependent on so many factors that you're not going to get the same exact development unless everything that led up to it is also absolutely exact. I don't believe in a deterministic universe and therefore reject such a notion.

It's got nothing to do with determinism. When life first started on Earth did it matter which life form survived long enough to reproduce? No it didn't - but the diversity of life would still be the same, regardless. Why? Because evolution follows rules, which lead it to develop in predictable ways. If the first tribe of man that had learned language got murdered by some other barbaric tribe, then language would have started somewhere else - and we wouldn't have English or Hebrew or anything else, but we would still have the same amount and quantity of language as we do today.

[Brakeman]

No, but there are an infinite set of theories that could describe the origin of Language, and predict how it develops.

When Adam spent thousands of years naming all the life on the earth, what language did he use? What was the purpose of naming them when his language was to be long forgotten and no one around him knew or cared about what a Rattus norvegicus was called? What did Adam call the tube worms found at the mile deep ocean vents, Riftia pachyptila? How did he know about them to describe them. What would be the significance of having one man bauble on about animals? This is like one man creating an encryption code but not creating a deciphering key for anyone else, it's useless in conversation if other people can not understand what you refer to.

How exactly did the Tower of Babel incident cause the birth of all modern languages, all at the same time. Is it not true that modern languages are derivatives of older languages?

The biblical history of language is completely pathetic.

[Edwardo Piet]

Not all theories are equally valid, Daniel.

[Shell B]

ITT: A man who think he's very smart and knows little about linguistics trying to argue linguistics with a linguist. Ouch! This is painful.


This might be of interest, though: Gorillas can't use ASL because of their thumb positions are different than humans (and I think a little less flexible), so they have to alter many signs so that gorillas and other species could actually do it.

I would venture to say that changing a few of the signs to make them attainable to other great apes is not necessarily changing the language. The English language has a shit ton of different dialects. All of them are English.

Someone catch me up here. Are we arguing that species like gorillas cannot use language? Fuck it. I'll actually read the thread. Point above stands. Game on.

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Question: Is Hovik a linguist or a student of linguistics? These are different, like husband and boyfriend are.

Everyone has to forgive me tonight. Summer set me loose on all of yous.

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And, Daniel, we only have one universe? Prove it.

I love picking through a thread backwards and catching the highlights.

[Aractus]

How exactly did the Tower of Babel incident cause the birth of all modern languages, all at the same time. Is it not true that modern languages are derivatives of older languages?

The biblical history of language is completely pathetic.

Did I use the Biblical history of Language? No.

The Tower of Babel followed Noah's flood. Noah's flood happened 3300 BC or even earlier (it could have happened 5,000 BC for instance). Some have even suggested it happened 5.5 million years ago, and Noah was an Australopithecine. In that scenario it is entirely possible that the entire world's population along with language was derived from Noah! We disagree over where it happened, how much land it covered, and of course when it happened. It was a very significant event, but it wasn't a truly global event the way that a volcanic event in 1816 was.

Nevertheless, if you want to take it literally, that places the Tower of Babel at around 40,000 BC.

Remember, Noah didn't know the earth was round. A flood that covered "all the world" simply meant all the inhabited space he knew about.

The one thing that we agree upon is that the Ark eventually ended up on one of the mountains of Ararat. There's plenty of this region which wouldn't, and couldn't, have been completely flooded anyway.