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Missing Links in the Evolution of Language

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Characterizing Consciousness: From Cognition to the Clinic?

Part of the book series: Research and Perspectives in Neurosciences ((NEUROSCIENCE))

Abstract

The evolution of language is an intractable problem if it is assumed (a la Chomsky) that language emerged full-blown at some point during the ~ 6,000,000 year period that elapsed between the divergence of the hominid line from chimpanzees, our closest living ancestor. It is intractable because it fails to recognize the role played by the evolution of conversation, and its antecedent, non-verbal conversation, a uniquely human phenomenon. For that we have to go back to the time when bipedalism replaced knuckle walking. Bipedalism resulted in a reduction in the size of the pelvis and the consequent reduction in the size of the birth canal, a birth canal that could not accommodate an infant with a brain larger than ~1,000 cc. As a result, human infants were born with a brain and skeletal system that were much less developed than those of non-human primates. To survive, the human infant required support from her mother for a period of time that was considerably longer than that needed by the offspring of other non-human primates. As a result, the human infant spent lots of face-to-face contact time with her mother, sharing eye gaze, another uniquely human activity. I hypothesize that those interactions allowed the infant to perceive and consciously compare the contents of her and her mother’s mind. From there it is a relatively small step to joint attention, yet another uniquely human activity, which provided a basis for the assignment of names to events and objects.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Lashley (1951) made a similar argument and also suggested a hierarchical, as opposed to a linear, structure of learned responses in which particular nodes controlled the spacing of particular subordinate responses. These and related ideas have been described in detail by others and will not be elaborated in this chapter (Anderson and Bower 1974). [Gardner]

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology and the New York State Psychiatric Institute, Columbia University, New York, NY, USA

    H. S. Terrace

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Correspondence to H. S. Terrace .

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  1. Unité INSERM-CEA Cognitive Neuroimaging, Gif-sur-Yvette, 91191, France

    Stanislas Dehaene

  2. Fondation Ipsen, Quai Georges Gorse 65, Boulogne-Billancourt, 92100, France

    Yves Christen

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Terrace, H.S. (2011). Missing Links in the Evolution of Language. In: Dehaene, S., Christen, Y. (eds) Characterizing Consciousness: From Cognition to the Clinic?. Research and Perspectives in Neurosciences. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-18015-6_1

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