Seupve 11 24 The Gift of Gab ‘Matt Cartmill Mat Carts profesor of iota! anthropology au anatomy at Duke Unie ly He fre president of he American Assocation of Physical Arthropao- ‘fut end thor f View toa Death in the Moring: Hunting and Nature ough History (1993 Flaread, referred fo in Selection 20. Pre 120-4 ‘A trait that sets humans profoundly apact from all ‘ther organisms (as far as we know) is Our language, writ i arbitrary sounds (and in some cases, writen ymbols), duality (whece units of sound are put to- ether in diferent combinations to produce units of {eaning), and prodacivity (he ability to generate an tress number of sew combinations to express ew ‘meanings ideas concepts, and experiences). A number (of major questions arise regarding this trait: How does itcompare with the communication systems of other tcpanieins, and do the communication systems of any thee creatures have some ofthe fetures of our Ian (gunge? Can any other organisms leur some of te ru- ‘Ements of human language? At what point did our an ‘estos begin 0 speak witha modent-type language? ‘What were the conditions that elected for that ability? Im this selection, Matt Cartmill addresses all these {questions and, in doing 20, eazy shows how the si- ‘Dili method is applied to a question about the past Prople can tal Otter animals ant They can all commuricate in one way oanoter—to ure mates at the very lastbut tok whines ac wiggles dont ao the Job that language dows. The bids and ben's ‘an usd their gas fo stract ater, or alert ech Stee but hey ca ask questo Ske bargains ell stoi, o lay outs pan of acto. “Those slo ae oma sen a uniquely success fal, powerful, and dangorovs mammel- Other cet three ngals cay only few lime Kinds of nor. tiation sbout whats kappening atthe moment, but Tnngnge leu el each oer mies detail about Fram Des Novem 1 9p 5.8 2-H Coppin {Spe by ba Carns Rep by peso tt. ‘As you read consider the following questions 1. How do we know th people were speaking a Jnuman language by a least 30000 years ago? 2. Whatare thediferenoes between the vocal tract fof humans and tatof chimpanzees, and what ef- ect does this have on spexch? To what extent can this information be used in examining the fossil record? 3, What conclusions about human speech did Cart tril and colleagues arsve at by looking at the hy- ‘oglosal canal? 4 Wit & Ui concept of rfrncsmportnt in dis ‘inguishing human language from other commu ‘cation systems? 5. What might experiments in language learning ‘wih apes el about te evolution of human language? what use to be or will be or might be. Language lets tus get vast sumbers of big, smart fellow primates all Wwotking together on a singe task—bullding the Great ‘all of China or fighting World War or Aiying to the moon, I et us constrict and communicate the gor. fous fantasies of tersre and he profound fables of {hyth It lets us cheat death by pouring out our know |- ‘Sige, dreams, and memories into younger people's frunds, And i does powerful things for ws inside our (wn minds becnase we do alt of ou thinking by ta {ig olen to ourselves. Without language, we would ‘Seonly aso. of upright chimpanzee with funny feet and cover hands, With it, we are the selpossessed masters ofthe planet "ow did such a marvelous adapiation get started? ‘And ifits so marvelous, why hasn't any othee species ouve up with anything salar? These may be the most 120Smportant questions we face in studying human evalu sion. They are also the lesstenderstood But inthe past few years, ingsists and anthropologists have bean making some breakthroughs, and we are now begin fing to have glimmering of sme answers, ‘We can reasonably assume that by atleast 3,000, years ago people wore talking—at any rate, they were producing carvings, rock paintings, and jewelry, a5 {well ae ceremonial! graves contsning various goods ‘These tokens of ar and religion ae high-evel forms of symbolic behavicr, and they imply tat the everyday Symbolhandling machinery of uaa language must have been in place then as wel, [Language surely goes back farther than that, but archeologists don’t agree on just hove far. Some think ‘hat earlier, more basic human behaviors hunting in groups, tending fies, making !0ls—also demanded Tinguage, Othts thnk these activites are possible without speech. Chimpanzees, afer al, hunt €or pally, and with human guidance they can learnt tend fires and chip int Paleontologats have pored over the fossil bones of ‘ur ancient eelatives in search of evidence for speech bilities. Because the most crcil organ for language the brain, they have looked for ign inte impressions left by the brain on the inner surfaces of fssil skulls, sattculatly impresions made by pers ofthe brs falled spesch areas because damage to them can i= pair person’ ability to talk or understand language Unfortunately, tums out hat you can tell whether a fossil hominid was able to talk simply by looking at brain impressions on the inside of skal For one thing, the fit berweon the brain and the bony brainease Islooce in people and other large mammals, and so the impressions we derive fom fossl skull are disap pointingly fuzzy. Moreover, we now know that lan {unge functions re not ght localized but spread ‘cross many parts of the brain Faced. ‘with these obstacles, researchers have tured from the bral to ober organs used in speech, suchas the throat and tongue. Some havemeasured the fossil skulls and jaws of ealy hominis, teed to recon struct the shape oftheir vocal tacts, and then applied the laws of acoustics to them oSeewhather they might Ihave been capable of producing human speech, ‘All mammals produce their vocal noises by cox teacting muscles that compress the ribcage. The ain the lang is driven out through the windpipetotheae- ys, where it dows between the vocal cords, Mare ike flaps than cords, these strsctares vibrate nthe breeze, producing a buzzing sound that becomes the voice. “he human diference es in what happens tothe ar after it gets past the vocal beds. ‘Inpeople,thelarynx lies wel below theback of the tongue, ane most of he air goes out trough the mouth THEGIFTOFGAB 121 ‘hen all, We make ony few sounds by exating through the nove for nstnce, ral consonants ke mort oc he so-lednasl vowels a wort ite he French fot andi. Bt ia moat manna icing aes the lar ike farther ip behind the Fong ito the back ofthe noe, andl most of the exh a asses out hough the nents Noshunaa amines rake mosty nas sod av aso. ‘Atsome point in hin eet the lary must have descended fom ip previous hight and ts hange fal some seis drowns put the opens ingol the windpipe aunsy he pth of esenting food, making Sangerosyexy for us to choke death fa een of mes goss doa he wong way Something that rely hoppen toa dog ora cee Why selon expose uso is ange? Some cents hin tat te beset outweighed she ssa, crue lowering he lane improved he ult fox vows and made speech ese oun ntand. The ferences Between vowels re pro diced mainly by changing the a and shape of the tirway Between the tong andthe ol of te mouth ‘When the ron othe ong sit toch pala you ge the ee sound in fe hen the tongue emped up high nthe back nd ips ae rounded), You get theo sound int soon Wee steal [osama comet opie tent cluding ‘Sngwe and lanijngigh op nth peck, ah hs Ssrngerent kes «dais vowel sound ls Ceaty Separated fem each ober hans dl Phllp Listens of Brown University thinks that sn apelte oat persed for some fe fn or om id ancestors His tes fol own ad als pe onde him hat a ore modern thet devel ne “some 50,00 yen ago, sn hat some elstnary ines in the grows Ao never cid acquire modern tral organ’ Licbeman concludes nt the Nearer {ha ho ved in Europe nt peaps 25.00 yeas tag, belonged to dense nese that never deve Spee our range of omen an thatthe speceh — $F hey bad sy stall would have boon heer fo ‘edrand nan ors Apparent bing nal unde Stod wae tess import them nab pon fant enough, at any rt to eutwegh the nak of ling a ck of ea ina lowered lar Ths eggs hat voc commricton was sano Bl ve wits ous ‘Many pleertopologiss, especially thse who keto ace Nears a separate specie, crept {hs soy Ober ve tei douse Ba he sy othe arts of te seston i fi omnis mapper Sot of Licberman connor. Daring éhe 180s 8 ‘ety complete skeleton young ome male was Covet fom] year-old lepers northem ‘nyu: Emining th urbe sched the boy's 1 OE $e122 HOMINID EVOLUTION ib cage, the English anatomist Ana MacLamon dis- Covered that hi spinal cord was proportionately tin- yer in this region than it's in people today Since that ‘part of the cord controls most ofthe muscles that deive Erin and out of the lungs, MacLaron concluded that the youth may not have had the kindof preciseneural Control over breathing movements that is needed for speech. “This year my colleague Richard Kay, his student ‘Michelle Bato and I were able o offer some insights from yet another part of the hominid bedy. The tongue’s movements are controlled almost solely by a nezve called the hypoglossal. In its course from the ‘rain the tongue this nerve pases through a hole in the shall, and Kay, Balow, and Ifound that this bony anal is relatively bigin modern mans about ice fs big in oss section as that of sikesizechimpanzce. (Our larger canal presumably reflects a bigger hy- poglossl nerve, giving us the precise control over fongue movement that we nee for 5 ‘ie also measured tis hoe inthe skis of anus ber of fossil hominids, Austrlopithecines have small ‘canals like those of apes, suggesting that they coulat talk But later Homo skulls, Beginning with 2 400,000- year-old skull from Zambia, all hive big, humanike [hypoglossal canals These are aso the skulls that were {Re fit to hous heving ne ig ax ou own. On hese ‘counts out work supports Licberman’s ideas, We dis- gree only on the matter of Neanderthals, While he ‘aime their thrsts couldn’ have produced human speech, oe find that their shall also had human-size Canals forthe hypoglossal nerve, suggesting that they ‘could indeed! tlk In shor, several lines of evidence suggest that ne ther the austeopithecnes nor the erly, small-brained species of Homo could talk Only around half a milion years ago did the Best big-brained Homo evolve ln {uage. The verdit stil ot on te language abilities Of Neandertals. [fend © think that they must have tad fully human language, After al, they had brains Inrger than thoee of most modern humans, made el (gant stone fools, and knew hove to use fie. But if {eberman and his friends ae right about those vow= ‘els, Neanderthals may have sounded something ike the Swedish che on The Muppet Show. ‘Weare beginning to get some idea of wher human language orginted, butte fossils ca tel us haw it go started, or what the intermediate stages betveen farina calls and human language might have been like. When trying to understand the origin of «trait ‘that doesn’t fossllize ts sometimes useful to look for similar but simpler versions of ti oer creatures v= dng today, With ick, you can ind a series of forms that suggest how simple primitive makesifts could have ‘evolved into more complex and elegant versions. This ishow Darwin altace the problem ofthe evolution the eye. Easier biologists Had pointed to the human. tye as an example of a marvelously perfect organ that ‘must have been specially eeated ala ce in ts Sal form by God, But Darin pointed out that animal eyes exist i all tages of complexity, fom simple skin calls that can detect only the diference between light and darkness, to pits ined with such coll, ad so on all the ‘way to the eves of people and other vertebrates, This Series, he argued, shows how the human eye could have evolved from simpler precursors by gradual stages ‘Can we look to other animals to find simpler pre courmogs of language? It seems unlikely. Scientiats Rave Sought expermmenta evidence of language in dolphins and chienpanzees, thus far without success. But even if ‘We had no experimental studies, common sense would tellus that the other animals cat have languages ike ‘us. If they Aad, we would be in big troble because they would organize against They don Outside of Gary Larson's far Side cartoons and George Orwells ‘Animal Farm, farmers dont have to watch thie backs ‘when they vst he cowshed. There are no conspiracies Sinong sows, or even among dolphins and. chim Danzaes. Unlike human slaves or prisoner, they never plot rebellions against thes oppressor. ‘Even if language ae 2 whole has no parallels in an ‘imal communieation, might some of specular prop cenies be foreshadowed among the beasts around us? It 50 that might tell us something abost how a in what ‘order those properties were acquired. One such prop- fry ieelerence Most ofthe unts of human languages ‘refer to things —t indivi (ke Fo) oF types af bjects (dog), actions (st), or propertics (fury). nic ‘mal signals don't have this kind of referential meaning, Instead, they have what is called insteumental moan ng: that, they act as stimali that trigger desired sponses from others. A frog mating croak doesnt ‘oer to sex. Its purpose i to get some, not to talk about it People, to0, have signals of this purely animal sor-—for example, weeping, laughing) and scream ing-—but these stand outside language. They have power meanings for us but not the kind of meaning tat words have. Some animal signals havea focused meaning that looks bit ike reference For ample vervet monkeys give diferent warning calle fr different predator ‘When they hese the “leopard” call, wecvets cmb trees and anxiously look dowry when they hear the “eagle” ‘all, they hide in low bushes or look up. Bu lshough the vervets leopard call isin some sense about leop- ards, tant a word fr leopaed. Like a frog's croak ‘human weeping, its meaning is strictly instramental; its stimulus at ects an automatic response. lla ‘verve ean “say” with itis “Eze! A leopara!”—not“Treally hate leoparde” or “No leopards here, thank ‘Boodness” of “A leopard ate Alice yestrday.” In these English sentences, such referential words ‘a lepard work their magic through an accompanying framework of norveferental, grammatical words, Which set pan empty web of meaning that the refer ‘ential symbole fill. When Lewis Carzoll tells ein “abberwocky” that the thy tves did gyreand gi Die in the wabe,” we have no idea what he is talking about, but we do Know certain things —for instance, ‘hat allthis happened in the past and that there was _moce than one fave but only one wabe. We know these things because ofthe grammatical structure of the sen- tence, a structure that Lnguists call syntax. Again, there's nothing much ike it in any animal signals. Buti here arent any intermediate stages between animal calls and human speech, then how could lar juage evolve? What was there fri 19 evolve from? il recendy,lnguists have shrugged off these ques tions-—or elas conclude that language didn evolve at all, but jut sprang into exstence by accident though some glorious random mutation. This theory drives Darwinians crazy, but the linguists ave beer ‘content with it because i its nally ino some key ideas in modem linguistics. Forty years ago most linguists thought that people eam to talk thvough the same sort of Behavior rene forcement used in raining an animal todo ticks: when dluldzen use a word corely or producea grammasi- fal sentence, they are rewarded, This picnire wae ‘sweptaway in the late 1950sby the revolutionary ideas fof Noam Choma. Chomely argued that te struc: ture of syntax len unconsionslinguistc pattems — so-called decp structures —thatare very diferent fom the surface rings of words that come out of our ‘mouths. Two sentences that loo diferent onthe sur- face frinstance,"A leopardae Alice” and “Alice was ‘eaten by a leopard”) car mean the save thing because they derive from a single deep structure. Conversely, toro sentences with diferent deep stractures and di {erent meanings can lok exactly the same on the sur- face (for eample, “Fleeing leopards can be danger- us"). Aay models of language lesming based stsctly ‘onthe observable behaviors of language, Chomsky in- sisted, cant account for these deeplying patterns of ‘Chomsky concluded thatthe deepest structures of language are innate, not learned. We are al bor with the same Fundamental grammar hacd-vced ino out brains, andl we ae preprogrammed to pick up the ad- “itional rules of the loal language, jut as baby ducks “ae hard-wired to follow the Set big animal they see when they hate. Chomsky could ae no evidence of ‘other animals’ possessing this innate syetax machin- ery. He concluded that we ca lean anything about THEGIFTOFGAR 123, the origin of language by dying ote nial and they cat earn language fom language leasing ‘wee [usta mater of proper tsining Chomsky rex Soned, we ought tobe seta ech English 0a as, rat leat apes Ase ato, pes ent bul oI Bt hey cant ine to me sgh language ro pln wor Symbols on keyboard. Stang in he 160s, sever fcperimenters trained chimpanzees and ther great ape toe sch signs fos for things and anewer Gfucstins to get fewer. Linguist, however, were umprsced. They sald that te ape” sgt hed 8 purely instrumental meaning: he animals were st fing resto gut a tea And there was note of sya inthe om ooking jumble of sigs the apes Produced an ape tat signed "You give me cookie Peso” one mine might ign Me oe please ou Cookie et give the nest Duane Rumbaugh and Sue Savage Rumbaugh set to work with chmparcees atthe Yeas Regional Pet trate Research Carter in Alara fo ty fo anower ho Iiguit elise, ter many yeas one res Sue made a suprising brskrough with a young tonobo (or pygmy chimp) named Kang, Kent ad vetshe his moth, Maat, ty fo lnm gn with Ite sacs When Sue pave ap on fer and stated ‘oth Kanai she was asenahedt ducer tat he a Teady knew the meaning of 12 ofthe keyboard sy ols Apparently, he Ra kare hem without sy tring or rewards. Ie the years tat followed, he Jenmed new symbols quell tnd used them rere tally both to answer questions and fo “ak” about things ta be intended Yo door ad already done, Sl ‘more amazingly he hada eonaierble understanding of epoken Englsh=induding is syan He grasped Sich grammatical cto a ae tucires (Ean you throw apo tothe fare?) and er impicton ("ou ean bave some cereal L'you give Austin your ‘monster mas to play wit). Upon heating such sn tence, Kanal behaved appropriately 7 percent ofthe time—-more tan 2 sb-mondeald Buran child given thesamte st ancl primatologits dream and a Inguists ighmare. His language fetming alte Sem ne pllcable He dint teed any rewards tolnrn language, SS the old behaviorss woud have predied: but he ‘leo defi the Chomabyan mode, wich cant expla Sry a specchles ape would have an inna tendency to lar English It fooks as though some als can develop lngultic ble for esone unrelated lan sage feel si ‘Newroscienist Wiliam Calvin of the University of Weshinglonand gust Derek Bicker ofthe Univer _y of Fai havea suggestion af what those = Sons might be. In thei 200] bok, Lingua ex Machi, a3Sune meen in een 124 HOMINID EVOLUTION they argue thatthe ability to create symbols —signs that refer fo things is pototialy present in any ani smal that can lear to itorpret natural signs, suchas a tral of footprints. Syntax: meanwhile, emerges From the abstract thought required fora social lif. In apes tnd some other mammals with complex and subtle 3 al relationships, individuals make alliances and act fltrusticlly toward others, withthe implicit under- Standing tat their favors willbe returned. To succeed fn such societies, animals need to choose trustworthy allies and to detect and punish cheaters who take but never give anything in return This demands fitting a Shifting constelation of individuals into an absteact ‘mental mode! of socal roles (debtors creditors, allies, and so on) connected by socal expectations ("IF you scratch my back Ill scratch yours) Calvin and Blck- ‘rts believe that such abstact models of socal obl- {gation furished the basic pattern forthe deep struc- fares of synta ‘These foreshadowings of symbols and syntax, they propose laid the groundwork for language i alot of Social animals but did't create language sel. That had to walt until our aneestore evolved brains big tenouigh to handle the Inge-scale operations needed £9 [generate and process complex strings of signs. Calvin nd Bickerton suggest that brain enlargement in our Shcesley waa te seul of evoluionary pressures that favored intelligence and motor coordination for mak: ing tools and throwing weapons. AB aside efcet of theve selection pressures, which had nothing 10 do with communication, human evolution crossed 2 threshold at which language became possible. Big- brained, nonhuman animals ike Karl remain just on the verge of language 8400 ‘This story reconciles natural selection with the li gulsts insistence that you eantevole language out 6. an animal communication system. eis also consistent ‘with what we know about language fom the fossil ocord. The easiest hominids with modern size brains also soum to be the frst ones with modemrsize hy- poglosal canals, Lieberman thinks that thee ae also the fst hominids with modem worl tracts. femay be po coincidance that all the ofthese changes seem to Show ap together around half a million years ago. IF (Calvin and Bickerton ae righ, the enlargement athe brain may have abrupdly brought language int being at this time, which would have placed new selection rossuzes on the evolving throat an tongue ‘This account may be wrong in some of is deta, ‘but the story in its broad outlines solves so many pur lesa ties up so many loos ends tat something Hike itmust surely be correct. tao promisos to resolve our conflicting views ofthe boundary between people and animals. To some people it seems cbvious that human beings are wry diferent fom any beasts, To others, Its jus as obvious that many other animals are essen: tally ike us, only with fewer smarts and more fur Each party ins the other view of amarity alien anc thveatening. The story of language origins sketched sbove suggests that both partes are right the humar ‘Siferece steal sued ptofourn but tis cov.ed pects of pychology and biology that we share with ou ose animal relatives, the growing consensus onthe brigins of language can join these digparate truths fo gether, it will bea big step forward in the study of hu ‘an evolabon,