[MD] Unkludging the MoQ

[David Thomas]

On 8/17/10 8:36 AM, "Krimel" <Krimel at Krimel.com> wrote:

> [Dave]
> Agreed. All I'm saying is since language more than likely emerged such a
> long, long, long, long, time ago and leaves no discernable traces its
> unlikely that we will ever nail down exactly when. How do you excavate a
> sound? Time machine, right?
> 
> [Krimel]
> The two avenues of excavation that seem most promising to me are
> phylogeneticially, by looking at the social and communicative practice of
> our closest primate relatives.
> And ontogenetically, in terms of the development of communicative practices
> in infants and young children.
[Dave]
That's what Alda's brain special was all about. That work while very
interesting and informative establishing the differences between animal
brains and human brains does little to establish timeframe.

 > [Krimel]
 >In either case I think it is a safe
> conclusion that humans, as humans, have never been without language.
> 
[Dave]
In general I agree that once humans were physiologically modern (125,000
years ago more or less) they more than likely had language. But full blown
language with grammar, syntax, etc. requires a brain capable of a high level
of abstraction. Might there be another process that helped the capacity
develop other than language? And one that might narrow the timeframe down?

Dave