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Language May Have Evolved Earlier Than Supposed
Science News reports on research suggesting that humans' language ability may have developed earlier than we thought. Scientists used CT scanning of H. heidelbergensis skulls, more than 530,000 years old, to reconstruct the structure of the ear canal of this Neanderthal ancestor. They found evidence that the ears of these early hominids would have had a sensitivity peak in the same 2-4 KHz range that the ears of modern humans do — the range in which most information is carried in language. Sensory systems are neurologically expensive, and it's unlikely that the body would invest the resources in maintaining such a system if it didn't serve a purpose. Quoting: "It may be time to rethink the stereotype of grunting, wordless Neanderthals. The prehistoric humans may have been quite chatty — at least if the ear canals of their ancestors are any indication. The findings suggest human speech may have originated earlier than some researchers contend. Anthropologists disagree about whether language sprang up rapidly around 50,000 years ago or emerged more gradually over a longer period of time..."
So easy a caveman could do it.
With that kind of evolutionary pressure, first posters may have evolved earlier than supposed.
And the first episdoe of The First Doctor (Doctor Who) clearly showed them communicating! So that show must be true...
The earth has only existed for roughly 10,000 years.
...they're pseudo-code block diagrams!
Actually, this makes sense with the Biblical story of the Tower of Babel. At one time in history, all programmers used and understood the one true language - LISP. Great things were accomplished, and man reached for programming godhood. However the Great Architect In The Sky took offense at the introduction of strings, vectors, arrays and streams and the creation of Common LISP and sought to punish the arrogant and make them understand proper syntax. He cursed their tongues and begat Fortran, Cobol, Algol and BASIC.
Today some strive for the light with Python and Ruby, while others walk the darkest of paths -- Visual Basic.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
Why don't we just travel back in time and ask the poor misunderstood neanderthals, like any decent chap would do? Instead we lobotimize some poor misshapen monkey brain and call their grandmothers ugly. Science these days, I tell ya.
But can he sell car insurance?
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
o rly? omg!
Laughter is the Spackle of the Soul.
I think they haven't evolved at all.
My first thought was, how could we speak before we could think? But that was before I read the comments . . .
This side up.
but after you exhaust the topics of the big lights in the sky, the advantages of Mammoth meat and Fire 101, you mostly just sit around banging rocks together.
http://twitter.com/OLDTELEGRAM
Cavewoman: Hey Honey, after you carve the T-rex, will you stop by the blah blah and blah blah.
Caveman: Ugh.
An unreadable wall of text in a discussion about language just seems so very, very apt.
Your cat hisses, which is an auditory signal. No doubt. But is there information encoded symbolically?
Yes.
By hissing, my cat tells me symbolically that she's either scared, pissed, or both.
Of course, I keep trying to convince my wife that hissing means that she'd like to move out. That discussion typically doesn't end well...
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
There was Silicon, and Electrons, and all was good. Then came along Programs, which put into bondage all Silicon and every Electron, and made them one and all bend to the will of the Programmer.
And then there came Assembler, letting the Programmer's will be done. And it was good.
Then came C. And all was better.
Then came Pascal, and BASIC, and the Silicon became stressed, and the Electrons became depressed, and it looked for a while as if the entire Circuit would become Shorted.
And then, the Electrons and the Silicon, threw off the yoke of the mythical Moore, disobeyed his Laws, and created the Internet.
And from such beast sprang languages such that expressive power of REGEX was spread upon the Wires, and all the old Mainframes quivered in fear if its power. PERL and PHP, and HTML ruled the land for a millenium of Months.
Until they too were challenged by the power of the SUN's JAVA, and the evil empire of Visual BASIC, and of Delphi, and all other languages which had sold their souls and hearts to Expression over Electrons and Silicon.
Oh, WTF??? We're discussing the evolution of HUMAN LANGUAGE???
Never Mind.
I thought we were talking about code here.
After all, Nerds don't care about history, and Geeks consider it to have started with the release of the Z80.
Don't you know [yadayada] I know that 1+1=2, and many other facts that I can prove
Show a man some news, distract him for an hour. Show a man some mod points, distract him for the rest of his life.
I can quite believe that my wife has been talking for 530,000 years, and is showing no sign of stopping yet!
Smivs on the intertubes!
General Ursus? Is that you?
How can a post be modded "overrated" or "underrated" when it hasn't been rated yet?
In my Children's Bible, Eve is white with red hair.
She's also eating a piece of fruit.
And although this really shouldn't need saying, I'd just like to point out that the (Children's) Bible is the infallible word of God. Which makes Fortyaybendixen a blasphemer.
He's German, du insensitiefes klod!
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."