Origins of Language: A Conspiracy Theory

Abstract

Introduction Language is puzzling. On the one hand, there are compelling reasons to believe that the possession of language by humans has deep biological roots. We are the only species that has a communication system with the complexity and richness of language. There are cases of non-human primates who can be taught (sometimes only with heroic effort) some aspects of human language, but their performance comes nowhere close to those of a six-year old child. Second, although languages differ, but there are also striking similarities across widely divergent cultures. Finally, there are significant similarities in the patterns of language acquisition across very different linguistic communities. These (and other considerations as well) all suggest that species-specific biological factors play a critical role in human's ability to acquire and process language. So what is puzzling? First, it is not at all clear what the biological foundations are. What precisely do we mean when w

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