Pbio 1001934
Pbio 1001934
Pbio 1001934
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Abstract: The evolution of the what it can tell us about the mechanisms evolution of language (Box 1) [1,4].
faculty of language largely remains of language. Here we argue that the basic However, speech and speech perception,
an enigma. In this essay, we ask principle that underlies language’s hierar- while functioning as possible external
why. Language’s evolutionary chical syntactic structure is consistent interfaces for the language system, are
analysis is complicated because it with a relatively recent evolutionary not identical to it. An alternative external-
has no equivalent in any nonhu- emergence. ization of language is in the visual domain,
man species. There is also no as sign language [1]; even haptic external-
consensus regarding the essential Conceptualizations of ization by touch seems possible in deaf and
nature of the language ‘‘pheno- Language blind individuals [5]. Thus, while the
type.’’ According to the ‘‘Strong evolution of auditory-vocal learning may
Minimalist Thesis,’’ the key distin- The language faculty is often equated be relevant for the evolution of speech, it is
guishing feature of language (and with ‘‘communication’’—a trait that is not for the language faculty per se. We
what evolutionary theory must shared by all animal species and possibly maintain that language is a computational
explain) is hierarchical syntactic also by plants. In our view, for the cognitive mechanism that has hierarchical
structure. The faculty of language purposes of scientific understanding, lan- syntactic structure at its core [1], as
is likely to have emerged quite guage should be understood as a particular outlined in the next section.
recently in evolutionary terms, computational cognitive system, imple-
some 70,000–100,000 years ago, mented neurally, that cannot be equated
and does not seem to have under- The Faculty of Language
with an excessively expansive notion of According to the ‘‘Strong
gone modification since then,
‘‘language as communication’’ [1]. Exter-
though individual languages do of Minimalist Thesis’’
course change over time, operating nalized language may be used for com-
within this basic framework. The munication, but that particular function is In the last few years, certain linguistic
recent emergence of language and largely irrelevant in this context. Thus, the theories have arrived at a much more
its stability are both consistent with origin of the language faculty does not narrowly defined and precise phenotype
the Strong Minimalist Thesis, which generally seem to be informed by consid- characterizing human language syntax. In
has at its core a single repeatable erations of the evolution of communica- place of a complex rule system or accounts
operation that takes exactly two tion. This viewpoint does not preclude the grounded on general notions of ‘‘culture’’
syntactic elements a and b and possibility that communicative consider- or ‘‘communication,’’ it appears that
assembles them to form the set {a, b}. ations can play a role in accounting for the human language syntax can be defined
maintenance of language once it has in an extremely simple way that makes
appeared or for the historical language conventional evolutionary explanations
change that has clearly occurred within much simpler. In this view, human
It is uncontroversial that language has the human species, with all individuals language syntax can be characterized via
evolved, just like any other trait of living sharing a common language faculty, as a single operation that takes exactly two
organisms. That is, once—not so long ago some mathematical models indicate [1–3]. (syntactic) elements a and b and puts them
in evolutionary terms—there was no A similar misconception is that language is together to form the set {a, b}. We call this
language at all, and now there is, at least coextensive with speech and that the basic operation ‘‘merge’’ [1]. The ‘‘Strong
in Homo sapiens. There is considerably evolution of vocalization or auditory-vocal Minimalist Thesis’’ (SMT) [6] holds that
less agreement as to how language learning can therefore inform us about the merge along with a general cognitive
evolved. There are a number of reasons
for this lack of agreement. First, ‘‘lan-
Citation: Bolhuis JJ, Tattersall I, Chomsky N, Berwick RC (2014) How Could Language Have Evolved? PLoS
guage’’ is not always clearly defined, and Biol 12(8): e1001934. doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1001934
this lack of clarity regarding the language
Published August 26, 2014
phenotype leads to a corresponding lack of
clarity regarding its evolutionary origins. Copyright: ß 2014 Bolhuis et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative
Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,
Second, there is often confusion as to the provided the original author and source are credited.
nature of the evolutionary process and
Funding: JJB is funded by Utrecht University and by Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO)
grants (ALW Open Competition and NWO Gravity and Horizon Programmes) (http://www.nwo.nl/). The funders
had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.
Essays articulate a specific perspective on a topic of
broad interest to scientists. Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
* Email: j.j.bolhuis@uu.nl
Figure 2. A crude plot of average hominid brain sizes over time. Although after an initial flatlining this plot appears to show consistent
enlargement of hominid brains over the last 2 million years, it is essential to note that these brain volumes are averaged across a number of
independent lineages within the genus Homo and likely represent the preferential success of larger-brained species. From [20]. Image credit: Gisselle
Garcia, artist (brain images).
doi:10.1371/journal.pbio.1001934.g002
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