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The functionality of the study of language origin
Antoni Gomila
Philosophy Department
Univ. of the Balearic Islands
07071 Palma de Mallorca (Spain)
e-mail: dfldpt@ps.uib.es
Although I am sympathetic to Pinker & Bloom (1990), I would like to point out
two ways in which their case could be strengthened. After clarifying what I take to be
the key question in the discussion, I try to show, against P&B’s claims, the importance
of an evolutionary reconstruction of language evolution. I furthermore argue that
taking this reconstruction seriously can turn out to be relevant to the question of the
nature of the language faculty. In other words, my contention is that the relationship
between language acquisition and language evolution is not just unidirectional, with
knowledge about language acquisition helping to figure out how language evolution
took place, but bidirectional: evolutionary considerations can also set constraints on
the nature of the language acquisition device (LAD).
1. P&B insist that the evolution of the language faculty must be understood the way the
evolution of the eye is, and that language must be conceived the way stereopsis is, but
there are reasons to think that an important asymmetry separates the two. Whereas the
optical stimulation required for the visual system to start working properly is
nonespecific (Hubel & Wiesel, 1962), that is not the case with respect to the acoustic
stimuli necessary to develop a language--not just any kind of sound will do. Another,
more radical difference, between the two capacities, is that whereas the existence of
optical energy is independent upon the existence of a visual organ, in the language case
the linguistic stimuli necessary for the development of linguistic behavior pressuposes
the existence of that very same faculty for language (in somebody else, of course).
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What these differences suggest, to my view, is that it is misleading to think of
language as a merely biological competence, and that it must be seen as a cognitive
one. The particular difficulties that accounting for the origin of language involves can
be better understood. The requirement that linguistic stimuli be available for language
ontogenesis makes it problematic to see how such linguistic data became available in
the first place (in phylogenesis). The problem can be formulated in the form of the
following antinomy (which generalizes over Sperber’s “paradox”):
An evolutionary account of the origin of language must take as its starting point
a situation in which language is absent and, accordingly, a situation in which no
specialized mechanism for language acquisition has yet appeared. If such a mechanism
is required in order to learn a language, as the research in language acquisition strongly
suggests, then the problem is to explain how such a device emerged in the absence of
language. In other words, given that the language acquisition device (LAD) itself is not
enough to produce language--linguistic stimulation is also required--the question arises
as to how the LAD appeared and made language learning possible. On the other hand,
if one is to account for the origin of language in terms of communicative pressures and
cognitive resources available (a functional approach), then the problem consists in
explaining why that very pressures and cognitive resources (general intelligence, let’s
say) are not enough for the child to learn a language. Or alternatively, how the LAD
developed if it was not necessary for the origin of language.
Now, of course, this is a kind of fictional opposition. The use of putting things
this way is mainly heuristic. It helps understand the reasoning underlying the positions
expressed in the Commentary. Thus, the attitude of the group composed by Frazier,
Hornstein, Lewontin, Otero, or Piatelli-Palmarini, is to stress the first part of the
antinomy and conclude that selective mechanisms are unable to explain the origin of a
language faculty. Conversely, Bates & MacWhinney, Kluender, Nimio, Lieberman,
Tomaselo or Freyd are impressed by the strength of the second part of the antinomy,
and conclude that an innate language faculty is not really necessary to account for the
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facts of language. Finally, there are those --Jackendoff, Newmeyer, Sperber, Limber,...
-- who think that the LAD is required to account for language development and a
selective account of the LAD is possible, and consequently sympathise with P&B's
argument.
Notice, however, that stated this way, the bottom line of the debate is whether
or not it is possible to give a plausible account of the evolution of the LAD and,
henceforth, an evolutionarily plausible account of different stages in the evolution of
linguistic behavior. Reconstructing the process is a central concern of an evolutionary
account of language.
2. Unfortunately, P&B are much more concerned with the argument from complex
design--relevant as it is--than with a reconstruction of an evolutionary scenario for the
progressive development of the LAD. This attitude, implicit in the paper, becomes a
matter of principle in the Response: “In fact, it is reconstructions of the origin of
language, from ‘bow-bow’ theories onward, that are often tainted by a lack of
constraining evidence and far-fetched efforts to find precursors. Our strategy is
different: we say virtually nothing about precursors and very first forms of language
and the specific sequence leding to its current form; we instead focus on evidence of
adaptation from signs of design in synchronic language structure and acquisition,
where the data are rich and abundant.” (pp. 765-6)
P&B draw support for this strategy from Ridley’s distinction between questions
of origin and questions of maintenance of a structure. Optimality considerations would
only apply to maintenance-questions in such a way that puzzles about arbitrariness
would vanish. Nevertheless, it is misleading to think of P&B’s contribution in this
vein. Nowhere in their article they address the question of the reasons for the
maintenance of the current innate mechanisms as opposed to alternative mutant ones.
They just point out that some arbitrariness is adaptive and expectable, but do not show
the superiority of the current arbitrariness over other possibilities. To put it in the terms
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of optimization theory, nowhere they show that the LAD is an evolutionarily stable
strategy, and that no mutation could be more fitness-enhancing for the organism having
it. Since optimality is cashed out in terms of evolutionary stability, what P&B should
show, if interested in maintenance, is that the current state is the best possible given the
current constraints. But nothing in the argument about trade-offs in the solution to
different, competing demands show that no better, feasable alternatives are possible. In
fact, the general impression one gets from P& B’s article is that, for all we know,
evolution of the faculty of language could perfectly be still taking place.
To this extent, they seem to be missing Sober’s point. To assess the optimality
of a trait one needs to compare different "solutions" to evolutionariry similar problems.
This is usually possible, but the species-specificity of many human features, in
particular
language,
makes
this
task
extremely
difficult,
and
gives
the
antiadaptationists their grip. To insist in the presence of evidence for complex design,
in this respect, is of no use. Sober's suggestions is to take into account diachronic,
instead of synchronic, comparisons; in other words, reconstructing the evolutionary
process turns out to be the only way to assess the optimality of current features.
In consequence, as long as P&B want to defend the functionality of language as
the reason for its evolution, they cannot restrict themselves to the argument from
complex design, and they have to account for the functionality of every single step in
the process that makes language possible. Lacking comparative data, this is the only
way to substantiate functional attributions.
As a matter of fact, though somewhat
indirectly, P&B concede this point in their criticism of Wilkins & Dumford’s exaptive
scenario (p.777), on the grounds that it does not offer an explanation of how the
language faculty could result from a brain structure serving intermodal associations
and feedback. The crucial question, again, is to explain how such a process could have
taken place.
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3. In all fairness, and despite their claims to the contrary, P&B do indeed offer some
insight into such an evolutionary process, in a way that avoids the antinomy presented,
even if they do not intend to offer a detailed reconstruction of its stages. Thus, they
asume an initial stage characterized by the absence of any specific linguistic
knowledge, but in which there exists vocal communication of propositional structures
on the basis of cognitive resources. Progressive especialization of such resources
would result in a gradualist process, which would allow for the functionality of
“intermediate” grammars, since availability of other cognitive capabilities (“cognitive
heuristics based on probable events”, “analogy, rote memory and Haigspeak”) would
not be undermined. The Baldwin effect is, furthermore, a major asset in order to make
sense of this process of specialization.
This is very interesting and deserves more attention. But the question that
interests me in this respect (and which was not directly raised by the commentators) is
to what extent an account of the evolution of the language faculty along these lines is
compatible, or convergent, with the standard account of that faculty in linguistic theory
(as a parameterized U.G.). In other words, I would like to cast doubt on P&B’s
assumption that the kinds of processes they postulate to account for the evolution of
the language faculty do produce the kind of LAD linguistic theory presently assumes.
Of course, the complexity of this question ensures that it will not be solved here; but I
want to suggest a couple of reasons why the current conception of UG could be
questioned from an evolutionary standpoint.
First, the current conception of the language faculty postulates the innate
presence of a set of principles that characterize the domain of possible human
languages; these principles are understood as determining a number of parameters
whose fixation, by means of linguistic input, results in a particular grammar. These
principles, hence, do not work as facilitatory rules but as constraints over the space of
possible hypotheses. Nevertheless, it is difficult to see how a mechanism like the
Baldwin effect, that is, the automatization of certain strategies of understanding or
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production, would not result in a strong preference for this strategies. This point, made
in another context by Bickerton (Bickerton, 1981), is one which P&B seem to be aware
of. In their Response, they claim that "a genetic change in the language faculty need
not simply generate the ambient language verbatim, in which case ease of processing
would be the only selection pressure, and further evolution would halt. It can generate
a superset of the language (or a partially overlapping set), much the way contemporary
children go beyond the information given in the development of creoles, sign
languages, and their frequent creative inventions." (p. 777)
In other words, since the process of automatization and genetic control of
certain cognitive resources is dependent upon the ambient language, we should expect
certains predispositions in the infant towards particular linguistic structures--instead of
merely abstract properties all languages satisfy.
Secondly, and as a consequence of the former, the conception of the LAD as
Universal Grammar turns out to be problematic. In a sense, the LAD constrains the
domain of possible human languages, but it can hardly be conceived as a
characterization of the universal properties shared by human languages. If the LAD
evolved to facilitate the processing and production of some proto-language, as the
Baldwin effect suggests, it can barely include an especification of the parameters along
which every language is organized. This does not make the characterization of these
parameters less interesting, but casts doubt on the approach that puts them into the
infant's head from the beginning. What the evolutionary considerations seem to suggest
is a less direct kind of relationship between linguistic theory and mental representation,
in convergence with some proposals put forth by learnability theorists (Matthews,
1989; Stabler, 1983).
Given, as P&B acknowledge , that linguistic theory’s claim to the existence of
an innate component for language acquisition has taken place quite apart from
evolutionary considerations, it would be a remarkable outcome if the linguistic
theory’s characterization of the innate component turned out to be perfectly compatible
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with evolutionary theory. Research on the reconstruction of the evolutionary path that
led to language can, no doubt, prove decisive in this regard.
Acknowledgements
This work has been possible through a Fulbright Grant of the Spanish Ministry
of Education. I wish to thank the Department of Philosophy at Rutgers University for
its hospitality and facilities.
References
Bickerton, D. (1981) Roots of Language. Karoma.
Hubel, D. & Wiesel, T. (1962) "Receptive
Fields, Binocular
Interaction and
functional architecture". Journal of Physiology 160: 106-154.
Matthews, R. (1989) "Introduction". In Learnability and Linguistic Theory , R.
Matthews & W. Demopoulos, eds.. Kluwer.
Pinker,
S.
&
Bloom,
P.
(1990)
"Natural
Language
and
Natural
Selection", Behavioral and Brain Sciences 13:
Stabler, E. (1983) "How are grammars represented?". Behavioral and Brain Sciences
6: 391-402.