Why only us: language and evolution

TLDR

Human infants acquire language rapidly, a species‑specific ability that raises fundamental questions about how language evolved. The authors adopt a biolinguistic framework, treating language as a biologically grounded, computationally efficient system, and examine the tension between gradual Darwinian change and modern evolutionary theory using evidence from vocal learning in songbirds.

Abstract

We are born crying, but those cries signal first stirring of language. Within a year or so, infants master sound system of their language; a few years after that, they are engaging in conversations. This remarkable, species-specific ability to acquire any human -- the faculty -- raises important biological questions about language, including how it has evolved. This book by two distinguished scholars -- a computer scientist and a linguist -- addresses enduring question of evolution of language. Robert Berwick and Noam Chomsky explain that until recently evolutionary question could not be properly posed, because we did not have a clear idea of how to define language and therefore what it was that had evolved. But since Minimalist Program, developed by Chomsky and others, we know key ingredients of and can put together an account of evolution of human and what distinguishes us from all other animals. Berwick and Chomsky discuss biolinguistic perspective on language, which views as a particular object of biological world; computational efficiency of as a system of thought and understanding; tension between Darwin's idea of gradual change and our contemporary understanding about evolutionary change and language; and evidence from nonhuman animals, in particular vocal learning in songbirds.