But there is no agency in evolution; it is inadvertent. We survived, modified, and multiplied, just like any animal alive today, and out of the wildly dodgem course we took, language arose.

About This Quote

I’ve always wondered how humans managed to survive in the past. Through the years, many theories have been proposed to explain how human beings managed to survive. One of these theories suggested that humans have an ability similar to that of other primates. This theory suggests that humans have a form of communication which is called “gestures.” The theory continues by explaining that most gestures are random and are used to communicate with other members of the same species. However, there is the theory that says humans are actually not monkeys at all but are more closely related to apes.

This theory suggests that humans are born without language. The theory explains that children are taught to speak by their parents or by hearing adults speak or by reading books or signs posted around the house. The theory also states that this language consists of basic sounds which can be combined in thousands of different ways. For example, the basic sound “ba” can be combined with “ta” for “bed” or “ba-ta-ba-ta” for “papa,” and these combinations can be repeated as often as necessary until a child learns to speak correctly. This information would be useful if we were still considered as primates who only know how to communicate through gestures and sound and who do not possess a form of speech or language on their own.

However, this is not so. According to many scientists and researchers, we now know that we evolved from apes and we developed speech and language on our own. All thanks to evolution by natural selection and chance events over millions of years, we manage to survive despite our lack of language skills.

Source: The First Word: The Search For The Origins Of Language

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