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Editor for this issue: Karen Milligan <karenlinguistlist.org>
aol.com>Larry is right when he contrasts biological loss of morphology with linguistic loss of morphology. But having several means to the same end is not limited to language- indeed, massive redundancy is a hallmark of biological systems. Not everything is so organized, but enough is. And languages sometimes find themselves in a position similar to that of parasitic organisms (no value judgement implied here): in language obsolescence situations there is often lexical and morphological reduction- functions once in-house are now carried out by other languages. Organelles within cells often carry their own remnant genetic strings- end-products of a long reduction, with genes either traveling to the dominant nucleus, or function replaced by genes from there. I agree that that "small adjustments" are the basis of most evolution of complex systems, but not always. Massive chromosomal rearrangement, for instance, is inferred for our species on the basis of comparison with the chromosomes of apes (fusion, inversion, etc.). But we really have to be careful by what we mean by small- one DNA-level point-mutation may be neutral, another might kill the organism, a third might confer advantage. Some mutations have small chemical or physical ultimate effects, others quite large. All depends on where they are, what they are. And it may turn out that some mutations, because of the organization of the system in which they occur, have pseudo-quantum effects. The angle the legs jut out from the body, for instance, in quadrupeds. Fossil and extant amphibians and reptiles have their legs sticking out laterally, the joints then allowing the next part to hang/swing vertically, while many dinosaurs, and all birds and mammals, have their legs straight down. No fossils known with intermediate condition. Doesn't mean a putative transitional form didn't exist, just that such a form is unknown. Perhaps the control of form and function within the genome is such that such axial alterations, at right angles, is available as an option. Certainly such mechanisms exist, as is seen in the formation of body-plan axes in the developing embryo. If there are other similar mechanisms within the genome and its external supports, then it is also possible that they are coherently organized together as a system. Push me pull you. That would allow saltation of macro-morphology without automatic dooming (of course the social and physical environments retain the ultimate decision). Adjustments to biological systems can be additive, subtractive, both (replacive), at the genetic and all higher levels of organization. The point I was trying to make was that most laypersons see evolution as additive, making the finished product somehow "more" x,y, or z than the ancestor. Probably our culture to blame, with its linear temporal "prejudice". You build a finished product out of parts- bricks, legos, blocks, logs, whatever. And the finished product is bigger. More. but sculptors can create subtractively as well, or combine the two processes. Transformation. I'm saying that an already existing, functioning system can be so transformed to create what one sees today. Its taken a long time. And very likely the original "lump-combination" was the ancient creation of a segmented ancestor- we're talking billions of years ago. All the interesting head and neck structures which allow us to speak (and chew) arose through modification of this segmental structure- we didn't really "add" anything at the macro level, though there have been large numbers of gene duplications/modifications and distributional shifts of materials intermediately. Most of the interesting evolution at the biochemical level took place before the rise of multicellular organisms, which is why we are so similar to yeasts, at the genetic-functional level (even though gene sequences continue to drift, the jobs genes do remain the same or extremely similar). Our remarkable vocal tract is neotenic. Prior to the rise of chewing there was no need for a soft or hard palate, or velum- and amphibians, reptiles, and birds don't have one (although there is some rudimentary "alveolar" shelf development- perhaps to keep food out of the nostrils, originally only for smelling but not breathing)- these structures act as a separation table, allowing the organism to follow the degree of food processing, pick out unfinished bits for re-working, etc. Without a separated nasal tract ancestral vertebrates were also subject to choking to death, and some developed compensatory adaptations (such as an extrusable larynx as seen in snakes- it hangs out the side of the mouth (the way a dog's tongue does) as it negotiates its jaws around food, which it is obliged to swallow whole). Animals which could pre-process their food into smaller bits by shearing or yanking apart, nipping, etc., or which merely took smaller items in the first place, were less likely to choke, and so show less spectacular adaptations. Our larynx is placed much like that of a frog or salamander (who also have very mobile tongues by comparison to many "higher" animals), which as members of lissamphibia are somewhat neotenic themselves (with all sorts of reductions of fossil ancestrally attested structures-parallel evolution? Reeedeeep!). We have a tendency to look only nearby when we make comparisons. This is usually profitable, as its always easier to hold most things constant and compare/contrast one or a handful of remaining things. We look at apes and not further. Might be a mistake. Sometimes broader, deeper views can be just as informative. Understanding how animals have evolved their communicative structures and functions out of former materials-processing ones can tell us of major trends which may have played important roles in the origin of language. May threaten our "uniqueness", but so what? Haven't we learned enough to let go of that? I don't want to nitpick endlessly over terminological turf- so a suggestion here: Let's choose names for different stages/levels of complexity within communicative systems, AND for typological skews which may crosscut them, etc. A language (L) will be a subset of LANGUAGE (L'), which will be a subset of LLAANNGGUUAAGGEE (L"), and so on, all at the same level of overall complexity. If we ever meet space aliens, maybe they'll be using some sort of sub-subset from L". We'd have a multidimensional space to play with, and to place the communicative systems of different organisms within. Human languages would occupy merely one zone within the system. Just an idea. Jess Tauber zylogyMail to author|Respond to list|Read more issues|LINGUIST home page|Top of issue