Was talking with an old Cuttyhunk friend in Berkeley the other day about language and many other things ...
and mentioned Terrence Deacon's "The Symbolic Species: The Co-evolution of Language and the Brain" (1998) as one current explanation/long hypothesis for the origins of language, and also suggesting to my friend that there's also almost no evidence for how language evolved say between 200,000 years ago and 2 million years ago. "Indexicality" (Deacon), which hypothesis I here interpret as from "pant hoots to 1, 2, 3," for example, and thanks to the evolution of the larynx which gives humans the physical ability to talk are important, - but there's no writing, there are no preserved brains, or anything similar, from that time period to help with thinking how language originated and developed. (It's also been a while since I read "The Symbolic Species.)"
So then I was wondering further with my friend, and afterward, about ways in which one could explore the history of the origin or language with brain and cognitive science - http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Brain_and_Cognitive_Sciences - and from the brain itself as evidence. As we begin to map further the human brain in multiple ways, as well as its developments over time, in what ways will we be able to begin to trace the development of language in terms of, for example "structures"/biology in the brain that might have developed with language, or related neural pathways, or kinds of functionality, - and in quite detailed ways. (See, too - http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Linguistics).
What would a focused, and inter-lingual, scientific literature review ... say about this inquiry thus far, and how does Terry Deacon's book further help define these questions in specific ways?
With so little evidence there's still, however, the brain and bodymind itself, which after much further understanding, may well become evidence itself for the origins of language - "inside" of us.
How too will Computational Linguistics help us understand further some of these questions?
Computational Linguistics:
http://worlduniversity.wikia.com/wiki/Computational_Linguistics
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