The faculty of language - what's special about it

The Faculty of Language: What Is It, Who HasIt, and How Did It Evolve?에 대한 비판적 리뷰.

Abstract

We examine the question of which aspects of language are uniquely human and uniquely linguistic in light of recent suggestions by Hauser, Chomsky, and Fitch that the only such aspect is syntactic recursion, the rest of language being either specific to humans but not to language (e.g. words and concepts) or not specific to humans (e.g. speech perception). We find the hypothesis problematic. It ignores the many aspects of grammar that are not recursive, such as phonology, morphology, case, agreement, and many properties of words. It is inconsistent with the anatomy and neural control of the human vocal tract. And it is weakened by experiments suggesting that speech perception cannot be reduced to primate audition, that word learning cannot be reduced to fact learning, and that at least one gene involved in speech and language was evolutionarily selected in the human lineage but is not specific to recursion. The recursion-only claim, we suggest, is motivated by Chomsky’s recent approach to syntax, the Minimalist Program, which de-emphasizes the same aspects of language. The approach, however, is sufficiently problematic that it cannot be used to support claims about evolution. We contest related arguments that language is not an adaptation, namely that it is “perfect,” non-redundant, unusable in any partial form, and badly designed for communication. The hypothesis that language is a complex adaptation for communication which evolved piecemeal avoids all these problems.

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15694646/

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저자들이 비판하는 지점은 1) 인간 언어가 특별한 점은 재귀 뿐이라는 주장, 2) 재귀는 언어가 아닌 다른 기능을 위해 진화되었다는 주장, 3) 이러한 사실이 언어에 대한 적응적 관점을 무효화한다는 주장.

Our disagreement specifically centers on the hypothesis that recursion is the only aspect of language that is special to it, that it evolved for functions other than language, and that this nullifies “the argument from design” that sees language as an adaptation.

FOXP2 유전자와 언어 장애 사이에 관련성이 있다는 점, 해당 유전자가 인간과 침팬지 사이에서 분화되었으며 진화적 적응의 타겟이었다는 점 등을 언급하며 촘스키 등의 주장을 비판:

These findings refute the hypothesis that the only evolutionary change for language in the human lineage was one that grafted syntactic recursion onto unchanged primate input–output abilities and enhanced learning of facts.

촘스키 등이 무리한 주장을 하는 이유가 Minimalist program의 영향이라고 추측.

We believe that it arises from Chomsky’s current overall approach to the language faculty, the Minimalist Program (MP) (Chomsky, 1995, 2000a,b; Lasnik, 2002).

PJ는 재귀가 다른 용도로 진화되었으면 언어를 위해 추가로 진화되지 않았으며 진화적 부산물이라는 HCF의 주장은 잘못된 이분법이라고 비판. 앞다리가 날개가 되는 등 전적응의 사례가 수도 없이 많기 때문. 게다가 인간 언어에서 나타나는 재귀적 구조에는 추가로 다양한 제약이나 특성이 존재한다는 점에도 주목해야 함. 그저 이미 존재하는 “재귀” 모듈을 가져오기만 한다고 되는 게 아님.

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PJ의 주장:

The alternative in which language is an adaptation for the communication of knowledge and intentions faces none of these problems. It is consistent with behavioral and genetic evidence that language shows multiple signs of partial specialization for this task rather than grafting one component (recursion) onto a completely unchanged primate base. It is based on defensible conclusions about the nature of language established by existing linguistic research rather than a promissory program that is admittedly incompatible with the facts. It does not require tendentious claims such as that language is non-redundant, perfect, unsuited for communication, or designed for beauty rather than use. It meshes with other features of human psychology that make our species unusual in the animal kingdom, namely a reliance on acquired technological know-how and extensive cooperation among non-kin. And it does not imply that linguistics poses a crisis for biology but rather helps bring them into consilience.