Theories of Language Evolution
ASSIGNMENTS
B.Com General – 1st Semester
Subject Name: Language – Functional English
Subject code: BCC 101
Summer Drive 2012
4 credits (60 marks)
(BKID: B1294)
Set 1
1. What is the difference between the theories of language evolution?
1.2.3 Language evolution and memes
It is possible to imagine numerous potential scenarios by which language might have evolved as a purely biological adaptation. However, Susan Blackmore, reveals a different theory of language evolution in her book The Meme Machine. She proposes that it evolved for the sake of being a characteristic of a culture (memes), not as an adaptation for the benefit of genes.
Susan says that memes first came into existence with the advent of true imitation in humans, which allowed the former to spread through populations. Recalling production of new copies or that fecundity is necessary for a replicator. She also said that the language came into existence to serve the purpose of being a mechanism for improving the fecundity of memes.
Sound transmission has many advantages for the purpose – sounds can be heard by multiple listeners and can be used even at night. After sound transmission (proto-language) came into existence, the "digitalization" of language into discrete words arose as a mechanism for ensuring meme fidelity, or lack of errors in the new copies. She explains that those alterations that produce the most copies of the highest fidelity will be those that predominate, thus improving the language.
Blackmore goes on to suggest that grammar was an adaptation to improve the fecundity and fidelity of existing memes; its recursive structure then provided the framework for the development of more complex memes, which then favored the existence of more complex grammar, etc. in a self-sustaining process. Furthermore, language then began to exert pressure on the genes, creating a selection pressure toward bigger brains that are better at language.
If people prefer to mate with those
B.Com General – 1st Semester
Subject Name: Language – Functional English
Subject code: BCC 101
Summer Drive 2012
4 credits (60 marks)
(BKID: B1294)
Set 1
1. What is the difference between the theories of language evolution?
1.2.3 Language evolution and memes
It is possible to imagine numerous potential scenarios by which language might have evolved as a purely biological adaptation. However, Susan Blackmore, reveals a different theory of language evolution in her book The Meme Machine. She proposes that it evolved for the sake of being a characteristic of a culture (memes), not as an adaptation for the benefit of genes.
Susan says that memes first came into existence with the advent of true imitation in humans, which allowed the former to spread through populations. Recalling production of new copies or that fecundity is necessary for a replicator. She also said that the language came into existence to serve the purpose of being a mechanism for improving the fecundity of memes.
Sound transmission has many advantages for the purpose – sounds can be heard by multiple listeners and can be used even at night. After sound transmission (proto-language) came into existence, the "digitalization" of language into discrete words arose as a mechanism for ensuring meme fidelity, or lack of errors in the new copies. She explains that those alterations that produce the most copies of the highest fidelity will be those that predominate, thus improving the language.
Blackmore goes on to suggest that grammar was an adaptation to improve the fecundity and fidelity of existing memes; its recursive structure then provided the framework for the development of more complex memes, which then favored the existence of more complex grammar, etc. in a self-sustaining process. Furthermore, language then began to exert pressure on the genes, creating a selection pressure toward bigger brains that are better at language.
If people prefer to mate with those