Newsgroups: sci.archaeology,sci.lang
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!rochester!rutgers!news.sgi.com!howland.erols.net!netcom.com!petrich
From: petrich@netcom.com (Loren Petrich)
Subject: Re: Etruscans [was: Re: The Coming of the Greeks]
Message-ID: <petrichE0v26r.BDp@netcom.com>
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References: <54q9ou$85o_002@dialin.csus.edu> <568md4$dnh@fridge-nf0.shore.net> <56dpr3$r14@news.ycc.yale.edu> <56e16h$5d2@fridge-nf0.shore.net>
Date: Thu, 14 Nov 1996 12:47:15 GMT
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Xref: glinda.oz.cs.cmu.edu sci.archaeology:55852 sci.lang:64180

In article <56e16h$5d2@fridge-nf0.shore.net>,
Steve Whittet <whittet@shore.net> wrote:

>I think you are missing the point Ben. If hunter-gathering and nomadic 
>pastoralist groups were perfectly proficient in language, language
>would not evolve. ...

	Irrelevant; there is an abundance of evidence of evolution of 
historically-attested languages -- and often evolution in fields that 
show no need for evolution, such as phonology, grammar, basic vocabulary, 
etc.

... Chimpanzees can be
>taught to form sentences even though their mouths and vocal cords are
>not suited for speech using sign language. Their sentences often use
>pivot words just as is the case with children.

	However, there's been a lot of controversy over simian linguistic 
abilities; it's not clear that chimps are able to construct coherent 
sentences, even with sign language.

>Perhaps you are confusing speech with language. People have had the
>ability to speak for about the last 200,000 years and may have had
>several hundred different vocalizations or calls ranging from
>grunts and growls to whoops, howls, screeches, screams, barks,
>whines, chortles, groans, whimpers, oohs, and aahs to whistles.

	Very cute. I'm sure that you can make all these sounds on 
command, Mr. Whittet. However, why isn't there *any* human society, even 
in the most isolated parts of the world, which have only those 
aforementioned sounds as their means of communication?

>>It's not for nothing you've been compared to a squid. An apt comparison,
>>in my experience.
>Generally it has been my experience that people who have the facts to
>make a case need not resort to recycling used invective.

	Just more proof of how well my comparison to a squid holds up; 
Mr. Whittet (metaphorically) squirts ink to cloud an issue when he sees 
that he's about to lose.

>>I can't imagine why you think a major adaptation like language, with
>>serious associated neurological apparatus, should have only appeared in
>>the last 6,000 years, and then spread without a single exception to every
>>group world-wide in such a short period of time. (Or, presumably, much
>>more recently, since urbanization in most of the world is a very recent
>>phenomenon.)

>I am measuring it as an exponential curve. ...

	And what is your motivation for an exponential curve, Mr. Whittet?
-- 
Loren Petrich				Happiness is a fast Macintosh
petrich@netcom.com			And a fast train
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