LBT232-234康政

LBT232-234康政

撰寫人：9580038 彭康政

The pages：232 ~ 234

I share some of Koehle's beliefs, but not all of them. However, what is important here is that his views necessarily imply that language is not a unique and integral behavioral development but a conglomeration of skills and abilities each of which has its own ,independent phylogenetic history. Except for one aspect of language, verbal behavior is a communication and amplification of ubiqutious zoological properties. There is a suggestion here of continuity with only a few recent innovations that lifted an earlier type of communication into the realm of human language. I reject this type of continuity theory on several counts.

(1)The prerequisite skills for language can only in a few cases be shown to have a fully documented phylogenetic history that reaches up to Homo sapiens. Actually, this is the exception. Continuity theories are bolstered by citing examples from all over the animal kingdom in complete disregard for phylogenetic proximity to man. One parallel comes from birds; the next from insects; another from fishes; still another from aquatic mammals. Frequently, only one species within a given genus or family even possesses the trait, indicating clearly that we are dealing with species-specificities, probably all of comparatively recent date. The reason the examples are so disparate is that parallels are rare. This suggests accidental convergence (if, indeed, it is even that) rather than milestones within one continuous phylogeny.

(2)In addition to being unsatisfactory proof for a continuous history, the examples customarily cited might even serve as evidence of discontinuities of skills and behavior patterns because of the sporadic occurrence on the branches of the phylogenetic tree.

(3)Language is not a loose association relatively independent abilities. There is no evidence that language comes about by a gradual accretion of skills. If this were so, we should be able to see all but a few of such skills in our closest relatives should show a few less, and so on down the line of evolution. Nothing like this seems to be the case.

(4)What is thought to be the beginning of language in parrots, monkeys, or dolphins, is empirically totally different from the beginnings of language in the human infants. *At the most primitive stages of language acquisition, man does not imitate sounds, words, or sentences, but generates novel sound-sequence that are recognized as speech and language because the rules of generation bear certain formal similarities to those of the standard language. A healthy child does not ordinarily parrot (or at least no more often than at special occasions). The outstanding characteristics of language are the all-pervasive principles of productivity (see Chapter Eight). These principles are totally lacking from the examples of animal communication.

Another line of thought, different from O. Koehler's in approach but similar in theoretical structure, was contributed by Hockett (1960) and applied to animal communication by Altmann (1966) and other zoologists (see also Marler, 1961). Hockett also begins with an analysis of language in terms of what we shall call for the moment essential attributes, and then examines a great variety of animal communication systems with a view to discovering how many and which of the essential attributes of human language are discernible in the communication of other species. In contrast to Koehler, his attributes are almost entirely of a logical nature (that is. Not physiological or psychological). He calls them design features, a terminology that expresses well the intent of the investigation: it is a study of the efficiency and effect of the communication system, the result and outcome, so to speak, of behavior rather than the mechanism of the behavior itself.

I believe this approach is an innovation in biological investigations and it is apt to focus attention on many interesting aspects of communication, including the underscoring of parallel but different developments and phenotypic convergences by very different means. For instance, some of the design features that characterize language (Hockett distinguishes thirteen) are also characteristic of the so-called language of the honey bee (broadcast, rapid fading, total feedback, and perhaps specialization and discreteness), but the physical means used for the incorporation of these design features into “bee-language” are quite different from those of human language.

This is an important point. A study of design features may give us insight into some of the biases that enter into the process of natural selection, into the biological usefulness of certain features of animal communication but it is not relevant to the reconstruction of phylogenetic history. For the latter we are only interested in the relation of types of anatomical structure (including motor coordination and sensory acuity), but we disregard the usefulness or efficiency of these features to the contemporary form. Thus whatever similarities exist on the surface between dolphins and fishes, shrews and rodents, bats and birds, pandas and bears must be ignored in our attempts to reconstruct the respective phylogenies and, in fact, the more abstract and pragmatic our criteria for comparison are, the less relevant will they be to a reconstruction of phylogenetic history. For instance, among the most abstract pragmatic criteria is successful adaptation to the environment; this may be accomplished by an apparent infinity of means. If we could rank-order adaptation in terms of success, it might tell us something about life in general, but it would tell us little about phyletic descent.

【翻譯】

從生物的發展史來看，語言的能力不是獨一無二或不可缺少的行為發展能力，而是混合的一種能力。除了語言的另一面，文字的行為是整個動物世界通訊的擴大表現。

語言的必要技能，從生物的發展史來看，有提到接近人類的語言技能只能在少數的情況下被顯示有被完整文獻的支持，實際上，這是例外，連續性理論透過完整的生物發展學引用動物界中接近人類的例子來支援。

除了在連續性的歷史上被作為不滿意的證據之外，因為在生物演進樹狀圖上零心的意外事件，照例引用的例子甚至可能作為技能和行為模式的間斷性證據。

語言沒有失去獨立能力的相關性，現在沒有證據可以說明語言透過技能逐漸增大發生。如果是這樣的話，我們就有可能看到在跟我們近親相關的物種上看到有關的技能，現在沒有這樣的案例。

在從鸚鵡、猴子、或是海豚來思考語言的開始，和人類嬰兒語言的開始被認為是全然不同。*在語言獲得的最原始階段，人不模仿聲音、話、或是句子，而是產生被認為是說話的聲音語段。健康的孩子不比鸚鵡，語言傑出的特性是all-pervasive principles中的創造性，動物溝通的例子中正缺乏這些原則。

上面這段提到了不同於O. Koehler但是理論架構相似的研究者Hockett，Altmann也提供了動物溝通的理論，另外還以求他的動物學家。使用另外的研究方法探討語言與動物演進之間的關係。Hockett也從我們稱呼為必要屬性的模式分析語言的開始，然後檢查許多動物的溝通系統，在跟人類說話的系統相比。

種方法是在生物學調查方面的革新，它易於使注意聚集在溝通有趣的地方，以非常不同的方法包括平行和強調生物演進學的發展。

這是一個重要的點，一個研究的特徵設計可以給我們有關天擇的偏見有些了解，進而聯繫到動物特徵於生物學的用途，但是卻和動物演進史不太相關。我們只有對解剖的架構類型(包括運動協調和感覺敏銳)感興趣，但是當我們不理會這些特徵的用途或效率。因此相近的表象存在於海豚和魚，地鼠和嚙齒動物，蝙蝠和鳥，熊貓和熊一定被忽視，在我們重建各自系統發育的嘗試內，事實上，有更多的摘和實用的尺度讓我們比較。