Babel's Dawn is providing coverage of the Cradle of Language conference in South Africa. Several presenters at the conference are challenging the idea that language arose from a single genetic mutation. Given the complexity of human language, such a finding would certainly be a surprise to me.
It's tempting to argue that since there appears to be a "universal grammar" -- that all modern languages share some basic similarities -- they must have stemmed from the same genetic mutation. The evidence doesn't appear to be in the single-mutation advocates' favor:
In an afternoon session, Bernard Bichakjian, from Radboud University in the Netherlands, claimed that no biologist would support a single mutation scenario. (Abstract here) A second, amended scenario with two punctuation points has also been proposed:1. A mutation that provided a rudimentary, protolanguage for some pre-Homo sapiens speakers and
2. a second mutation, around the birth of the sapiens species, that gave us the whole syntactical package.Bichakjian referred to this scenario as a "Deus ex machina" model with no empirical support. Contrary evidence from the fossil record includes clear evidence of gradual evolution of speech organs, suggesting a mutual gradual evolution of the speech supported by the organs.
Think about it this way: Humans also share the same basic eye structure, but no biologist would argue that the human eye evolved in a single mutation. (Pharyngula fans, I know what you're thinking: No, Behe and Dembski don't count as "biologists.")
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Just to point out here what I pointed out there, there is a big difference between the statements in (1) and (2):
(1) All the complexity of human language arose from a single genetic mutation
(2)A single genetic mutation made language as we know it possible
Many linguists in the Chomskyan tradition like myself would take (2) as a plausible hypothesis, but no linguist would argue for (1).
(2) allows that many of the principles responsible for human language may have existed before language did (at least in its modern form). But it may be that a single genetic mutation resulted in a new ability which allowed humans to exapt those principles for linguistic purposes. In fact, much of modern syntactic theory can be seen as an effort to tease the individual principles of language apart. Other linguists work to determine if these principles are specific to language or may have more general uses in cognitivie abilities. All of this is making it possible for us to tell if an evolutionary story based on (2) is plausible or not.