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The assertion that humans differ from animals in their use of language has been the subject of much discussion as scientists have investigated language use by non-human species. Researchers have taught apes, dolphins, and parrots various systems of human-like communication, and recently, the study of animal language and behaviour in its natural environment rather than in the laboratory has increased. But, apart from purely physical aspects, we still don't know why: 1 Most talking humans carry the Word Gene but some don't and still talk without difficulties 2 Apes and monkeys do not use a spoken word language though they are physically able 3 Parrots and other 'talking' birds lack the Word Gene and do talk The ability to exchange information is shared by all communication systems, and a number of non-human systems share some features of human language. The fundamental difference between human and non-human communication is that animals are believed to react instinctively, in a stereotyped and predictable way. Mostly, human behaviour is under the voluntary control, and human language is creative and unpredictable. |
African Grey: "Hello!" (20k) |
Green Amazon: "Okay, see you later!" (60k) |
African Grey: "Yeah Jesus loves me, no I won't tell" (184k) |
Birdsong appears to have much in common with human language. Birds have an innate system of calls, but their songs mostly involve learning and develop by later experience. Like babies experimentally babbling, young birds have a period of sub-song before their songs are fully developed, and they also appear to have a sensitive period in which they learn their songs. The African grey parrot is the most capable imitator of human speech. Parrot Alex (studied by Irene Pepperberg) imitates human utterances and seems to relate these sounds with meanings, but his ability to imitate sounds similar to those produced by humans is quite different from the acquisition of syntax. Birds have syrinxes, which indicates that some articulated speech is possible without a larynx. The famous and influential linguist Naom Chomsky (and close friend of Thomas Beacon!) assumes that a kind of language organ within the human mind is part of the genetic make-up. A system which makes it possible from a limited set of rules to construct an unlimited number of sentences is not found in any other species. |
All social mammals learn by imitating their elders, and children also observe, imitate, and play. One can argue that babies (children under two) are not acquiring language but a protolanguage and that the preference of word order is just as much a characteristic of apes as it is of babies. The earliest sounds of a human infant are stimulus controlled. It has a mammalian larynx that can rise, enabling concurrent breathing and eating, and not until the age of three months are its speech organs ready for producing vowels. Around the age of six months the infant begins to experiment with sounds, and soon after it begins to babble in syllables and to imitate intonation patterns. One year old it produces one-word utterances and sentence-like gibberish, and around eighteen months the first two-word utterances occur. The first utterances longer than two words consist of open-class words carrying the main message. This "telegraphic speech" is supposed to represent the grammar at that particular stage of the child's language development. Perhaps linguistic accomplishments like babbling, first words, and grammar require minimum levels of brain size, long-distance connections, and extra synapses, particularly in the language centres of the brain. |
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Baby crying, 1 week old (148k) |
Baby vocalizing, 2.5 months (88k) |
Twinkle, twinkle... 18 months old (160k) |
Twinkle, twinkle... 23 months old (1176k) |
The languages of our human ancestors of millions of years ago would not resemble the languages we speak today. In a less demanding environment they would have had no need for a complex grammar, and the ability to combine a limited number of sounds in different ways would be sufficient. Presumably, the vocabulary was not very large, and grunts and gurgles may have been used rather than modern speech sounds, e.g. gorilla pant-hoots, the expressions of solidarity between male primates, very much like the utterances of human male sporting teams. |
Apes are our closest relatives in nature, and researchers have tried to teach apes to communicate with humans. The earliest experiments with gorillas showed that they were not physically capable of producing articulated speech although they did understand many spoken words. Other methods were adopted in order to avoid the problems in trying to teach apes to speak, and some of these attempts were remarkably successful! Some apes use warnings like "angry" and "bite" without attacking, and they definitely relate sign and meaning. Also the use of language to mislead others purposely, is found. Falsity of meaning requires a creative and "dishonest" system as an instinctively induced limited set of calls is "honest". Apes are very good at social manipulation. They can interpret the behaviour and intentions of their fellows, and they can deliberately control some facial expressions and body language in order to mislead others. The ability to lie, to hide your feelings and intentions, is a very important human-like behaviour!. |
Among themselves primates use a wide variety of communication. The meaning of primate communication depends on the social and environmental context as well as the emotional state of the animals, and their calls appear to be like complete human utterances, e.g. "you may mate with me". Sounds like laughter and screams are controlled by the older neural (subcortical) structures in the brain, which are also responsible for the call systems of other species. Some non-human species appear to have a system of sounds which involve learning and experience, existing alongside the innate call system. |
A simple experiment conducted by The Somniloquy Institute gives with no doubt the evidence that apes are certainly capable to talk, more or less like us. We have taken a souns recording of a newborn baby and lowered the pitch exactly 200%. After this, the sound of a grown man crying for his mummy is the first thing that springs to mind. But, when we lowered the pitch the same sound of the newborn baby with 400%, it is beyond any doubt that we can hear an ape grunt and gurgle. In this way we are able to prove that apes, who have been provided with a will and language capabilities of their own, ostentaciously have refused to speak probably since the emergence of homo sapiens! Open the sound files below to hear for yourself. |
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Human newborn baby (148k) |
Grown man crying = human baby 2 times lower (152k) |
Ape grunting = human baby 4 times lower (142k) |
According to the findings of the biologist Thomas Beacon, who studied the DNA fingerprints of more than 1000 subjects (in his spare time), most people (97,3%) carry the 'Word Gene' gene D2433. That leaves us with the phenomena of those who don't, and still are able to talk like any other human being. To find an answer, Beacon studied chromosome16 (where gene D2433 resides) in primates and 'talking' birds as well. Since there is no proof of a so called 'Monkey Gene' in human beings (yet there is a widely spread suspicion), the only conclusion Beacon was left with until he died, was that 2.7% of human beings, who do not carry the Word Gene D2433, but who are able to talk just like you and me, must carry in their DNA, the missing link with our prehistoric ancestors. |
Travel books from the nineteenth century are full of tales of primitive native tribes who used very few words, and the European travellers found it just as difficult to understand the unfamiliar sounds of these languages as zoologists find it when trying to decode the sounds of birds, whales, or primates. Alas these tribes are extinct or not yet discovered, and so it is impossible to examine their DNA and compare it with ours. This is why The Somniloquy Institute started The Missing Gene Project. By collecting and reading thousands of DNA fingerprints from all over the world, it wants to proceed with finding the origins of human speech, generally honoring the discoveries of Thomas Beacon, and to learn more about ourselves and what makes the human being a unique-but-not-so-unique species on this planet. left: old radio recording of members of the lost 'speechless' tribe of Kanga and Telingi,Tibet 1948 (132k) |
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