Science and Speech in Determining "Human" Kind

They don't. You are the one who keeps saying it is a problem in defining speech. But speech has been defined several times, and there is no conflict between those definitions and observations.You are left with three basic possibilities:(1) Speech is definable (you then give definition) and we can test whether this is observed in animals as well as humans. The definitions that we do have all end up with animals capable of speech, and no special difference between human speech and animal speech ... it is a difference in degree and not in kind.(2) Speech is not definable, in which case there are conflicts between observations that show this conflict. So far no such conflicts have been noted. If this is so then speech cannot be measured in humans or animals and your claim of uniques speech cannot be verified or tested. If this were so it does not make your claim true.(3) Claim it is indefinable when in fact it is (ie self delusion), so that you can avoid\deny the consequences of (1) that it is a difference in degree and not in kind. This leaves your argument one of silly denial instead of based on reality.You have moved from tautological definitions that beg the question to the claim that speech is not definable when many definitions have been offered. The conclusion is that you are avoiding the reality of the situation, which is that animal speech is a difference in degree from human speech and not a difference in kind.Enjoy.

---

Join the effort to unravel AIDS/HIV, unfold Proteomes, fight Cancer,
compare Fiocruz Genome and fight Muscular Dystrophy with Team EvC! (click)

---

we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand
RebelAAmericanOZen[Deist
... to learn ... to think ... to live ... to laugh ...
to share.

But that's not what you asked. Now you're begging the question. How do you know? Thus far you have failed to show how this is so. Even if it is proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that speech cannot be explained via mutation and natural selection, such a proof would not invalidate evolutionary theory.

Huh? How can you possibly have something that can even be called speech without language? What does this language-free speech you speak of even look like?

Are you aware that you are making careless logical fallacies like these all over the place? Which prominent biologists say that? Cite a source please; otherwise it's a thinly-veiled appeal to authority.

Don't know how it looks, but it sounds like, bird calls, chimp grunts, monkey howls, dog barks, ground squirrels chitter, whale songs, elephant rumbles, lion roars and elk trumpets.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

IamJoseph Well, other animals have speech, if we define speech as a means of communicating events relevant to the survival of the species. That humans developed the ability to manipulate speech is no more amazing than the fact that animals have developed the ability of diving to bone crushing depths { 2000 meters recorded = pressure of 2800 PSI} or have vision capabilities of which we find evidence yet cannot even imagine.Why did we not adapt likewise?

---

Hey BB,Glad a linguistics specialist joined the conversation. Could you perhaps explain to me the difference between "speech" and "communication"? I was always under the (quite possibly erroneus) impression that speech was simply one form of communcation. Lots of organisms, as has been repeatedly pointed out on this thread, can communicate with their conspecifics, but only a tiny handful have the ability to communicate using something that could justifiably represent "speech" (humans of course, dolphins probably, a few specially trained gorillas or chimps, etc). Or am I completely off-base here?PS: Welcome to the forum.

Indeed, but that contradicts joseph's assertion that speech is only human. So I'm trying to figure out how he thinks languageless speech is still uniquely human.

Oh hell, I'm not a specialist. But thanks for the compliment anyway I studied linguistics a bit during my undergrad at Cornell and have more than a passing interest in it, and I don't think I've represented otherwise here. If I have, my apologies. So my knowledge may still be limited in scope in some cases but I'll do my best. I'm not so sure that I can answer that, but in MY slightly more-informed opinion "speech" seems to be sufficiently vague that it's hard to pin down an exact difference. By your definition, "speech" could be audible communication, and I suppose that's as good a definition as any, even though it would give Joseph here all kinds of seizures. Linguistics students and professionals prefer to use "natural language" to describe human communication as it's a far more precise label for just what it is they study, even though linguistics disciplines vary as far and wide as some of the "purer" sciences.

quote:

---

A three second stint with google gave me a working definition:

​

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Speech is voice modulated by the throat, tongue, lips, etc, the modulation being accomplished by changing the form of the cavity of the mouth and nose through the action of muscles which move their walls.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

---

Your problem is the assumption no one remembered to click a search button. I am sure all the scientists quoted have read such 'descriptions' [as opposed definitions]. Your other problem is, you have negated your own held premise: all the attributes listed therein [throat, tongue, lips, etc - modulation, cavities and throat muscles, etc] are commonplace with life forms, contradicting the unique human speech factor. But you ARE affirming my premise by default.

If you scale this thread, the seizures are from the other sector. All I said was, it is a problem to define speech. You and a host of scientists today - are in concert in this premise with me, it's denial here notwithstanding.

quote:

---

Why did we not adapt likewise?

---

This is one of the counter arguements, and a reasonable one. But it does not make it all equitable, and here's why.All animals adapt to their environments or what they must do to survive - and whatever the attributes they inherit, the premise is the same, be it a squirrel able to open a shell like no one else, or a fish diving to massive pressure realms. All display graduated, accumulated steps to reach a point of adaptability to their immediate surrounds, and all of them have a form of limited communication - limited to their own environs, in which sense it is not unique, but a subset of uniqueness limited to their own environs and survival. A zebra's markings may be it's own, and so is a butterfly's imprints - but these are not universe-changing phenomenons, but variances - similar to more sub-set variances which define sub-sets of species within species.Humans did not emerge with 'another' form of communication, by graduated steps, or limited to their environs - else they would not be unique by speech, displaying a standour trait varied in kind. There is a blatant reasoning behind the widespread acknowledgement of biologists why speech is unique - notwithstanding the display of millions of differences seen in all life forms: it is also clear they know of unique diving fish.It is true that a list of life forms containing a zebra with stripes, and no other life forms displaying those exact stripes, still does not constitute a uniqueness, apart from a sub-set variance among life forms. It is true also, that if humans are placed on the same list of all life forms - speech will be a standout unique factor - by kind than degree. You will fail this exam if you tick anything else than humans by speech - even while protesting loudly how zebras are unique too.That in itself is not the factor making everyone uncomfortable. I have gone further, and made subsequent assertions what this means, imposing a variant on an established worldly mindset no less.My position is, even if this issue is partially accepted as a possibility, even as all evidence makes it blatant, that speech may have emerged recently, in an already formed state, and is unique to one life form only - it becomes very difficult to uphold the premises of ToE. Here, what was deemed a theological 'myth' factor, has become the pivotial 'scientific' counter to ToE: contradicting 'Adaptation' - a fulcrum pillar. It is also one reason why the secular/atheist disdain the OT most, and never bother to take on other scriptures. Anything which has a hint of theology begets a balistic, almost pychotic reaction, and which I understand - even when portraying a factor in genesis in a scientific premise, even when no other ancient document addresses the issue how the universe emerged, and in a logical, patterned view which is fully vindicatable via science - which does not necessarilly condone all factors in ToE. Here, I don't propose starting a thread why the creation chapter of genesis is fully scientific, unless it is inserted in a science thread - because it's only interest for me is any scientific vindication it has.

quote:

---

God does not exist until there is proof he does.

---

The aspect of speech remains one to debate via science, with no effect what can be proven [what criteria applies here?], or disproven, concerning the Creator premise. The assumption I have not posed scientific reasoning is ubsurd. Your statement is also ubsurd, considering the state of art sciences have no allignment with it's condoning: this issue is in escrow, so let's call a spade a black dish with a long handle.

i think what he's trying to say is that if god exists, our ability to prove his existence has no bearing on it. in other words, if we were suddenly able to prove god, he wouldn't at that minute pop into existence.

I will grant you that there are many problems in various disciplines of linguistics that are just an absolute pain in the ass to describe adequately and as such are still the subject of active research and study just because natural language is so complex.That does not, however, make language or "speech" a thorn in the side of the theory of evolution.Nor has it prevented many professional linguists from disciplined study and observation of human language, something that I daresay might be impossible if it's not a function of mind.Nor does it mean linguistics hasn't made leaps and bounds in pinning down certain aspects of human language.Nor does it explain why the aspect of "speech" that is uniquely human is something transcendent of natural language as you claim.