Science and Speech in Determining "Human" Kind

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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.

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Depends what comes out of further findings. If speech is seen as a recent phenomenon, emerging fully developed - it does impact on ToE in its bypassing the core premise of evolution. 'SHUDDER' is an appropriate potential here.

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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.

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That's just it - the scientific study is what I depend on too - combined with historical factual stats and evidences. The 'mind' is common to all life forms, and does not appear the operative factor here.

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Nor does it mean linguistics hasn't made leaps and bounds in pinning down certain aspects of human language.

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I will rest my case on their results - provided it does not bypass reality for the academic solely. Thus far, linguistics is more confused than before with speech, but let's wait their findings: currently, it is inclined with the premise speech is not an extension of communication by degree.

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Nor does it explain why the aspect of "speech" that is uniquely human is something transcendent of natural language as you claim.

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Language is an outgrowth of speech - it is basically 'speeching', my improvising of such a term. There is no speech or language where there is only communication traits.

It is not 'my' position, nor is your definition 'any' position.

Linguistics are in confusion, as to the latest findings. This says again, speech was never a privy of any life form, namely pointing to it not being a developed evolutionary grad:

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Skull canals spark speech-origins dispute - scientists disagree ability of Neandertals and other prehistorics spoke as humans do today -
Science News, Feb 20, 1999 by B. Bower
http://findarticles.com/...les/mi_m1200/is_8_155/ai_54062577

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Fossil indications of whether Neandertals and other prehistoric populations were capable of talking have proven scarce and subject to conflicting interpretations. The hypoglossal canals, a pair of bony tubes located on the left and right sides of the skull's base, were nominated just last year as skeletal signposts of speech.

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These cranial passages carry branches of a nerve that activates all but one of the tongue's muscles. However, they bear no telltale traces of an individual's anatomical readiness to speak, according to a new study.

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The findings challenge a proposal that relatively large hypoglossal canals in the skulls of human ancestors who lived about 400,000 years ago reflect their ability to talk much like people do today (SN: 5/2/98, p. 276). In that report, Richard F. Kay of Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C., and his coworkers asserted that hypoglossal canal size relative to mouth size averages about twice as large in humans, Neandertals, and some early Homo species as in chimpanzees.

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Growth of the hypoglossal canals in the human lineage may have accompanied a thickening of the hypoglossal nerve to coordinate tongue movements needed for speaking, Kay's group theorized.

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David DeGusta of the University of California, Berkeley and his colleagues disagree. Many prosimian, monkey, and ape species have hypoglossal-canal-mouth ratios that reach or exceed the modern human range, DeGusta's team reports in the Feb. 16 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

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Hypoglossal-canal-mouth ratios in skulls from two early species in the human evolutionary family, neither of which is thought by anthropologists to have spoken, also fall within the modern human range, the scientists say.

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"I think it's pretty clear that hypoglossal canal size has nothing to do with speech," DeGusta says. "The date of origin for human language and the speech capabilities of Neandertals remain open questions."

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DeGusta and his team measured the hypoglossal-canal-mouth ratios from skulls of 104 modern humans, 75 nonhuman primates from more than 30 species, and 4 pre-human australopithecines from species dating to 3.2 million years ago. Dissections of five modern human cadavers also yielded no indication that larger hypoglossal canals carry thicker hypoglossal nerves.

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The new report provides interesting data on variability in hypoglossal-canal-mouth ratios within species but leaves unexplained the canal's larger average relative size in humans and Neandertals compared with chimps, asserts Kay.

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Ranges of hypoglossal canal size vary so much that comparisons of average ratios can offer little insight, DeGusta responds. For instance, he says, some chimps have hypoglossal canals that are proportionately three times as large as those of some modern humans, although only the people speak their minds.

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COPYRIGHT 1999 Science Service, Inc.

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Linguistics are in confusion, as to the latest findings. This says again, speech was never a privy of any life form, namely pointing to it not being a developed evolutionary grad:

quote:

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Skull canals spark speech-origins dispute - scientists disagree ability of Neandertals and other prehistorics spoke as humans do today -
Science News, Feb 20, 1999 by B. Bower
http://findarticles.com/...les/mi_m1200/is_8_155/ai_54062577

​

Fossil indications of whether Neandertals and other prehistoric populations were capable of talking have proven scarce and subject to conflicting interpretations. The hypoglossal canals, a pair of bony tubes located on the left and right sides of the skull's base, were nominated just last year as skeletal signposts of speech.

​

These cranial passages carry branches of a nerve that activates all but one of the tongue's muscles. However, they bear no telltale traces of an individual's anatomical readiness to speak, according to a new study.

​

The findings challenge a proposal that relatively large hypoglossal canals in the skulls of human ancestors who lived about 400,000 years ago reflect their ability to talk much like people do today (SN: 5/2/98, p. 276). In that report, Richard F. Kay of Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C., and his coworkers asserted that hypoglossal canal size relative to mouth size averages about twice as large in humans, Neandertals, and some early Homo species as in chimpanzees.

​

Growth of the hypoglossal canals in the human lineage may have accompanied a thickening of the hypoglossal nerve to coordinate tongue movements needed for speaking, Kay's group theorized.

​

David DeGusta of the University of California, Berkeley and his colleagues disagree. Many prosimian, monkey, and ape species have hypoglossal-canal-mouth ratios that reach or exceed the modern human range, DeGusta's team reports in the Feb. 16 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

​

Hypoglossal-canal-mouth ratios in skulls from two early species in the human evolutionary family, neither of which is thought by anthropologists to have spoken, also fall within the modern human range, the scientists say.

​

"I think it's pretty clear that hypoglossal canal size has nothing to do with speech," DeGusta says. "The date of origin for human language and the speech capabilities of Neandertals remain open questions."

​

DeGusta and his team measured the hypoglossal-canal-mouth ratios from skulls of 104 modern humans, 75 nonhuman primates from more than 30 species, and 4 pre-human australopithecines from species dating to 3.2 million years ago. Dissections of five modern human cadavers also yielded no indication that larger hypoglossal canals carry thicker hypoglossal nerves.

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The new report provides interesting data on variability in hypoglossal-canal-mouth ratios within species but leaves unexplained the canal's larger average relative size in humans and Neandertals compared with chimps, asserts Kay.

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Ranges of hypoglossal canal size vary so much that comparisons of average ratios can offer little insight, DeGusta responds. For instance, he says, some chimps have hypoglossal canals that are proportionately three times as large as those of some modern humans, although only the people speak their minds.

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COPYRIGHT 1999 Science Service, Inc.

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Its not a difference in degree but in kind.

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No speech in any life forms

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Just repeating a claim doesn't make it truer. You haven't yet substantiated either of these.

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With the first, I tended the outermost limit what can be termed as a dif in kind. There is nothing more extreme than all life forms [trillions] vs one; I extended on that limit.With the latter, no speech in any other life form, is a manifest and indisputable fact.These are also upheld by sectors of prominent scientists who have made the same premise.

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Parrots are far better at mimicking sounds than humans.

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Correct - thus it is an anomoly humans begat speech before parrots, despite appearing billions of years later. Parots/birds are the descendents of dinosaurs.

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But if their brains evolved to the complexity necessary to process language on the same level humans do, they would no longer be able to fly due to the disproportionate size of their heads. It would be more burdensome than beneficial. There has to be a net benefit with respect to the environment for natural selection to favor a mutation.

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This is another example of slight of hand casino science. Firstly, there is no evidence the brain caused speech - else we would see partial speech by grads subject to brain sizes in a host of other life forms. Secondly, the size of the brain becomes a moot factor when considering the overall weight and size of large birds. It is self-contradictory to assume the brain being both the cause and negation for speech.It appears this debate will go on forever and in a cyclical mode, and its not due to lack of evidence or logic. Because the speech factor comes from what is seen as a theology, it is automatically viewed in defense - regardless if it has a coherent and sustainable emperical premise. It gets worse that here is a premise which actually counters one science premise - with another scientific premise - and that one can negate the other. Had the premise of speech come from another scientists, and was not related to genesis - we would see 50% of the debate resting on one side, if not 75% of it.In fact, the core of this issue is hardly vested in the semantics of degree and kind, but is just as easily seen as a difference by any measure one likes. The real impact is that there is no transitory grads between communications of all life forms, and that of modern humans. This issue, which requires evidences and imprints of speech - perhaps every 5000 years - is confounded by the premise speech is not recordable or storable in a fossil, and that there was no recording writings - till suspiciously close to the Genesis dating when both speech and writings occured.But this premise is a false one, and despite the absence of writings, there are numerous other indicators for evidence of speech: I sited the recalling of a human name, king, queen, nation, war, folksong or liturgy. These are recallable without writings. I cited that Genesis is relating to a periofd when writings did not exist - not even pitcture writings, but that speech was still active.
I suggest a notion of history be shown prior to the genesis datings. One does not select what criteria suits one's preferred conclusion: this is casino science.

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Where in the paper do the scientists/linguists say, "Well geez. This is just embarrassing. This means the whole theory is evolution is wrong. We've been spinning our wheels for the last 200 years. We really feel just awful about all this. Sorry to confuse everybody."?

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Yes they do say that. Speech is seen as a stumbling block for ToE, with statements by scientists - linguists and biologists, such as 'THIS POSES A QUANDARY FOR EVOLUTION, INDEED IT DOES'; 'TOUGH ONE FOR EVOLUTION', etc. Some of these quotes have been posted in articles here.

I took a day off and thought it over. Empirically, scientifically and mathematically, speech =KENTUCKY FRIED CHICKEN AND A DRIVE-IN MOVIE.Beware of imitations.

CAPS are required here. Over "ONE" kind only.

In summary, I think the topic is exhausted itself. It cannot be said there was a deficiency in correctly defining speech, because the preamble agreed the definition is a problem, affirmed by a host of scientists; this form of definition problem is also consistant with the issue of defining life.Its opposition retreated to defending itself only by this definition issue, thereby deflecting its own inabilities in disputing speech is unique to humans, and not a dot on the thread of common communication.Conclusion: The inability to know or define an exacting definition of speech, does not mean it is not unique: it is, by a factor of 1: all communications of other life forms.SUGGESTION: Consider the impacts if speech is indeed a difference in kind than degree. If anyone dares.