Creation of the English Language

I don’t think I’ve seen this question in the forums. There are posts related to the Tower of Babel and language, but I’m interested in English specifically.I support evolution and I’m looking for feedback for an idea I have to debate the issue. Instead of arguing endlessly, I want to play Devil’s advocate and concede the point (ie. Creation/ID/whatever is wonderful, explains everything, etc.) and then ask about the Creation of the English Language
English, the third most spoken language in the world; the most prevalent language of the Internet; the lingua franca of international politics, commerce, science, entertainment; the language with more Bible translations than any other; and the language we’re using in this forum: What about its creation?Who, when, where, how and in what form was it created?I’m interested mostly in responses from creationists or ID supporters, since I figure most evolutionists would do what I would do if faced with this question: pull down an anthropology or linguistics textbook and be satisfied with the answer there.So anyway...
Was it created by God or human? If human, was it one human or lots? Was it all at once or over a period of time? When did it start? Is it still happening? If God, when? Did He come to Medieval England to give it to the English?
Was it at Babel? Were people speaking English in ancient Mesopotamia? Why no record of English back then? Was it like Old English, Modern English or something else?
Did it derive from a Germanic precursor? Was that by design? Whose design? Was it purposeful or unconscious design? Does language design happen today? Can you or I act to create language?

You're right. And in fact Shakespeare is not even Middle English, but Early Modern English. (Beowolf is Old English, and Chaucer is Middle English)Thanks for the lovely passage; it may serve some use here in due time...

I know of a few PhD linguists who are creationists (though not fully committed). I wouldn't mind asking one of them to see what they say.Never underestimate (misunderestimate?) creationists. And if you think you're making a fool of one, he probably is looking like a Biblical hero to his followers.Anyway since none of them are taking my bait, I hope it's all right if I refer to this example:
Missing Link | Answers in Genesis Half of it is some standard introductory linguistics and the other half is very bizarre pseudoscience. This passage in particular really bothers me:

"In fact, I think it is misleading to talk about any ”evolution of language.’ Changes in language come about mostly from humanity’s inventiveness, innate creativity, and flexibility, not from random genetic mutations filtered by selection."

Obviously evoking ID here. But my question is WHICH humans and when and where? Is there a big conference every ten years in England to determine what changes to make to the language? Can I make some changes now?If they're honest, they have to admit the changes made are NOT consciously directed by the speakers (intelligent or not) And if that's true, then I think you might as well say that they ARE random changes -- and incidentally "mutation" is just another word for change. So if you can accept that the aggregate of many of these random mutations can transform one language to a completely different language (the average English speaker today cannot understand Old English), then it can account for any and all language change.And then how different is that from biological evolution?!??!

Hi Jon, thanks for joining the discussion.I'm more than a little astonished that you can call the changes from our Modern English and going back further to Old English and earlier "slight changes". As I said before a Modern English speaker wouldn't be able to make neither heads nor tails of OE.I would really appreciate a bit more detail then, relating to my first post. It sounds like you believe that English ...metamorphosized? (I don't know what word you prefer) from a language that was created at Babel. What was that language? Was it Indo-European? German? Old English? I'm really interested in knowing what you think the progression was. When did we first see what we call Old English?Incidentally, do you believe that post-Babel changes can be explained for the most part by natural processes (i.e. conscious agents rarely act to create changes?)

Sorry for breaking character, but I should add your response was really impressive. Is that by your own design, or did you get it somewhere?Hmm.. there's that "design" word again.

Seems as though there's a companion book for that series available. I may look for that.There was also a great PBS series way back in the 80s (yeah I'm old) with Robert MacNeil called "The Story of English" and there's a companion book -- updated many times -- for that as well.

Most are familiar with the words of Psalm 23 especially in the King James Version. Look it up if you don't remember and then check this out. It's something I found a while ago that's quite funny

Some linguists believe that new communication technologies, with
their drive for instant responses to torrents of messages, are
robbing the English language of its richness and poetry. The
elaborate syntactical brickwork characteristic of writing from
the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries will become a linguistic
luxury as most lose the capacity to form long sentences with any
degree of subtlety. (Linguist Sven Birkhurst)

​

Here, for example, is science-fiction author Samuel Delany's
version of how the 23rd Psalm will be translated a century from
now:

​

I have a supervisor.
I need nothing more.
My sleeping, my eating, my drinking is observed and controlled.
My morality is controlled.
Even if threatened by death, I need not fear.
I need not think.
Controls and aides are all around me.
I am fed.
My enemies starve while they watch me eat.
My head is rubbed like a pet.
My water dish is full to overflowing.
My whole life I will frisk about the palace.

What about immediately after Babel? Were those languages anything with which we would be familiar today? (any archeological or historical records written in one of those languages?)
It sounds like you're implying that none of those post-Babel languages was English -- or any Germanic language for that matter.I agree with you completely that any given infant human can learn any given language over its lifetime. If any baby was given to a group of Star Trek conventioneers and if they were unconcerned enough about the child's quality of life then he could grow up speaking Klingon.
The key word, though, is learn. It has be taught, and if you encounter a different language, you have to go through the learning process again. I think it would be more correct to say: If language has one common root then language (as a whole) was invented once, but a given language could have been invented at a later time. Right?Back to the English language. Here's what I take you believe about its Creation. Please correct me if I'm wrong:
Your use of the word "invention" suggests you think it was human activity more than divine that was responsible for the English language much like we describe the growth of a fetus in the womb through natural processes and not divine actions. (But you would say that humanity, as a whole, arose from a single divine action)
I think you believe English was created sometime after Babel via the accumulation of slow random non-directed changes throughout the general population over a period of time. Also, there would have been no concrete divisions in time between the changes in the language.

Yes, you're right that language acquisition is innate. My point was just to clarify what we mean by one language being different from another. If there were no differences among languages then the story of Babel would not make sense and we would not be able to understand each other. That's true. Language must be one of Evolution's greatest gifts to us... Oops! There I go again This almost contradicts what you said before about English in reply to my reply question. In an earlier post you said that the languages at Babel were "unlikely to have been anything with which we are today familiar." So when did English come along?
I can say, for example, that airplanes were first invented in 1903 but the Concorde, a subcategory of "airplane", was first invented in 1969. When was English invented?

Oh no. And I was having so much fun!Thanks for taking it as far as you did. I knew the truth halfway through, but it was hard to remind myself. You made an uncannily convincing creationist (not that creationism is convincing) and sometimes the arguments you used were scarily true-to-form, but it's given me lots to think about.I'm actually not that well versed in linguistics at all. As I said before I know a couple of PhD linguists who are creationists (?!?!? I know). I think it proves what the heroes of evolutionary biology always say: that the ideas of Darwin and others are meant for everyone. The primary research is the domain of specialized experts, to be sure, but the basic concepts are such that they can be understood by lay people.And that, kids, is today's Lesson of the Day.

Oh, I guess we're not done here after all...I'll leave it to the true linguists to dispute the more technical details of your argument. Let's focus on English, and forget the other languages for now. So what caused the *English* language to "emerge"? Okay let me see if I understand you. Before the year 800CE there was no English; in England they were speaking French. Then in that year 800 the king decides to initiate English. Did he create English? Did he assign a committee to create it? Where did it come from? What do you mean by "grow"? They put it in a greenhouse and watched it flourish? Who is doing the "incorporating". The aristrocrats get together every ten years and decide they like some Hebrew words so they decree those are part of English now?Tell me who created English? and when and where?

Oh man, I wasn't kidding when I said this wasn't done.Look, IAJ, Let's assume that this is what you believe about the Creation of Man.

quote:

---

Genesis 2:7 Then the LORD God formed man from the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and the man became a living being.

---

That's pretty straighforward. There's nothing in there about systemizing, initializing, formalising, incorporating, or any other abstract nonsense. God did it, snap, it's done.So could you please explain in a similarly straighforward way the Creation of the English Language. Which king was it that decided in 800CE, "Hmmm, this French is crimping my style. You servants there, I want you to formulate Old English now. Make it a 'microcosm' You have until sundown."
"Er, doesn't "microcosm" mean a world in miniature?"
"Off with his head!" *LOP*
"Er, isn't it a French word?"
"Off with his head, too!" *LOP*

In my first post, I said that I'm pretending that I also agree with creationism. I only meant to compare the creation of man story to the creation of English story. Let's leave that debate about man's origins for other forums, since I don't want this discussion to get too unwieldy. Wow, thanks for that. We definitely need some language experts to discuss this, but in the meantime I have some more questions if that's all right:I'm confused. What were the people speaking before Old English? Was it French or viking?You said there was a "primitive communication system", a "prototype of Old English." Who created this prototype? When? How? Did they just take the viking (I assume you mean Norse) language and only add words or were there any changes to other aspects of the language? What did the Anglo-Saxons do with their language while they were waiting around for this "viking prototype of Old English"?Are you familiar with Cædmon's Hymn? It's an Old English poem written to praise God that was composed in the seventh century? How did the poet do that if Old English wasn't invented until 800?When did the French come to England? The only thing I can think of is the Norman Conquest of 1066. Isn't that quite a late date for the creation of Old English?What did the king do to change from the prototype to Old English? Did he only add words? Any changes to syntax?And finally, can you explain who created Middle English? and when?

Where is your information about English coming from. You keep saying you don't remember some details, and that's fine, but where did you learn this. Have you got a book title or URL we can cross-reference?I don't know if you realize that your claims about English history are quite bizarre. Not even Ken Ham or Stephen Meyer would agree with what you say (they've got enough crap to shovel). That's why I'm wondering what your source is.

Joseph, Joseph, Joseph, *sigh*. I had to pick myself off of the floor when you said that 1066 is "circa 800CE". Let's take this from the top. I apologize to the linguists for my errors, but feel free to correct me.First of all, everytime you use the word "microcosm", God kills a llama.Your claims contradict everything about standard English history. I wanted to debate creationists, but no creationist would want to be associated with your ideas.English, like any other language emerged mostly through slow, gradual changes, sometime made more rapid by cultural events (none of which you have correctly identified). Old English can be said to have emerged when the Anglo-Saxons came to England around 450CE (you're right that there were already ancient Britons, also called Brythons living in England at that time. Their language had very little influence on English so they are not germane to this discussion). That's the fifth century, and it's not circa 800! And there are NO FRENCH YET! It's Anglo-Saxons!Their language, Anglo-Frisian slowly became what we call Old English. Got that? Old English. In the years 500-800! BEFORE THE FRENCH! Have you ever heard of Beowulf? That's right, it's a new CGI movie with Angelina Jolie. Well, it turns out that it's based on an Old English epic composed somewhere in 700-750CE! Other examples of Old English text include Bede's Historia Ecclesiastica (731) and the aforementioned Cædmon's Hymn of about the same time.The vikings start coming in around 800-1000 (this is still BEFORE 1066 and there are NO FRENCH YET). The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles are composed late 9th century and it has NOTHING TO DO WITH THE FRENCH!1066: cue the French (Normans). The Norman conquerors bring in French and the common people mostly continue to speak Old English. The intersection of cultures will slowly and gradually transform Old English into Middle English.In 1086, The English king, William I -- who happens to be French (Norman), remember -- orders the great survey that came to be known as the Domesday Book. It's written in ...(drumroll)... LATIN!This French/Norman line of kings gradually over decades and centuries thinks of themselves as English. There is no act of rebellion against the French/Norman language which was the language of the English royalty for a few centuries. Instead the borrowing of words and other slow, gradual changes results in the emergence of Middle English. By the 1400s English has slowly become the language of the king and the Establishment. After the 1500s we have Early Modern English (again through slow changes). In the 1600s the word coffee/cafe is first used and it originally came from ... TURKISH! (kahveh) Coffee - Wikipedia. Incidentally the 1600s are NOT circa 800.To sum up from 500-1000 in England Old English was developing from its Anglo-Frisian roots BEFORE THE FRENCH came in 1066. There was NO Rebellious document to overturn the French language. The borrowing of French words played an important role in the gradual emergence of Middle English. Coffee came later still.And everytime you use the word "microcosm", God kills a llama.