[goatlover]

Because other animals don't produce sounds which constitute abstract meaning that can be combined into sentences. Possibly a few birds and dolphins or whales might get close. But there's clearly something more going on in the brain than making sounds which contribute to word formation.

[zR0x]

Sure there is more going on than we see on the surface.

Before neuroscience and modern imaging we needed to sit and imagine and theorize.

Now we don’t.

[mcswell]

Neuroscience and brain imaging still don't tell us how language works--they're at a much to course level of granularity. Even if we could see every single neuron as it fired (which we can't), the volume of data would be overwhelming, far more than if you followed every transistor in a modern computer.

[goatlover]

You don't think neuroscience involves theorizing? You think the neuroscientists can just image the neuronal activity and read it out in some complete scientific explanation?

[zR0x]

Yes. It’s emergent behavior of a physical universe that has no meaning. It just is.

“Meaning to us” is subjective. That’s how we have conflicting theories in many fields. Science isn’t about meaning. It’s about measuring how matter coalesces at various speeds relative to light.

I make noise because my biology “just has” properties to allow it given the other physical conditions.

Perfectly elegant theory based on the physical structure of reality alone. No ephemeral language organs.

Theory can quickly go from scientific observation to reinforced nonsense used to sell books and bond as species.

That’s fine, it’s how society works. It doesn’t mean anything to reality.

[goatlover]

So when you talk about emergent behavior, physical universe and biology, you're just making noise.

[zR0x]

Yep. Babies can add and subtract when they’re days old.

Can they write Shakespeare?

If human language is fundamental, how is it missing from the start? Are we learning language or muscle mechanics? Why can a word or phrase mean one thing in this country and nonsense in another? If language processing has a universal basis, why all the confusing variety and ignorant ideas? 1+1=2 everywhere because we can observe the physical process everywhere, because light, eyes, etc

Who cares?

Like I said back in the day we didn’t know that. We had to theorize these abstract schemes to establish something.

But like religion, doesn’t mean linguistics is building on something that means what we want it to.

Given how hard it is to learn language while arithmetic seems innate, how do we know emphasizing it’s value is leading us where we want?

It’s easier for me to see that long dead scientifically illiterate humans we inherited those ideas from were just stupid.

[mcswell]

"If language processing has a universal basis, why all the confusing variety..." Because the universal processing mechanism provides lots of options for individual languages--the option for different words, obviously, but the option to use or not to use morphology (and lots of varieties of morphology), and different syntax rules, etc. etc.

To use an analogy, a computer chip provides a single instruction set at the machine language level--yet you can run a huge variety of computer languages on it: FORTRAN, LISP, Python, Prolog and so forth.