If language began in the hands, why did it ever leave?
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But this drew my attention to situations where sign language doesn't work: in the dark, around obstacles, when hands are occupied.
Guess which situation our ancestors were more frequently confronted with?
EDIT: The article does address this, but I'm not sure I buy it. Maybe it's a function of my limited ability with sign, but I don't think signs pressed against the skin are particularly effective, and while our ancestors may have had fires, the most survival-critical situations could be ones where no light is present. I agree that sign remains extremely useful, but I'm skeptical of the claim, "[I]f language had first built a home in the hands, it would have had no compelling reason to leave. Thus, it must have been spoken from the start."
"A second supposed advantage is that speech is better in the dark – that, as Levelt put it, gesture is ‘functionally dead during, on average, 12 hours a day’. This is probably overstated. As Emmorey points out, modern signers get by without much problem, even in dim lighting, and can use tactile forms of signing – that is, signing in contact with another’s skin – in a pinch. Our prehistoric ancestors likely didn’t spend many waking hours in pitch-black. Rather, they would have used fires for warmth, cooking, illumination and protection from predators. And, whether or not there’s anything to Hewes’s palmar depigmentation story, hand movements can certainly be seen by firelight.
"Another advantage of speech, it has been argued, is that it frees the hands for other activities. But, here again, this is likely too swift. Signers don’t seem to have much of a problem with this, using one-handed signs when necessary. And though most of what we think of as gesture takes place in the hands, critical visual signals can also be produced with the head and face – pointing, affirming, questioning. The list of putative advantages of speech goes still further. But this kind of ‘rear-view mirror’ reasoning is inherently shaky: we know the outcome and are motivated to explain it."
The other side of this, though, is there's presumably some sort of reason, and these ones are plausible. We should be open to more compelling hypotheses, but waiving away "it's good to have two hands free" with "you can sorta get by with one" is "inherently shaky" too.
Stuff like grinding corn and butchering game are two-hand jobs, for example. It helps to be able to chat while you do it.
It's not claiming, "Language started in the hands, but we don't know why it left the hands."
It's claiming, "We can't be sure that language started in the hands, because we don't have an adequate explanation for why it would have ever left if it started there."
Put another way, this article is summarizing the "started in the hands vs. started in the mouth" argument. The article is very much not on the side of "language started in the hands".
That is, above some threshold, the main barrier is contrast, not dimness?
I've spent a good amount of time out in nature in the dark, in areas with very little light pollution. In these areas, moonlight can definitely be adequate for a lot of things. But under tree or cloud cover, or when the moon is new, the natural dark can be truly debilitating. Now, this could be because my modern vision system never properly adjusts because it's used to light pollution, but I'd at least conclude from this that a lack of light pollution doesn't inherently mean better night vision.
The places I've visited where light pollution is low, are really, really dark at night.
1) There are many artificial sources of light, which creates a sharp contrast. If the stuff near those sources is illuminated, everything else becomes harder to see.
2) You spend very little time outside, so even when there isn't a sharp contrast, you haven't waited for your eyes to adjust.
Obviously, given artificial illumination where we want it, stuff is easier to see.
See sibling reply about navigating by moonlight remote places.
2. Where it's really dark, you can't see. Period. No amount of waiting will help.
2. Hence the last paragraph of my original post, that you do need some minimum level of light. I was specifically speaking about conditions above some minimal threshold.
Is there a better way I could have said either of those things so you wouldn't miss them?
I'm honestly not sure where you're getting this idea from, or why you're stating it as fact. Are you just unintentionally overstating a hypothesis here? Or do you have some information that I don't? I'm certainly not an expert on how sight works, but nothing from my experience in the wilderness matches what you're saying.
How do you begin a conversation? You first have to get the other person's attention. You can't get someone's attention with sign language if they are not looking at you.
Necessity breeds invention, and the ultimate necessity is survival. If a chimp sees a pack of hyenas coming, she doesn't walk in front of each chimp in her clan and point to the hyenas. Instead she makes some kind of guttural yell to make the clan aware of the danger. The clan then looks at her, and then utilizes body language of her eye tracking or pointing. The most dangerous situations in nature are when one is not aware of a threat because one cannot see it, and vocalization can solve that in ways sign language cannot. This behavior (vocalization used before signing) is exhibited in most social mammals.
Assuming we evolved from primates, I'm betting it's likely vocalizations were already an established form of communication before humans as we know them began coming up with more advanced signs, but by that point we likely had more advanced vocalizations as well. Since vocalizations have a better SYN/ACK methodology, it was the easier and more effective form of communication throughout our entire history.
Totally unprovable, of course.
We don't speak Italian; we just pretend we have a language so you guys out there don't freak out :)
How do you silence an Italian? Tie his hands.
</sillyjokes>
(1) Abstractness (which it debunks, I think successfully).
(2) Better in the dark.
(3) Frees the hands.
(4) Energy usage.
There are some others I can think of, too:
(5) Not only does it free the hands of the speaker, it frees the eyes of the listener. I can only look in one direction at a time. If you're trying to communicate to me about a task I'm doing which involves looking at something, with gestures I need to shift my gaze to you and then back to what I'm doing. This makes real-time coordination of physical tasks difficult.
(6) Distance. If two people are far apart (say, 100 meters), they can shout and be understood. With gestures, that could be possible but only if they involve large movements. Verbal communication can be scaled to large distances with a more straightforward modification.
(7) Vision problems are more prevalent and strike at a younger age than hearing problems. What percentage of otherwise-healthy 35 year old people have myopia vs. have hearing loss?
When people work, their hands are occupied, they may not be that near to each other, and they may not be able to look away from their immediate workspace.
I think of construction workers yelling back and forth to each other at a worksite as a glimpse at language being invented.
One, they're hard to see and blocked by line of sight (voice isn't.)
Two, they require hands to be free to communicate (not always the case, and in situations of survival it's probably not doable at all.)
Three, they're limited versus voice. Voice has soft and loud and more sounds can be made than variations of hands. More meaning can be ascribed to a sound.
The article convincingly argues there's more to this than just your list of problems with hand gestures and the article
I agree with your first two points, but I have to disagree with you on this third point. Mute your computer and check out the way she provides emphasis in this[1], or the way Lydia Callis signs so expressively[2]. Large motions are like loud exclamations, smooth, slow motions are like a crooning voice, etc. People who sign have a "voice"--a style of signing. Signing without any sort of emphasis or expression is the sign equivalent of speaking in a monotone, and can actually make it harder to understand someone, because these elements communicate a lot of meaning, just as intonation and volume communicate meaning in speech.
The second doesn't seem to come up much in practice. Can eat and sign at the same time unlike voice.
Third isn't true -- signing is more expressive because it takes advantage of space, facial expressions, and signs can be modulated to adjust the meaning. But it almost has to be since the symbol rate is lower than speech.
If you're being attacked or in a fight, do you really think you'll have a hand free to do sign language?
Here's some context I quickly found in Wikipedia
Audiobooks are recommended to be 150–160 words per minute, which is the range that people comfortably hear and vocalize words.[14]
An average professional typist types usually in speeds of 50 to 80 wpm, while some positions can require 80 to 95 (usually the minimum required for dispatch positions and other time-sensitive typing jobs), and some advanced typists work at speeds above 120 wpm.[4]
Yes, you need to be able to "sign" 110-130 wpm.Duh.
Another case: when two people are swimming in deep water.