Evolutionary Semiotics: How the Sign Use of Human Came about

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Evolutionary SemioticsHow the Sign Use of Human
Came about

• 11th Early Fall School of Semiotics Semiotics of
  Genre
• September 10-16, 2005
• Sozopol (Bulgaria)

Wolfgang Wildgen, Bremen (Germany)
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Introductory remarks

• Yesterday, I have shown how dynamical structures
  are relevant even for the analysis of pictures
  which were traditionally considered as a typical
  example of static sign-structures. In this
  context, it became already clear that the
  underlying capacities of vision/manual action and
  audition/articulation have strong links, although
  deep functional differences show up.
• Today, I will make a radical move by considering
  the most far-reaching dynamics one can consider
  in linguistics the evolution of human language
  and the underlying capacity (faculté de language,
  Saussure).
• Less far-reaching dynamics are those encountered
  in the (cultural) evolution of language families
  or of a specific language,
• The individual acquisition of a primary or a
  secondary language.

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Part I

• The Evolution of a Protolanguage

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An informed guess of the shape of protolanguage

• I shall try to respond to the following
  questions
• What is the most plausible evolutionary era in
  which a protolanguage existed?
• Can artifacts stone tools, engravings, paintings
  tell us something about the cognitive basis of a
  protolanguage (as one symbolic form among
  others)?
• Does the anatomical change of hominids give hints
  to the shape of a protolanguage?

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The idea of a protolanguage and the methodology
of reconstruction

• Since Darwins theory of evolution (theoretically
  already since Lylells transformationalism
  against Cuviers catastrophism) the basic idea
  is that of a continuous evolution (i.e., moved by
  infinitesimal steps). Applied to language, it
  derives linguistic capacities in a continuous
  series of steps from communicational habits and
  intellectual capacities of mammals (and animals
  in general).
• Derek Bickerton assumes an internal
  stratification of human language capacity, which
  recapitulates (and thus indicates) an
  evolutionary stratification. Basically he
  presupposes an additive effect of evolution,
  i.e., early developed forms of behavior persist
  and constitute the stable platform on which later
  forms rest. He formulates his methodology as
  follows
• If there indeed exists a more primitive variety
  of language alongside fully developed human
  language, then the task of accounting for the
  origins of language is made much easier. No
  longer do we have to hypothesize some gargantuan
  leap from speechlessness to full language, a leap
  so vast and abrupt that evolutionary theory would
  be hard to put to account for it. (Bickerton,
  1990 128)

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• Any analysis of the evolution of language should
  strictly follow the general strategy and
  methodology of post-Darwinian theory including
  the results of modern genetics. I will consider
  the traces of semiotic activity of hominids and
  early man until the upcoming of writing systems
  as data for the reconstruction of intermediate
  forms of human language. This direct strategy has
  two consequences
• Insofar as the contours of early semiotic
  capacities can be reconstructed from artifacts
  and art, one can only infer the semantics
  (perhaps the pragmatics) of a earlier language
  capacity, not its lexicon or syntax.
• As the artefacts point rather to the cognitive
  level than to the level of linguistic expression,
  the reconstructed semantics must be a type of
  cognitive semantics (although it differs from
  current cognitive theories which have no
  evolutionary dimension).

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Anatomical evolution and the shape of a
protolanguage

• The control of a larger area, the use of centers
  for communal life, the systematic expansion into
  new areas presupposes high ecological flexibility
  and a global spatial orientation. It seems
  therefore highly plausible that advanced Homo
  erectus who migrated to Europe and Asia had the
  cognitive and social capacity for symbol use,
  i.e., for a language which probably was organized
  vocally with gestural cues. The power of motor
  imitation in the learning of techniques, gestures
  and phonations was already given to higher
  primates (cf. the existence of mirror-neurons).
  Thus the cognitive, social and behavioral
  presuppositions for language were given.
• The basic question Did they speak a language?
  can only be answered probabilistically As all
  conditions were given, they probably did.

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Can artifacts tell us something about a
protolanguage?

• In fact, first stone axes were produced around 2,
  0 my (the so-called pebble culture). Whereas
  chimpanzees may use a stone to open a nut or fit
  a branch for the fishing of termites, the
  pebble culture asks for the use of a stone or
  bone to chock another one, in order to produce a
  sharp edge on the pebble, i.e., a tool is used to
  produce a specific shape (fitted to a large
  number of uses). Probably other materials (bone,
  wood, fur) were again shaped using the primitive
  stone axes.
• Artefacts are not only hints at the cognitive
  level of humans, they are also linked to social
  life. In order to produce artifacts and to keep
  fire, a socially organized exploitation of the
  environment, a division of labor and a mode of
  social distribution of products must be in place.
  This asks for rules of collective behavior and
  language as a kind of rule-governed social
  behavior not only helps to represent and enact
  social behavior, it is quasi the symbolic
  representation of social behavior.

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The semantics of space and time in a protolanguage

• The representation of space has to do with
  frontiers (their transition) and perspectives.
• A first perspective is centrifugal, i.e.,
  starting from the self and its basic bodily
  motions an experienced three dimensional space
  is cognized front  behind (go), above  below
  (climb, fall), left  right (grasp with the left
  hand or the right hand). This space of bodily
  motion with feet and arms defines the immediate
  space, where objects may be reached and
  manipulated. The intermediate space depends on
  mans ecology it can be the housing (the cave,
  abri) or the village the distal space contains
  roughly all possible itineraries (of
  hunting/gathering).
• The second perspective is centripetal, i.e., the
  self is seen as the place of effect of external
  causes. The sky, the horizon (typical points
  where the sun sets or rises), the favored
  direction of winds, the ridge of mountains may be
  the external locus of orientation for the self,
  who is at the center of a force field or gradient
  implicit in these delimitations.

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Fig. 1 Force fields of centrifugal versus
centripetal orientation.
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• A protolanguage must categorize events and
  actions (by proto-verbs) and must discriminate
  stable entities (by proto-nouns). The question
  arises, if temporal, dynamic, quantitative,
  qualitative relations between them can be
  mastered and to what degree.
• I will argue that there are intrinsic complexity
  barriers which could have blocked the elaboration
  of a protolanguage for a long (evolutionary)
  time-span, say 0,5 my.

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Representation of actions and events

• The action-concept GRASP involves two stable
  entities the body (the hand) and the object.
  Every point on the lines in Fig. 2 is an
  attractor, i.e., the perception of a stable
  entity in the 30 msec window. The whole schema
  should fit into the 3 sec window, e.g., in the
  sentence The father took the book (from the
  table) (cf. Pöppel, 1994 and 1997 for the
  neurological evidence)
• Fig. 2 Catastrophe schema of GRASP.

The book
The father (having the book)
The father
Catastrophe of capture
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• One may distinguish three ways of grasping
• the force grip (e.g., of a branch)
• the precision grip (e.g., of a small tool)
• the refined grip (e.g., of a needle)

finger
Force-grip
finger
thumb
object
thumb
Precision-grip
Fig. 3 Topological difference between power grip
and precision grip.
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First principle of a protolanguage

• The GRASP schema constitutes a structured
  (bivalent) action schema with a long evolutionary
  history and includes a manner specification
  categorized on topological cues.
• As the distinction between several precision
  grips shows, more elaboration appears as soon as
  more precise manipulations on objects and
  instruments are developed.

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Second principle of a protolanguage

• The topologico-dynamical schema of grasping
  assembles causal/enabling/intentional meaning
  components, which are necessarily present in the
  purposeful shaping of a tool and it sets the
  ground of force-dynamics in phonic language

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Restriction on valence complexity

• The iteration of basic action schemata presents a
  barrier of complexity as the composition is not
  dynamically stable.

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Order of emergence

• The order of emergence of grammatical features
  transcending these restrictions could have been
• elaboration of valence patterns (up to valence 3
  or even 4),
• elaboration of the manner component,
• elaboration of the TMA-component.

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The Design of Lithic Instruments

• The industry had to consider the following
  factors
• Form and quality of a stone found (this includes
  a geographic knowledge of places, where they may
  be found).
• Splitting of the stone and isolation of the
  kernel.
• Separation of sharp blades from the kernel.
• Use of instruments for choking stone on one side
  and use of stone instruments for the
  manufucturing of other instruments (bone and
  wood).

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Chopper of the Olduwai.-culture East-Africa
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Handaxe in the early Paleolithicum (above) Abbévil
lien- Biface (Le Stade) Le Champs de
Mars (below) Middle Acheuléen (Saint Acheul) (cf.
Weiner, 1972 130)
Abbévillien 600.000-350.000, second glacial
period Acheuléen 350.000-100.000 third glacial
period
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(left) Moustérien until 40.000, fourth glacial
period Charente (middle), La Quina (right) , La
Quina (all in the Mousterian period)
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Blades from the Solutréen
Blades from the Magdalénien
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Stages of glaciations (measured by isotopes of oxygen) ky BP Lithic technologies (Neanderthals, recent man) Stylistic periods of cave art in France (recent man)
Interglacial (5e) 128-118 Core/chopping tool
Early glacial/temperate (5d-a) 118-75 Flake, core/chopping tool
Early glacial, glacial (4,3) 75-32 Handaxes, scrapers
Full glacial (2) 32-13 Blades Perigordian (ca. 34 ky-19 ky) Aurignacian (33 ky- 18 ky)
Late glacial (1) 13-10 Microlithic elements Solutrean (18 ky 16 ky) Magdalenian (16 ky 10 ky)
Current interglacial 10-0
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Beyond the grasp-scenario
As a consequence catastrophe theoretical
semantics (cf. Wildgen, 1982 and 1994) contains
implicitly an evolutionary stratification of
human sign use and language.
Fig. 4 Schema of shaping an object with an
instrument via subtraction.
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The restriction on the complexity of (nominal)
phrases

• The head and its attribute (or non-determiner
  specifier) are of the same basic type
  (nominal/adjectival) and the restriction
  primarily concern the risk of blending two or
  more semantic spaces. If every noun or adjective
  is associated with a place in a semantic space
  (e.g., kinship, color, age, evaluation) then the
  mapping of one place in space A (say father) to
  one place in space B (say old) is a problem
  insofar as the spaces are different and may not
  be combined simply to a conjunct space A x B.

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Conclusions for Part I

• The grammar of a protolanguage specifies three
  hierarchically scaled levels of primary
  categorization
• Stable entities (no change in the perceptual and
  classificatory time window and recurrence as
  pattern (statistical relevance),
• dynamic aspects of entities in change and motion
  (inchoative, egressive, durative), and
• bivalent GRASP-schema with qualitative change
  (capture or emission).
• The restriction principles may explain why
  further conditions of control on the
  combinatorial /mapping /blending semantics had to
  evolve in order to arrive at a more complex and
  less context dependent grammar, i.e., at a
  full-fletched language, and why this took the
  time it took.

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Part II

• Symbolic Evolution in the late Paleolithic
• Referential art and abstract symbols

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The origin of art in rock-engravings

• Rock engravings and later plastic art in stone
  may be understood as the origin of
  representational art.
• As this line also leads to the invention abstract
  (mnemotechnically motivated) signs and finally to
  writing, the modern cultures of fine arts and
  literature have their origin in Paleolithic
  symbol techniques.
• Color was originally used for body-painting,
  later in the context of funeral practices, and
  finally in the art of caves (after 40.000 BP)

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• Combination (and separation) of pictorial and
  abstract signs in the Paleolithic period.
• (cf. J. Jelinek, 1975, 433)

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• Styled Representations of hands
• Cave Santian (Spain)).

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Abstract representations of humans Russia
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Paleolithic Sculptures
Representations of women (so called Venus of
Willendorf, Austria
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Paleolithic cave paintingGeographic distribution
The so called franco-cantabric culture
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Drawing techniques
Monochrome drawing of a horse (Peña de Candamo)
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Polychrome pictures in the Cave Chauvet (France)
Battle between two rhinozeros
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A group of chasing lions Cave Chauvet
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A bison which turns ist head in attack cave
Chauvet
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Details of horses
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Methonymic abstraction
Giant deer
Contours of a deers head
Sketch of a deers head
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A list of abstract symbols
Tectiform symbols 1-16 1-10 Dordogne ( Les
Eyzies) 11-16 Northern Spain (Altamira,
Castillo, u.a.) 17 23 isolated signs
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Art of the Levante (Spain) ca. 9-8 000 BP
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Transition to the Meso- und Neolithic
Norhtern Sahara (Kargur Talh) (Neolithic 4-5.
Thou. B.C.)
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From object-language to writing

• Between 8000 BC and 3000 BC very simple object
  languages, where small-scale sculptures
  represent their objects, existged.
• Later two-dimensional contours represented the
  object-signs included in a jar.
• They finally lead to the first systems which may
  truly be called writing systems. These presuppose
  the political and economic organization of the
  first empires and cities.
• Cf. Schmandt-Besserat (1978 82)

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Transition to writing (the last 10.000 years)

• Original functions
• Representation of objects for the purpose of
  bookkeeping (a sign stands for an object in the
  economic world)
• Creation of a representational universe of
  discourse (where the buying, selling, transfer.,
  loss etc. of objects is represented).
• Calculation (origin of mathematics)

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Early object-symbols (choice from a field of 12
categories)
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Hieroglyphs in Egypt
Signs for concrete contents
Signs for processes
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Further developments in Egypt
Hieroglyphs First simplifications in the 3rd
millenium B.C. Hieratic Latest text 3rd century
AD Demotic Latest text 476 AD
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Conclusions

• There is a line which leads continously from
  artifact-industries already presupposing the
  semantics and pragmatics of a natural language to
  art, writing and mathematics.
• The basic principles which organize these levels
  of semiotic evolution should be formulated in a
  common language.
• Such a scientific language must have geometrical
  and combinatorial powers.