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Odd linguistics argument

Phaycops said:
Ummm.....what? Why would you say that?
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Gaps in fossil remains are not a significant issue in my opinion and don't appear to be for most scientists. There are likely transitional forms found and so not a big deal. The only ones making a big deal out of it are antievolutionists, usually religious and intelligent design proponents. I just wanted to check and see if that is what was lying behind those thoughts. I am not interested in arguing intelligent design.
 
Dogdoctor said:
Are you talking about some mathematical thing?
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Yes. The problem of "transitional fossils" is one of simple mathematics.

Let's assume that we have two fossils in (presumptive) lineage, separated by ten million years of time. This gives us a big gap between the fossils, a gap in which quite a lot of evolutionary change can be expected to occur. Creationists and similar idiots will point to the lack of fossils in this gap as a potential saltational event -- basically, how did things get from here to there, and what evidence do we have for that?

So now, someone goes out, hunts really hard, gets lucky, and finds another fossil, a "transitional form," five million years after the first form and five million years before the second. Unfortunately, from the creationist viewpoint -- or at least how they argue -- this simply creates two gaps. Now we have to explain not only how we got from A to B, but now we have to explain both how we got from A to C, and then how we got from C to B.

Trying to address the creationst argument about "gaps" is like trying to get rid of the end of a rope by cutting it off. Every time you cut, you make two new ends.

With specific regard to the hominid lineage -- there are (of course) gaps between the earliest "human" fossil that we know, and the latest non-human hominid fossil. And we don't have a lot of examples of fossils of either, so we don't have a lot of data to play with. But from the data we do have, it looks like the evolution of the capacity for language may have occurred as early as the evolution of humans -- Homo sapiens. It may have happened later, in the subbranch of H. sap that gave rise to modern humans, but not to Neanderthals. It's hard to tell, because the relevant parts of the body don't fossilize well, so it's very hard to get data. But there's nothing "ID"ish about it.

We've got a similar problem, further back, with the evolution of taillessness in apes. As far as we can tell, apes and monkeys split apart about twenty-five million years ago. Since modern monkeys have tails, and modern apes do not, it's tempting to guess that twenty-five million years ago was also when the ape lineage lost its tail. But it doesn't work out that way. The ape lineage might have had tails until almost the point at which they split into gibbons and the great apes, about fifteen million years ago. We don't have the data, because we don't have the fossils. And tails -- which have bones -- fossilize a lot better than voiceboxes and brains.....
 
Ok well I wouldn't look at it as a problem. It sounds like you are saying there is a problem. Is it only a problem in that anti-evolutionists will bring up these points or do you think they are valid arguments?
 
Dogdoctor said:
Ok well I wouldn't look at it as a problem. It sounds like you are saying there is a problem. Is it only a problem in that anti-evolutionists will bring up these points or do you think they are valid arguments?
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No, it's mostly a problem in that it's something that needs to be continually re-addressed in discussions of evolution, because evolutionists continually return to the same tired arguments.

And in this case, as far as I can tell, you were the one who brought it up. As you might imagine, there are obvious physiological differences betwen fossils generally categorized as Homo sapiens, and fossils that are not -- otherwise, there wouldn't be a species difference there. Biologists don't simply pluck taxonomical differences out of thin air.

You asked, and I quote, "[D]id the language areas develop after we were humans? If not then it doesn't sound like that is evidence of lack of language prior to the evolution of humans." Most of the key changes that define "humans" are, of course, related to the brain and skull, since that's one of the areas that differentiates humans from other early hominids. The hominids that have a sufficiently "human-like" skull get classified as Homo sapiens -- and one of the key aspects of a human-like skull is the neurological capacity for classic human abilities.

So there are basically three possible positions. First, pre-human hominids (e.g. Homo ergaster) may have had speech capacity. This is often regarded as unlikely, since the neck vertebrae of H. ergaster doesn't appear to allow for the necessary fine control to produce the needed variety of sounds. Second, other human subspecies (e.g. H. sapiens neanderthalis) may not have had speech capacity -- again, this is supported by some intepretations of the neck and skull structure of Neanderthal samples we have. Third, the very changes that distinguish H. sapiens from H. ergaster were what permitted human-like speech, in which case speech is indeed a defining characteristic of humanity.

Any of these three views are compatible with what we know at the moment, because we know so little. My personal bet is on the second, but with that and five bucks, you can get coffee...
 
Thanks for the detailed explanation. Still looking at all you have presented I'll skip the coffee and have a cup of tea.
 
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