THE EVOLUTIONAIRY PROCES OF COMMUNICATION; WHAT CAUSED HUMAN
LANGUAGE TO DEVELOP?
Steven Maaswinkel
ANR: 267051
Supervisor: Dr. F.A.I. Buekens
1
Preface
In the Philosophy of Mind and the Philosophy of Language intentionality is a hot topic. Some
philosophers claim that humans behave intentional which means that they act according to
purposes i.e. humans intend to influence the behavior of others with their actions. Besides this
humans are also held to be capable of understanding the intentions of other humans.
Nowadays we have a very complex communication system that spreads out through a wide
variety of institutions and language groups. In general there is a tendency towards human
language that describes it as an exclusive human capability and as a complex form of
communication. This ‘folk’ consensus aroused my interest and therefore I wanted to examine
the roots of this tendency.
This thesis first concentrates on a rational reconstruction of the evolution of human
communication by looking at ‘Origins of Human Communication’ by Michael Tomasello.
After that the focus is on the evolution of communication amongst all kinds of organisms by
looking at the evolution of signals in Brian Skyrms his book ‘Signals’.
Tomasello is a subscriber of intentionality who even states that humans possess something
that he calls ‘shared intentionality’. This cognitive ability is ought to separate humans from
other primate species. Skyrms on the other hand does not think it is necessary to speak of
intentionality regarding communication. He believes that micro organisms have
communication systems that are just as complex as human language. Skyrms thinks that we
should not make use of intentionality in discussing communication, but instead speak of the
information that spreads out through signals.
In conclusion I will speak my own mind about the origins of human language and I will
combine the two theories, making some small adaptations that will hopefully be useful to the
discussion on the origins of human language.
This thesis rests on the excellent works of Michael Tomasello and Brian Skyrms.
2
Inhoud
Preface ..................................................................................................................................................... 2
1. Back to simple cooperation ................................................................................................................. 5
1.1 Natural gestures ............................................................................................................................ 5
1.2 Shared Intentionality ..................................................................................................................... 5
1.3 Chicken or the egg ......................................................................................................................... 5
1.4 Attending in the immediate place and time ................................................................................... 6
1.5 Iconic gestures............................................................................................................................... 7
2. Natural gestures by Infants .................................................................................................................. 7
2.1 Empirical observation of pre linguistic humans; why do infants point? ....................................... 7
2.1.1 Social motivations .................................................................................................................. 7
2.1.2 Pointing as intentional behavior ............................................................................................ 8
2.1.3 Expressing emotions ............................................................................................................... 8
2.1.4 Social cooperation: helping adults with information ............................................................. 9
2.1.5 Common Ground .................................................................................................................... 9
2.1.6 Importance of age ................................................................................................................. 10
2.2 Early Pantomiming...................................................................................................................... 10
2.3 Iconic gestures and language ...................................................................................................... 11
3. Human and chimpanzee cooperation................................................................................................. 13
3.1 Collaboration among chimpanzees ............................................................................................. 13
3.2 Summary; the Intentional stance ................................................................................................. 15
4. Brian Skyrms on the evolution of signals.......................................................................................... 16
4.1 Signaling games .......................................................................................................................... 17
4.1.1 Signaling networks ............................................................................................................... 18
4.1.2 Success of signals in nature .................................................................................................. 18
4.2 The mathematical theory of information ..................................................................................... 19
4.2.1 The content of information ................................................................................................... 20
4.2.2 Objective and subjective information ................................................................................... 20
4.2.3 The flow of information ........................................................................................................ 21
4.3 Evolution of signals ..................................................................................................................... 22
4.3.1 Learning in order to make signals........................................................................................ 22
4.3.2 Reinforcement learning ........................................................................................................ 22
4.4 Summary ...................................................................................................................................... 23
5. The intentional stance versus signals carrying information .............................................................. 23
3
5.1 The intentional stance ................................................................................................................. 24
5.1.1 Doubts about altruistic nature.............................................................................................. 24
5.1.2 Iconic gestures do not necessarily precede language .......................................................... 24
5.2 Better safe than sorry .................................................................................................................. 25
6. Human language; information or intentionality ............................................................................ 26
6.1.1 A contradiction concerning intentionality ............................................................................ 26
7. Signals, pointing and pantomiming ................................................................................................... 27
7.1 Signals become referents trough direct attending and convention ............................................. 27
7.2 Pantomiming can evolve gradually alongside simple language ................................................. 27
7.4 The difference with Skyrms.......................................................................................................... 29
7.5 The difference with Tomasello; shared intentionality and subjective information ..................... 29
8. Convention of signals, utterances and references; difference with other organisms ......................... 30
9. Summary ........................................................................................................................................... 30
Reverences............................................................................................................................................. 32
4
1. Back to simple cooperation
In the first three chapters I will introduce some problems concerning language and
communication by explaining the work of Michael Tomasello, who is a co-director at the Max
Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, and who claims that natural gestures like
pointing and pantomiming are the building blocks of human language and are necessary
components to establish a shared intentionality, which is a fruitful cooperation that is based on
recognizing- and reacting in response to intentions.
1.1 Natural gestures
The problem in seeking for the origin of language according to Tomasello is that this origin
must precede language. Tomasello suggests that “The linguistic code rests on a non-linguistic
infrastructure of intentional understanding and common conceptual ground” (2009: 58).
Another concern towards the origin of communication is the problem of code origination. To
establish a code you already need to have a code that is at the same complex level as the one
you are making. For instance, if you agree with your friend that two taps on the back means
that you should not kiss the girl you have just hooked up with at a local bar you already need
a code to establish your mutual agreement. How can a linguistic language develop when you
already need language to create one?
1.2 Shared Intentionality
According to Michael Tomasello we must therefore begin with unconventionalized, uncoded
communication such as pointing and pantomiming. These gestures were elementary to the
development of language. Second he states that humans are able to have a shared
intentionality which derives from the ability to read behavior and respond to it. Something
like shared intentionality can also be found in the work of John Searle: “Intentionality
presupposes a background sense of the other as a candidate for cooperative agency... that is
necessary for all collective behavior” (1990: 414). Tomasello divides the background
mentioned by Searle into the cognitive skills that humans need to create a joint intention, and
the social motivations for helping each other. The cooperators in this shared intentionality
have a common ground of shared memories which is necessary to understand intentions. In
chapter 5 and 6 I will discuss shared intentionality as an important contributor to language.
1.3 Chicken or the egg
The main focus is on gestures that are complete communicative acts on their own. They are
not used to accompany linguistic communicative acts or as a substitute for them (gestures of
5
deaf people) but must precede language entirely.
There are two reasons to make use of gestures. First to direct the attention at something that
can be seen in the immediate perceptual surroundings (pointing), and second to direct the
imagination of the recipient to something that cannot be seen in the immediate environment,
but takes place at another point in time (pantomiming or iconic gestures). In chapter 7 I will
argue that there is no chicken or the egg problem
1.4 Attending in the immediate place and time
A gesture that symbolizes something requires understanding from the recipient to be useful at
all. For instance if two people are in a crowded and noisy place where they cannot hear each
other they can make use of pointing or pantomiming to communicate. A simple example is a
customer who sits at the bar in a café and who looks the bartender in the eye while pointing at
his glass. The bartender understands this communicative act and gives the customer a new
beverage. However the bartender needs to know what sort of drink the man wants to have.
There are all sorts of drinks he can choose but in this case he seems to know what the man
wants and therefore fills his glass with a beer. The bartender and the customer share a certain
background that leads to understanding of the gesture. It is probable that the customer already
ordered four beers and therefore it is likely that he wants a fifth one.
Harry is a man that just came to live in Tilburg. Harry walks into a pub in the city centre for
the first time. He walks to the bar, sits down and points at a glass of beer that is from another
customer while putting up one finger and making eye contact with bartender Bob. Bartender
Bob understands what Harry wants and gives the newcomer a glass of beer.
Now Harry is quite a difficult customer; he comes from Amsterdam and is used to have all
sorts of drinks on his night out. In Amsterdam Harry often went to a place called ‘the
bananenbar’ (which is a light erotic establishment in the red light district). Harry had made up
gestures that he used for three types of drinks. His forefinger and middle finger crossed meant
a Bacardi and coke. His pinky directed towards the bartender means a Safari Seven-up and
two thumbs up is a double single malt whiskey.
Harry walks up to the bar for the seventh time and is already getting drunk. He holds up his
two thumbs believing that the bartender would understand what he means and now aspects to
get a double single malt whiskey. Bartender Bob does not understands this gesture and after a
couple of repeated thumbs up by Harry, Bob waves the drunk away and helps another
customer. Harry is very upset which is partially caused by his drunk state of mind and goes
off to bed.
6
Now we can learn two things from this example. First that understanding each other is partly a
concern of imagination but also a matter of convention. Without certain conventionalized
meaning that can be agreed with it is very difficult to understand intentions. In chapter 7 I will
come back at this point and suggest that convention is a fundamental contributor to the
development of language.
1.5 Iconic gestures
The second gesture that Tomasello gives is an iconic gesture or ‘the act of pantomiming’.
Iconic gestures are “typically simulations of actions that are not currently happening”
(Tomasello, M. 2009: 66). These gestures belong to a different category than pointing because
they can be used to refer to situations that do not take place in current time.
For instance Mary and Rosie are having a social psychology lesson and they are bored.
They are not paying attention very well but must be silent because other students want to hear
the professor talk. The girls are fund of playing games on their Xbox. Mary is tired of
boredom and looks at Rosie while pretending she is holding the console with which you can
play on the Xbox. While doing this, she nods her head to the door at the back of the room.
Rosie is also tired of boredom and does not want to stay either. She understands what Mary
means, namely: ‘Shall we leave the room and go play on the Xbox?’ Luckily for the girls,
they are sitting at the back of the room and they sneak out silently to freedom.
2. Natural gestures by Infants
The examples above are situated within a context where sophisticated language is already
evolved. To understand these gestures as tools where language is build on we have to think of
examples where there is no language in the form of a codified linguistic system of meaning.
2.1 Empirical observation of pre linguistic humans; why do infants point?
A good way to examine the use of natural gestures to communicate in a social way is the use
of gestures by young children who are in their prelinguistic age. Children at this age are not
yet influenced by language which can prove that the natural gestures are indeed the
fundaments of linguistic communication, but only if they use the same kind of iconic gestures
that adults do.
2.1.1 Social motivations
In most studies infants point for two motives namely to request things (imperatives) and to
share experiences and emotions. However there is no evidence yet that shows us if pointing is
caused ontogenetically or if it is imitated behavior (Tomasello 2009).
7
Tomasello thinks pointing occurs naturally because it is observed in all cultures and there are
even some other ape species that make use of it, although he admits that this is not a hard
conclusion and we simply do not know enough to draw an outline on this subject.
The important question for our investigation is whether young children communicate through
pointing to influence the intentional states of others.
2.1.2 Pointing as intentional behavior
Tomasello wants to prove that small infants are already trying to inform and share their
experiences. Melinda Carpenter is a senior scientist who works at the Max Planck institute for
Evolutionary Psychology, who has set up observations in which parents had to make diary
observations of their children that involve pointing behavior (2009).
One example is example 14 where an eleven and a half year old infant called ‘J’, points to the
door while the father is preparing to leave the room. Could it be that J understands what is
going on and is trying to inform that father is leaving?
A second example is example 15 where J at the same age points to his empty glass a few
minutes after his mother had poured water in it. Did J ask for a refill?
The third example (number 17) is an observation of J wherein he sees his father arranging the
Christmas tree. Moments later his grandfather enters the room and J points to the tree and
makes some sound as if he is trying to say ‘Look at the tree!’ (Tomasello 2009).
2.1.3 Expressing emotions
Tomasello wants to distinguish between declaratives as expressive; the infant wants to share
an attitude with an adult to a common referent, and declaratives as informatives; the infant
provides the adult with information in order to help the adult while knowing his intentions.
An experiment set up by Ulf Liszkowski ea. (2004) put one year olds in a situation where the
adult’s different reactions at possible situations were set up. The adult should react in four
different ways. First by looking to the event the infant points at without looking to the infant,
so they cannot share attention and interest. Second by reacting positive to the infant without
looking at the referred event to see if the only goal from the infant is the attention of the adult.
Third by doing nothing in order to see if the infant is just pointing for the sake of doing
something and is not attempting to communicate. Fourth by looking at the infant and the
event and also reacting positively to the child (this last type of reaction is a state of joint
attention where a condition is shared).
The results showed that ignoring the child and looking at the event, and looking at the child
and ignoring the event were unsatisfying for the children. In these states and the total ignore
8
state children would repeat their pointing to the same event while in the joint attention state
the child would only give one long point as if they were sharing as a matter of fact. Besides
this they also pointed at more events in the joint attention state than the other three states as if
they were unsatisfied with their communication partner. What these results show is that the
children not only want the attention of the adult, they also want to share the event they are
referring to by their expression with the adult.
2.1.4 Social cooperation: helping adults with information
Can prelinguistic infants also declare informatives? To do this they have to provide an adult
with information that helps them to get what they need or would be interested in. This motive
requires that the infant understands that others can be knowledgeable or ignorant, and the
child must have an altruistic motive to help others, not a selfish motive.
Liszkowski, Carpenter, Striano and Tomasello (2006) did an observation in which they placed
1 year olds in situations where an adult pretends he lost sight of an object and then starts
looking for it. As a result the infants pointed to the objects that the adults were looking for
more often than other objects that were present in the room. In addition they showed no
expression of wanting the object for themselves (they did not start to whine or reach out to the
object) therefore suggesting that they wanted to help the adult to find the thing they were
looking for.
Summarizing the different observations, Tomasello concludes that there are three classes of
social intentions with these prelinguistic infants that are similar to linguistic adults; sharing
emotions and attitudes, informing (by directing attention) and requesting (‘help me attain my
goal’). He considers these types of cases as involving shared intentionality. In section 5.1.1 I
will briefly discuss some doubts about the altruistic nature of the infants in the examples.
2.1.5 Common Ground
As explained earlier shared intentionality is not only based on the cognitive skills of those
involved, but also on the common ground that they share; shared memories that are about a
situation that they experienced together. An observation by Liebal ea. (2009) placed 14- and
18 month olds and an adult together in a room with toys and baskets. The adult picked up the
toys and put them in a basket repeatedly before stopping this activity to point at a toy while
making eye contact with one of the infants. The infants picked up the toy and dropped them in
a basket just like the adult did. While this observation took place another adult was waiting
outside and when he walked in to the room and pointed at a toy, surprisingly the infant did not
do anything.
9
This example suggests that without the use of language there can be established a shared
intentionality based on common ground. The activity could not take place with the adult who
was not picking the toys up earlier which suggests that the infant did not understood the
intentions of the second adult.
What we seem to have here is a cooperation that is made possible by two humans with two
intentions; pick up the toy and put it in the basket and the willingness to do this and a joint
attention. In chapter 7 there will be a broader discussion of shared intentionality based on
pantomiming and language.
2.1.6 Importance of age
The infants we discussed so far are all around eleven or twelve months old. Some scientists
ask why three months old do not point and behave intentional for there are no observations
available that prove they do so. Tomasello responds with three possible reasons why younger
infants do not make us of pointing.
First they do not need to display this behavior because adults mostly respond immediately to
their crying. Second he argues that there is social engagement through the exchange of
emotions with the parents but not with the use of natural gestures and third: the infants simply
do not understand enough of their surroundings to be able to inform the parents of his
intentions.
In any way Tomasello suggests that the cognitive skills to behave intentional simply are not
there yet until children reach around the age of twelve months.
2.2 Early Pantomiming
There is not much relevant research that show young infants using iconic gestures but the act
of pantomiming is an essential part of the claim Tomasello makes that pointing and
pantomiming are the natural gestures on which language is build. Especially because
attending to something that is not in the immediate perception would be something that is
exclusive human behavior.
Until the time of ‘Origins of human communication’ (2009) the iconic gestures found with
prelinguistic infants are all conventional gestures that are imitated from adults. The display of
this behavior occurs around the same age as linguistic conventions, which suggests that both
are caused by the same cognitive skills.
Another research by Carpenter ea. (2009) showed some observations that suggest the use of
creative iconic gestures. In the first observation a 13 months old pantomimes biting a thing
that is not supposed to be bitten. The interpretation is that the infant wants to communicate
10
that he is going to bite that thing.
At 14 months the same infant tilts his head to the side to tell his mom what she should do to
dump a bucket off her own head (although the example does not says if the bucket was on her
head). Still at the same age he ‘fingers’ his chest while he is looking at his mother who has a
shirt on with strings with which he likes to play and he smiles.
These are all examples of the infant indicating that he is going to do something or that he
wants something to be done that needs imagination of a situation that is not occurring at that
time or has occurred before. Tomasello (2009) states that the research on this topic is still at
the very beginning and there is not much evidence yet to support the claim that prelinguistic
infants use pantomiming like adults do.
Further on the conventional gestures are used much less frequent than pointing by infants in
their second life year. A creative iconic gesture is even rarer and most infants at that age do
not even understand a creative iconic gesture. The research until now supports the claim that
pointing is the most natural communicative behavior among young infants.
I will discuss my own view on these iconic gestures by infants in section 5.1.2 and 7.2.
2.3 Iconic gestures and language
During the second life year iconic gestures and conventionalized gestures (nodding the head,
thumbs up) go down in frequency compared with pointing. Most researchers think that this is
caused by the learning of language that develops during this time. The conventionalized and
iconic gestures together with language are held to be symbolic representations and
categorizations of a referent. There is research by Bretherton (1981) and Namy and Waxman
(1998) that infants approaching their second birthday use language more and more often to
refer to things instead of gestures. They also learn words easier than gestures around the age
of two. The pointing gesture however keeps increasing in frequency and is even used to learn
language. These findings suggest that iconic and conventional gestures oppose linguistic
communication and actually compete with each other as both being ways to communicate.
Language seems to take over the symbolic representational function of the iconic and
conventional gestures, because children learn to symbolize in words.
According to Tomasello (2009) children engage in symbolic play which is a playful way to
symbolize something without communicating it. It might be that the cognitive ability or urge
to iconic representation manifests itself in this playing behavior.
Especially infants in the age before three do not combine language with iconic gestures in the
way adults do when they communicate something that involves imagination (attending to the
11
non-immediate). The claim that Tomasello wants to make here is that in evolutionary aspect,
vocal conventions replaced pantomiming while humans remained to use pointing as a way to
direct meaning to their surroundings and attend to things in the immediate perception.
2.4 Shared intentionality; the fundamental contributor in acquiring language
Linguistic conventions are made possible by a shared background of understanding. We will
see that the common ground is a necessary and inevitable component in learning language.
The famous example of the utterance ‘gavagai’ by Willard van Orman Quine (1960) is in no
way understandable for an adult let alone a young infant who is learning to communicate
verbally. You simply need to know what gavagai refers to if you want to understand the
utterance; the referent of gavagai must be known mutually and thus present in the common
ground between two or more people.
Between the age of one and two year old the young infant begins to comprehend and use
linguistic conventions. Many scientists have no idea why this process begins around that age
and not earlier for instance after six months. Tomasello states this believe is caused by
overlooking shared intentionality as the cooperative infrastructure that is elementary to
acquire language; “In the social-pragmatic theory of language acquisition…the close
developmental synchrony between gestural and linguistic communication is expected because
both gestures and language are learned and used within the same interpersonal nexus of
shared intentionality”(2009:155).
Quine’s story of the stranger visiting an unknown culture who meets a native, who utters
‘gavagai’ when a rabbit passes by, is also interesting for our purposes. The stranger knows
that this utterance is a communication act, but how can she know where the native wants to
direct her attention to? Without shared experience it is impossible to know what the native is
referring to.
Learning language is exactly done by knowing what the referent of a word is. The young
children interact with the adults and learn from them which word refers to what things
according to the language group they are raised in.
In conclusion Tomasello goes back to pointing which is just as good a referential act as a
linguistic reference is. Both pointing and the linguistic referent are directed at something.
Pointing can be used to inform the recipient about something new, but can also be used to
establish a new topic on which things can be further communicated. These functions are just
as well done by linguistic utterances.
Pointing and linguistic conventions are based on the same activity; first you have to direct the
12
attention at something before a reference can be made on which a communicative act can be
established. As we saw with young infants, the communicative act as done buy emotions
around the first year of life. Soon after this the infant will acquire language which is based on
the same reference principle. Communicative acts will then involve both emotions and
linguistic utterance. All this can only occur when learner and teacher share a common ground
to know what is exactly understood by which reference.
3. Human and chimpanzee cooperation
The main thing that divides us humans from animals in communicative aspect according to
Tomasello is that linguistic conventions can only be acquired by common conceptual ground.
Cooperative activities with joint goals and attention are developed after the first life year
because only then the cognitive species-unique skills to conceptualize the surroundings are
well developed.
Is this anthropomorphic tendency right and are animals close to us on the evolutionary tree
like chimpanzees and bonobos unable to conventionalize referents to things? Acquiring
language seems to rest on the cognitive skills to imitate and refer to things in the immediate
perception by pointing. Pantomiming is a communicative act on its own that opposes
language in the first years but additions it later on. Iconic gestures rest on the imagination of
humans that are able to communicate about things that cannot be attended to in the immediate
perception. Humans can communicate their intentions and establish a shared intentionality on
which a cooperative communication can be established. These intentions can be either
altruistic or selfish.
3.1 Collaboration among chimpanzees
The collaborative activities and cooperative communication of humans differ from great ape
communication in the way that the latter has individual intentionality while humans have
shared intentionality (Tomasello 2009). Besides this the group activity of the apes has got a
different structure than human group activity.
The chimpanzee is perhaps the most familiar ape in relation to the human. They are held to be
social beings and are known to have many social activities such as hunting, grooming, playing
etcetera. The individual members of the group strive to fulfill the same goal and have their
own role and tasks in doing so. There are observations wherein groups of chimpanzees hunt
together on a way that humans could describe as intelligent. One chases the prey while the
other prevents it to change direction and the third lies ambush and waits for the prey to come
in its direction.
13
These examples suggest that the chimps have a joint attention and also share their intentions
to cooperate. Tomasello however states that we must be careful with describing this behavior
in our own terms. He claims that this activity is based on the individual intentions of the
chimps. One starts the hunt, the others try to maximize their own benefit and take the
positions that are still left, and when one catches the prey he will try to get the most for his
own without starting a big conflict with the others. There is no joint attention and joint goal
but mere activity to satisfy individual needs. There is no research that has showed that during
such a group activity the different actors communicate with each other. The chimps do not
share their intentions but are only motivated to act on their own intentions.
Warneken, Chen and Tomasello (2006) set up an experiment to support this claim. They
thought up four collaborative tasks for 14- and 24 months old children and three human
trained young chimps. Two practical tasks were there were concrete goals and two social
tasks where there was no goal but to play the game itself. In the cases of a concrete goal, the
chimp stopped to communicate when the human also stopped participating, which suggests
that they had not formed a shared goal but. Furthermore they did not have any interest in the
social tasks were there was no goal but the activity itself, whereas the children did do the
social tasks and even proceeded them when the adult stopped participating. The children
collaborated for the sake of the activity itself, the chimps had to attain an individual goal
otherwise they would not show any interest. In addition, the young chimpanzees showed that
individually they had similar social skills as human infants.
If we look at chimpanzee group hunting they share the score afterwards and even with group
members who did not participate in the hunt (although their share is less than the
participants). Recent research by Gilby (2006) shows that this sharing of the prey is a direct
result from the begging and harassment by other group members towards the possessor of
meat. The latter will first try to escape from them and make get out of reach by sitting on a
high branch or hiding in a distant tree.
Tomasello (2009) outlines the chimpanzee as an animal that is only interested in his
individual needs and not those of others. For instance collaboration during the hunt is a direct
result of the nature of the selfish chimp. Tomasello not only has to defend this claim by
proving that humans in their collaboration are not just as well striving to fulfill their own
needs, there cannot be any evidence that proves otherwise. Are humans really universal
sharers that are led by altruistic as well as selfish motives? I will discuss this briefly in section
5.1.1.
14
3.2 Summary; the Intentional stance
For Tomasello social behavior starts with intentional communication. The contemporary
human being evolved from a great ape that was able to communicate his intentions to a social
being that not only communicated his intentions but was also eager to communicate in order
to inform others (helping them with their intentions), express own feelings (sharing attitudes)
and to cooperate on a common ground to achieve a shared goal. Social cooperation is made
possible by two or more humans that share their intentions and establish a shared
intentionality. This shared intentionality is nothing more than the reading of one’s intentions,
understanding his goals and helping the other succeed in his aim. Humans can only behave
intentionally when they can reason practically (insight in cause and effect) and understand
what lies in the immediate perception.
The prelinguistic human makes use of pointing to refer to things in the immediate perception
and is able to perform iconic gestures to refer to things that are not present in the immediate
perception. These natural gestures oppose meaning on human surroundings and are the
fundaments of contemporary language. To prove this claim we looked at young infants who
could not communicate linguistically but use the very natural gestures that precede language
in human evolution. In the transition from natural gestures to acquiring language, these infants
use pointing to learn to add linguistic meaning to their surroundings. The learning of language
in this stage opposes the use of iconic gestures; the infant prefers to use language only. In
time the infant will make use of iconic gestures again in addition to linguistic communication.
Humans are thus social and cultural beings and those capacities differs us from the other great
apes. For instance a chimpanzee can cooperate and communicate intentional but he acts only
to get what lies in his own interest. There is no altruistic tendency to be found among other
great apes that we find in human nature.
However we cannot be sure that this is really the case. Other great apes communicate with
each other in a way we cannot understand them just as they cannot understand our language.
We can interpret Chimpanzees on the hunt just as well as having a shared intentionality. They
cooperate in order to achieve a shared goal (get the prey) and when they have done so they
share the prey with each other and even with other group members who did not participate in
the actual hunt. Although not every member gets the same share, this does not mean that this
way of sharing essentially differs from the way humans do it. Do we not share because we
know that if we do not, we can get a conflict with others which is not in our own interest? Is
there really an altruistic tendency, or are we only bound emotionally to our family and friends.
Further more, intentionality is still a somewhat vague subscription. A dog is not likely to be a
15
linguistic animal, but makes use of communication to get what he wants just like humans in
the prelinguistic area did.
Last but not least; on which point or through what change did humans actually made a
transition from natural gestures to the use of language and natural gestures? It does not
become clear what made humans evolve into social linguistic beings, only that they suddenly
did so. I will try to answer these questions in chapter 7.
4. Brian Skyrms on the evolution of signals
In chapter 4 I will try to explain his work and show another way at looking on the origins of
human communication. Overall we have seen a very remarkable and admirable account of the
origin of human communication by Tomasello, but not a completely satisfying one. We still
have no idea how language arose gradually and what steps were made during this process of
nonlinguistic- to linguistic humans.
Bryan Skyrms is a Professor of Logic and Philosophy of Science at the California Irvine
University and Professor of Philosophy at Stanford University who focuses on the evolution
of signals by all sorts of organisms. In his view most scientists do not use the proper tool to
search for answers in this, to a large extent, blank field. Instead of dividing natural and nonnatural meaning, the first one caused by natural processes and the second by human language
that gave meaning to the world, Skyrms (2010) believes all meaning is natural. He claims that
meaning can arise spontaneously and that we must not ask for the meaning of a word but for
the information that a ‘signal’ carries.
His project takes four steps in doing so, first by looking at the theory of signaling games by
the famous David Lewis and second comes the mathematical theory of information. The third
step and fourth step concern the evolution of signals trough trial and error. The central aim in
his work is to find out if signals can acquire information spontaneously trough a process of
naïve learning (no intentions) and trough repeated interaction. It becomes clear that Skyrms
understands this evolution of language as a gradual process. He does not deny that we have
such a thing as language however he believes that language as a complex signaling system
also evolved spontaneously.
In his work ‘Signals’ Skyrms introduces mathematical models for the invention of signals
(2010). These models are not made of one receiver and one sender but include a network of
senders and receivers of all kinds of different organisms. Simple signaling systems must be
able to implement information, process tasks, inform and coordinate action. This information
process can be thought of as the ‘act of teamwork’ in order to defend against a predator,
16
cooperation during the hunt or even teamwork at the microscopic level of bacterial organisms.
Skyrms main focus lies on simple signaling structures that stand at the basis of the bigger
signaling networks.
4.1 Signaling games
Signaling not only transmits information but also coordinates action. Signals are not likely to
be originated by an innate process where information is contained in an organism that can
miraculously lead to the act of signaling. The more plausible view is that signals originate
spontaneously (Skyrms 2010). However this seems to be just as magical as the innate view.
David Lewis already challenged this problem in 1969 when he introduced the sender-receiver
games in which there are two players; the sender and the receiver. The sender observes a state
in nature and sends a signal to the receiver who cannot observe the state but can receive the
signal. The receiver then chooses an act to respond to the signal and the outcome of that
signal effects the sender and the receiver which means that they get a payoff. In this situation
both sender and receiver have a common interest because they get the same payoff. If they
choose the correct act there is a positive payoff if they do not payoff is zero.
Signals do not have intrinsic meaning; the meaning has to be added by the players in the
signal game (Skyrms 2010). Lewis calls this transmission of information a ‘signaling system’
only when the transmission is perfect, which means that the act matches the state and the
payoff for the players is optimal.
The fact that there is no meaning in the signal does not imply that mental language (a sentence
in one’s thought) has no part in the signal game. When a sender observes a state he can think
something like ‘I want to inform my father about this’ just as well as the receiver can think
‘Wow, does my son really think that I have not noticed his observation on my own’. Skyrms
thinks that the signal game works perfectly if no mental language is involved, and it is
successfully a signaling system when the payoff is optimal which means that both sender and
receiver chose the right state and act.
Signals can carry information in two ways, they have information about what state the sender
observes and they can be about the act that the receiver chooses. The first type measures how
successful the sender’s use of signals to describe a state is, the second measures how effective
the signal is because it changes the receivers probability of action. In a signaling system
equilibrium both types of information are maximal in their success; the sender chose the best
signal about a state and the receiver chose the best act. Remember that the types of
information are about the same signal, so the signal is measured in two ways. The
17
transmission of information is perfect when the receiver chose a state that he would have
chosen when he did the observation himself.
4.1.1 Signaling networks
There are more types of signaling systems thinkable than a one sender and two receivers
system; alarm calls usually have one sender and many receivers. There can be logical
interference when there are multiple senders but only one receiver; which signal should the
receiver react to and what is the state of nature that is observed. For instance a receiver might
want to ask a sender to make the right observation. This can result in a dialogue (humans)
where information goes in both directions and not only from sender to receiver. There is also
the case of a third player who eavesdrops on the signaling between two players and decides to
act as well. Now the first two players have to choose a response in order two get the optimal
pay-off.
With all these possible systems in mind, we must not lose sight of what Skyrms is trying to
show: Can unsophisticated, meaningless, learning dynamics spontaneously generate
meaningful signaling? Skyrms thinks that this is the case. Communication seems to arise at
the point of very simple signals that are the result of observations of an organism on a state of
nature and is received by another organism (or more than one) that will react to the signal by
doing something. I will reflect on the signaling system concept by Skyrms in chapter 6 and
will partially combine it with the ideas of Tomasello in chapter 7.
4.1.2 Success of signals in nature
The signaling game models can provide a natural fundament for language to originate and
they do not require pre-existing language to be performed. For instance there is a group of ten
humans walking in an open field and a lion approaches, one sender can signal a sound like
‘aaaahh!!’ For the receivers to act in success they have to respond to the signal with a certain
action that saves them from being eaten by the lion. In an optimal pay-off all receivers fight
with the lion and this will turn out to be successful because they kill it (or they decide to flee
together and escape).
The success factor of a signaling game is always to be confirmed after the whole situation has
passed by. When successful the sender who made the signal will surely use it again when a
comparable state of nature arises (convention of signals: also see chapter 7). In this way
humans can add signals to all kinds of states.
Which signal is ought to be used for which state is a matter of convention within the group
that they live. This convention must not be seen as a directors meeting where all humans sit
18
down and decide which signal to assess but on the contrary it is repeated because of its
success only.
To look at some more evidence for this theory Skyrms (2010) has an example of vervet
monkeys that have distinct alarm calls for different classes of predators (different states of
nature): “Cheney and Seyfarth (1990) show that the vervets have a ‘cough’ for an eagle, a
‘bark’ for a leopard and a ‘chutter’ for a snake. For leopards it is best to run up a tree and out
on a branch where leopards cannot follow; for snakes one should stand tall and scan the
ground…”(2010:22).
Another good example is a meerkat, who has alarm-calls that distinguish three types of
predator (Skyrms B. 2010). On top of that, they also distinguish the urgency of the threat.
They are believed to do so because they live in burrows and forage nearby these burrows. A
high urgency call (eagle at close distance) from the sender leads to an immediate freeze and
crouch act of the receiver. A low urgency call will lead them to flight into a nearby burrow.
There is a more complex case when diana monkeys are prey to leopards and crowned eagles.
The last one also hunts the yellow-casqued hornbill. When a diana monkey alarms for the
crowned eagle the hornbill will respond either and flee from the situation.
We now have a situation as discussed earlier with a sender, receiver and an eavesdropper.
Within the Philosophy of Mind the discussion often revolves around the mental states of
actors when they communicate. Skyrms however does not think that we should look at the
evolution of communication in terms of mental states; for what mental state has a bee or even
bacteria. It is evident that both these organisms communicate and send signals to each other
therefore we must not focus on intentions, mental states or meaning but only on ‘information’
(Skyrms 2010).
4.2 The mathematical theory of information
Humans are often seen to be the only animal that is able to learn and develop syntax. These
more complex structures of spoken sentences are evidence of exclusivity. Birds however are
well capable of making signals that have a more complex structure. According to Skyrms
(2010) recent study has shown that the black-capped chickadee has a number of repetitions in
D notes for information about a predator. Chickadees are observed to have four different notes
that are classified as A, B, C and D. Playback experiments have shown that the notes that this
bird utters only gets reaction when there is a certain structure in them. When they are
displayed in the order of A, B, C, D, they will get responded to but when this is not the case
19
there is simply no reaction. An example like this shows us that a form of syntax (of course
you can question the definition of ‘syntax’) is not exclusive to humans.
4.2.1 The content of information
What do we ‘conventionalizing’ humans in a language group understand by the word
‘information’. A convenient definition could be ‘the content that is given trough the act of
telling something about a situation to another in such a way that it is clear what the sender
wants to explicate’.
Information can be carried trough signals, gestures, written sentences and spoken sentences.
With Tomasello we looked at the information that can be given through pointing and
pantomiming and focused on prelinguistic communication in order to cooperate. But
information in Skyrms notion can be about anything in the world. Most philosophers think of
informational content in a semantic way; information is expressible as a proposition and can
be true or false. Skyrms (2010) wants to give a new definition namely that the informational
content of a signal is about how that signal affects probabilities. Besides content there is also
quantity of information in a signal which is the measurement of how far the probabilities are
moved (they move within a mathematical formula).
For instance signal A moves the probabilities for state 1 at a scale 9 to 10, and for state 2 at 1
to 10. Signal B does the exact opposite. Whatever the outcome will be, we can see that both
signals carry the same amount of information by their symmetry in probabilities. They do not
have the same informational content because they move the probabilities in different
directions. Signal A moves the probability of state 1 up, and signal B will move it down.
So a signal moves the probabilities of the states, how it moves the second state is dependent
on how much it moves the first state. When the probabilities of the two states are equal, a
signal that is given in state 1 will not move the possibility of state 2. When there is a slight
more chance of state 2 to occur a signal that is given in state 1 will also move state 2.
This is a mathematical model of how signals influence the probable actions that are the result
of the signaling game. It is interesting because there is not any subscription of meaning or
intentionality; there is only chance which is exactly what Skyrms is searching for stable
signals should they emerge spontaneous.
4.2.2 Objective and subjective information
There is a division in objective and subjective information. A sender can have objective
information about a state but can also have subjective information towards the probability of
the receiver’s strategy and vice versa. Organisms do not need any cognitive skills to be part of
20
a signaling game but if they do they will think rationally about the signaling game. Both
sender and receiver will have their considerations on the strategy of the other; we can say that
they have subjective probabilities in mind about them (Skyrms 2010). These subjective
probabilities are states of belief and do not have to be true at all; they can turn out to be
wrong.
There are two types of subjective information, the first is about how the receiver will react
which is in the sender’s interest. The second is about the state that the sender observed which
is in the receiver’s interest. They both will use this subjective information to decide on how
they will behave and they will both try to act optimally according to their subjective
probabilities. What is even more important is that they will learn to bring their subjective
probabilities in concordance with the actual objective probabilities and they will either
succeed to do it or not.
4.2.3 The flow of information
A flow of information occurs when there are for instance a sender, an intermediary, and a
receiver. The sender observes a state of nature and chooses one of two signals. The
intermediary senses the signal and on his own turn chooses one of two signals to send to a
receiver (Skyrms 2010). The receiver chooses one of two acts and if this act matches the state,
they all get a payoff of one, and in every other case they get zero. We now have a signaling
chain, from sender through an intermediary to the receiver.
In this chain the sender and receiver can be used for different signaling systems as well as
have different languages as long as the intermediary chooses the right signal and the receiver
the right act. Skyrms (2010) believes that human language is just as complex as the
communication systems of other organisms and therefore states that it does not matter which
language is used in the chain, because it is all about the content and quantity of information in
the signal chain. The intermediary plays the role of a translator or a transducer.
If the sender and receiver use the same tokens for a signal but with different meaning for
instance State 1 is red and State 2 is blue for the sender and red is Act 2 and blue is Act 1 for
the receiver, there can be a successful signaling chain as long as the intermediary knows that
they have different meanings and translates it in the right way. There is a learning problem for
the translator, because when he chooses the wrong translation there will be an unsuccessful
signaling chain. The flow of information goes through the intermediary and does not stop
after one signaling chain because the intermediary will get new information back on how the
receiver acted. There can be more than one intermediary and information can flow through a
21
very long signaling chain. This is how signaling networks arise, some of the original
informational content will get lost but this can be just as beneficial as it can be damaging for
the informational content (the information can get shorter and more practical and vice versa).
These signaling networks can be found at every biological level.
4.3 Evolution of signals
Regarding the evolution of signals you cannot ignore a certain ‘ex nihilo nihil fit’ problem.
Skyrms states that the first emergence of a stable signal is a result of a long process of
iteration. A stable signal is a signal that fits the observation of the state of nature in so far that
the receiver chooses the right act. I think it is fair to call this first successful signal a
‘meaningful’ signal. But still there are a lot of questions raised when you think about this first
arrival especially when you bear in mind that unsuccessful signals can have quit negative
consequences.
A network of signals can easily arise when the first signal is given. Iteration can lead to the
continuous success of the signal: participants in the network of signals start to use this signal
and this signal alone because of its success.
4.3.1 Learning in order to make signals
Before the iteration process of signals evolves, there must be a learning process of how to
signal. Imitation plays a big role in the evolution of a signal. When a certain strategy of a
signaling game is successful, it is more likely to be imitated by individuals that look around
them.
According to Skyrms strategic behavior is an important component in the evolution of signals.
Strategies are always aimed at success and can be defined as the behavior that focuses on
survival and the fulfilling of needs through signaling. Strategies can be aimed at telling the
truth about a state but also at deception and half-truth.
Deception is the act of misinforming that displays in a game with partial interests. Deception
is impossible in a state of equilibrium where players have complete mutual interests (Skyrms
2010).
4.3.2 Reinforcement learning
Reinforcement learning is a science field where the focus is not on cognitive psychology but
on behavior. At every beginning of a process of reinforcement learning stands a new signal
that can be a starting point, just as well as it can be an adaptation.
The idea within this study is that the probability of choosing an action is proportional to the
22
accumulated rewards from choosing a certain action in the past. Within this process the
organism that undergoes reinforcement learning does not have to know that he does (Skyrms
2010). However when humans understand this process, it is likely to speed up because the
individuals can look at the success of others and imitate their last behavior.
4.4 Summary
Brian Skyrms believes that language is actually a complex signaling system, like many other
signaling systems that can be found among different organisms all over the world. Being a
logician who is well familiar with mathematical models, he tries to explain the gradual
evolution of signals throughout a process of spontaneous development that is based on chance
and success. A signal is always about a state of nature; a sender observes the state and sends a
signal to a receiver who chooses an act to match the signal. The signaling system is a
cooperation system, which is understandable because an individual action does not need any
signals send to receivers to be performed.
The signaling games are essential in the reconstruction of the first signals. A successful
signaling game consists of a signal that matches the state made by sender and an action that
matches the signal made by the receiver. In a successful signaling system a fruitful
cooperation is established; organisms that have caught a prey or escaped from a potentially
life threatening situation are successful in their cooperation.
Signals are conventionalized by their success within a group of organisms, mostly the same
kind, that live together and carry information. A signal therefore consists in the quantity of
information and the content of information. Information can be further divided in objective
and subjective information, which is a division that Skyrms makes for us humans (2010).
In his book he clearly wants to kick intentionality out of the philosophy of mind and wants to
substitute it for information. He also wants the discussion to be about information instead of
cognitive psychology and therefore gives a behavioristic and reductionist account of the
development of communication. This development has a gradual character and is done by
reinforcement learning trough imitation and trial and error.
5. The intentional stance versus signals carrying information
In chapter 5, 6 and 7, I will write my own thoughts on the origin of human communication.
Michael Tomasello and Brian Skyrms have placed themselves in opposite directions towards
intentionality. Tomasello thinks that the uniqueness of human communication is caused by the
cognitive skills that make shared intentionality possible. Intentionality can also be found
23
among other animals but only humans can share their intentions to establish cooperation. To
do this they must have a common ground to be able to understand each other. According to
Tomasello understanding was first established through natural gestures. When humans
acquired language they used this to understand each other next to using iconic gestures.
5.1 The intentional stance
Tomasello’s work is appealing but might be somewhat incomplete because it shows us some
important steps but not a gradual development of communication. Furthermore he claims that
humans are altruistic social beings that do not only act for their own benefit but by nature
want to help others. I will try to show in 5.1.1 that this altruism can be interpreted in other
ways. My second criticism is that the use of iconic gestures to understand each other is not
likely to have taken place without the use of signals. This notion will be further discussed
from section 5.1.2 onwards to chapter 7.
5.1.1 Doubts about altruistic nature
The examples where young infants cooperated with adults by giving them information
(section 2.1.4) can be multiply interpreted. Does the infant really intend to help someone by
informing? It is possible that infants point to many things and look at the reaction of adults.
When adults did not look at the infant they displayed ‘unsatisfied’ behavior. When the adult
made eye contact the infants reacted ‘satisfied’. What we do not know is how many times this
act is repeated before the observation was made and we also do not know if the infant feels
rewarded every time an adult smiles when he points to something. Maybe he is just displaying
this pointing behavior to get rewarded with a positive attitude which is behavior that is
focused on own benefit. Shared intentionality in this last interpretation is not more altruistic
than chimpanzees going on the hunt for their own share of the prey (and as large as possible).
I admit that Tomasello does not say that every action of humans is altruistically motivated but
my claim is that even in possible cases of altruism they can be explained as having selfish
motives too.
The claim of shared intentionality based on altruistic motives is important for the whole story
because it is supposed to be a cognitive ability that separates humans from other animals. As I
tried to show there is not one single interpretation for the examples that rules out other
possibilities.
5.1.2 Iconic gestures do not necessarily precede language
Pointing is obviously a natural gesture. Humans seem to have the cognitive skill that makes it
24
possible to direct attention at things in the immediate surroundings. The examples of young
infants pointing with the aim of directing attention of adults are clear and distinct. Iconic
gestures on the contrary can be questioned in there being a fundament that made language
possible.
Pointing and pantomiming are two different things. The first is always an act of referring in
the immediate environment. The second requires the imagination of recipients and even more
it needs their understanding to be useful at all; which is a vital part of Tomasello’s idea that
shared intentionality can only take place when there is a common ground otherwise there
would be no consensus on the meaning of intentions. The examples with young infants in
chapter 2 always had at least one linguistic adult and one prelinguistic infant. The
interpretation of the act of pantomiming was always made by the linguistic actor in the
communication act (the adult). At first sight this seems trivial but it is actually very important
if we want to know what understanding and thus having a shared intentionality requires. The
basic element is that both actors confirm that they understand the intentions of the other. In
the examples that were given concerning the use of iconic gestures there is hardly any
evidence that the infants did; the confirmation of shared intentionality is a bit one-sided.
5.2 Better safe than sorry
When we consider our own thoughts or memory it is true that we can remember words,
sentences or even whole stories and images of situations that we experienced. However we
are grown adults that have acquired language and are educated in all sorts of disciplines. For
our purposes (checking Tomasello’s claim of pointing and pantomiming as building blocks)
we must therefore think of humans that are in situations where they use no signals but
pointing and pantomiming, and where it is likely that they are not as intelligent as we are now.
If so then we are not speaking of humans that are reflecting on their own actions or discussing
politics but humans who primarily look for food and are both predator and prey. Imagine a
lion that approaches Erk and Ork at fifty meters away. Both men are nearby their cave which
is unreachable for the lion. Erk spots the lion and wants to inform Ork that a lion is
approaching, while knowing that he does not have much time. Now there has been a small
problem since our last example where are favorite ‘prelinguistic’ subjects starred. Ork’s long
distance vision is not working properly and is getting worse every week. Erk has noticed this
because he attended to something far away in their immediate perception a couple of times,
and Ork did not show any kind of understanding to what Erk was attending at.
Now Erk has to decide quickly: ‘Should I try to copy a lion or just imitate the sound that they
25
make’. My guess is the second option; there is not much time and I even think that Erk would
not reflect on his next action and go for the fast option immediately.
This example shows that in most cases, it is much more advantageous to make use of fast
communication because in the ‘prelinguistic’ area, you should better be fast (and safe) than
sorry. Signals are much more effective because they are easier to understand; you can
memorize which animal belongs to which signal. A signal is also performed much faster than
trying to imitate the behavior of both prey and predator.
Besides all this, there is no hard evidence that prelinguistic infants make use of pantomiming
in the way they make us of pointing which also supports my claim that pantomiming is an act
that evolved alongside language rather than it preceded it.
6. Human language; information or intentionality
Skyrms claims that it is better to speak of information than of intentionality and should not
play a big role in studying the origin of communication. The focus should lie on the
information that is carried and spread out through signals and that can be performed by all
organisms. In his view communication of certain bird species and bacteria can be just as
complex as human language. Skyrms does not believe that humans are unique in
communicating through language; signals can be just as well send without any mental
language (holding subjective information towards probable outcomes of actions) having part
in the signaling game (section 4.2.2).
6.1.1 A contradiction concerning intentionality
Skyrms his claim holds a contradiction for he admits that mental language does play a role in
a communicative act but communication can just as well be established without it, and more
important that humans are not unique in their communicative abilities.
Can you admit that there is something like subjective information (a small chapter in
‘Signals’) and mental language, and then say that they are not important because
communication of signals can be well established without mental language? I think that you
cannot claim this because admitting that signals can be send at the premises of subjective
information and thus individual motivations to influence the probability of a recipients
behavior in a signaling game, you actually say that there is something like intentionality.
So on my view, the idea of signals that evolve gradually by a process of iteration, learning
reinforcement and trial and error is correct but somewhere in this process humans and other
organisms came to possess subjective information that influenced the probability of the action
that they would choose.
26
7. Signals, pointing and pantomiming
The concept of gradual development through iteration, imitation and trial and error fills in part
of the blanks that Tomasello leaves open in his account on the origin of human
communication.
When it comes to the development of language it is likely that stable signals were
conventionalized within a group that lived together and through generations became a
language group. Besides this conventionalizing of stable signals I do not think there is a
problem of code origination when signals become referents to situations, objects and other
organisms through simple utterances like ‘a’ or ‘o’. Utterances like that can be examples of
simple language when you define simple language as using referents for all sorts of things. It
sounds a bit circular but I strongly believe that simple language develops in more complex
language by an accumulative process that starts with using combinations of referents to
inform others about things in the world.
7.1 Signals become referents trough direct attending and convention
Language is a unique adaptation of humans that brought a huge evolutionary advantage;
humans became able to communicate about things they experienced in such a way that things
in the environment could not only be described, but could also have function and meaning for
humans.
I believe that pointing is indeed like Tomasello claims a tool that made human language
possible. Without pointing humans could not add referents to things that were present in their
immediate perception.
Signals can be performed by all organisms and can be seen as simple language but for a stable
signal to emerge it has to be used by a whole group in the same way. The convention of a
stable signal rests on the premises that everyone within a group knows what this signal means.
This meaning can be danger, rain or thunder but also joy, lust for sex and other emotions like
anger and grief.
I have to be very modest here and admit that I do not yet know what the abilities are that
made conventionalizing possible but I do believe that the ability to conventionalize made it
possible for signals and utterances to become referents and made it possible for combinations
of signals and utterances to change into words by a gradual process.
7.2 Pantomiming can evolve gradually alongside simple language
Criticizing existing theories is much easier than bringing original ideas to life like Tomasello
and Skyrms did. I find myself in a privileged position to read their works and be able to see
27
where they oppose each other and where one fills in the blanks that the other leaves open. Not
in the least way I claim to give a complete account on the origins of human communication, I
will only try to combine certain aspects and put them in a rational reconstruction of the early
‘prelinguistic’ human.
The most important question is whether we approve utterances that are used to refer to things
to be a form of language or do not think of them as such. We can see in the ‘better safe than
sorry’ section (5.2) that the environment sometimes asks for a signal because it is much more
efficient than using an iconic gesture to explicate intentions.
We can also think of examples where an iconic gesture is more useful than using a signal. For
instance when two humans are hunting on a deer and do not want the deer to hear them
otherwise the deer would run away. It seems to be that the situation where humans find
themselves in is decisive for which tool suits best.
Now the question remains if these referents can be understood as language. When we
summarize Tomasello’s account (2009) communication begins with pointing and
pantomiming and by those gestures changes into language. Skyrms (2010) believes that every
organism uses signals to communicate just as humans do. I believe the latter has a point and
therefore do not think it is plausible that humans first used signals to communicate, then used
pointing and pantomiming and suddenly began to use language.
My believe is that signals and pantomiming evolved gradually alongside each other and that
both could be used to explicate meaning and could even be combined to do so. It might be
possible that referents to things that are not in the immediate environment and pantomiming
are caused by the same cognitive ability like Tomasello suggested (chapter 2).
7.3 Code origination: no need for prelinguistic fundaments
In the first chapter there were two central questions that Tomasello pointed out that are
important for him in searching for the origin of communication. First we needed to look at
something that preceded language and second there was the problem of code origination.
With gradual development of signals and utterances into conventionalized referents and from
there into words we see that language when we define it as a form of communication that uses
referents to things in the world and is used within a group that conventionalizes those
referents can evolve from simple to more complex language by the accumulation of added
referents.
Again I do not yet understand what the exact cognitive abilities are which gave humans the
possibility to conventionalize referents but this is not an obstruction for my idea. We are only
28
searching for prelinguistic components in so far that we need to know what makes it possible
for signals and utterances to become referents and words. Attending at something in the direct
environment by pointing and being able to recognize and memorize that particular referent,
can be the exact components that we are looking for.
For the same reason we do not need a code to establish one because the code comes to life
through signals and direct attending and develops further on through the accumulation of
added referents.
7.4 The difference with Skyrms
The concept of gradual development from signals to simple language is similar to Skyrms his
idea. The main difference is that Skyrms gives a reductionist account on the origins of
communication. He does not believe that humans are unique in their way of communicating.
I think that they are and that the convention of the same referents to particular objects,
situations and other organisms is a capability of humans that we do not find among other
animals, not even among closely related ape species.
7.5 The difference with Tomasello; shared intentionality and subjective information
While Skyrms states that communication can be established with subjective information just
as well as without, Tomasello thinks that reading intentions and being able to foresee the
reactions certain behavior will cause are important capabilities.
I believe Tomasello is right and that he sufficiently shows that human beings are the only
specie to display this behavior. The ability to read and react to the behavior of others can be
seen as holding subjective information toward the thing you are going to communicate.
Shared intentionality is therefore an exclusive human ability, but for me does not rest solely
on pointing and pantomiming. In establishing a shared intentionality the use of signals can
just as well be used to do this as the act of pantomiming. The situation where humans found
themselves in was decisive for the tool that should be used to establish a cooperation that is
based on shared intentionality like I show in section 5.2.
My idea is in this way very similar to that of Tomasello except for the provision of signals as
a tool to establish shared intentionality. However I do not think that intentionality is the only
important contributor to human language. The accumulation of conventionalized referents is
just as important for human language to have originated; a concept which Tomasello also
mentions as ‘common ground’.
29
8. Convention of signals, utterances and references; difference with other organisms
The unique capability of humans to conventionalize signals, utterances and references can be
that humans are able to memorize a large amount of these categories. Language could never
evolve when humans were for instance not able to memorize more than twenty referents. The
examples of bird species that also use complex syntax in their communication are appealing
but do not show that birds have the same ability to memorize such a large amount of referents
like humans have. If we really think it is necessary at all to speak of the uniqueness of men
then it is likely we must search for it in this direction (other than physical characterizations).
Language is something that could not have been originated by the hands of one human alone
but is a result of a long process of conventionalizing added referents by members of a group
that lives together. If bird species add different referents, function and meaning to particular
things in their surroundings, humans are no longer unique but until there is proof of such a
process among other organisms I believe that humans are unique in their way of
communicating.
9. Summary
In this thesis I have tried to find the origins of human communication. I have studied works of
Michael Tomasello and Brian Skyrms that are both equally interesting as important to this
search.
Tomasello thinks that humans are able to read- and react to the intentions of others and can
establish a shared intentionality; the actors know what their intentions are and can now
cooperate in ways that other animals cannot.
Skyrms does not want to speak of intentionality in looking at communication and gives a
reductionist account of how communication evolved through the use of signals that by
chance, reinforcement learning, imitation and trial and error become stable. His focus lies on
information that is spread out by these signals and not on intentional behavior of humans.
A contradiction could be found in denying intentionality as an important contributor to the
development of language. Skyrms speaks of subjective information that can be held by
humans that is not important for the objective flow of information. His claim is internally
consistent however this subjective information is quite important for the rise of human
communication because a subjective dimension in communication is something that is very
different from the mere objective flow of information. I agree with Skyrms that intentionality
is not the main contributor for human language to origin but I do not think that the reduction
of human communication to the objective flow of information is satisfying to define the
30
origins of human language. Humans are able to hold subjective information towards the thing
that they are going to communicate and can do this in such various ways by the huge amount
of memorized referents they have in mind that are about things in the world.
The cognitive abilities that are necessary to conventionalize referents to all sorts of things in
the world and which can be done by attending to things in the immediate environment by
pointing at it are fundamentally important for simple language to become more complex and
for human language to have evolved into what it is nowadays.
I would like to thank Filip Buekens for guiding me with his good advice and experience on my bachelor
thesis and I would like to thank Raymond Corbey for his exchange of thoughts with me on this subject.
31
Reverences
Buekens, F. (2001) Het teken en de wereld. Leuven: Uitgeverij Acco.
Bretherton, I., Bates, E., McNew, S., Shore, C., Williamson, C. & Beeghly-Smith, M.
(1981).Comprehension and production of symbols in infancy. Developmental Psychology, 17,
pp 728-736.
Carpenter, M., Nagell, K., and Tomasello, M. (1998) Social cognition, joint attention, and
communicative competence from 9 to 15 months of age. Monographs of the society of
research in Child Development, 63 pp 4.
Cheney, D.L., and Seyfarth, R.M. (1990). Attending to behaviour versus attending to
knowledge: Examining monkeys’ attribution of mental states. Animal Behaviour, 40, pp 742753.
Gilby, I.C. 2006. Meat sharing among the Gombe chimpanzees: Harassment and reciprocal
exchange. Animal Behaviour 71(4): pp 953-963
Liszkowski, U., Carpenter, M., Henning, A., Striano, T., and Tomasello, M. (2004) 12months-old point to share attention and interest. Developmental Science, 7, pp 297-307.
Liebal, K., Behne, T., Carpenter, M., & Tomasello, M. (2009). Infants use shared experience
to interpret pointing gestures. Developmental Science, 12, pp 264-271.
Liszkowski, U., Carpenter, M., Striano, T., & Tomasello, M. (2006). Twelve- and 18-montholds point to provide information for others. Journal of Cognition and Development, 7, pp
173-187.
Namy, L., Waxman, S. R. (1998). Words and gestures: Infants’ interpretations of different
forms of symbolic reference. Child Development, 69(2), 295-308.
Quine, W. V. (1960) Word and Object. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.
Searle, J. (1990) Collective Intentions and Actions, Intentions in Communications, P. Cohen,
J. Morgan and M. E. Pollack (eds.), Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, Bradford Books, 1990.
Skyrms, B. (2010) Signals. New York: Oxford University Press Inc.
Tomasello, M. (2008) Origins of Human Communication. Cambridge Massachusetts London:
The MIT Press.
Tomasello, M. (2009) Why we cooperate. Cambridge Massachusetts London: The MIT Press.
Warneken, F., Chen, F., and Tomasello, M. (2006). Cooperative activities in young children
and chimpanzees. Child Development, 77 (3) pp 640 – 663.
32