As we trace the past for the roots and origins of words, it is as though we are digging deeper and deeper into the mounds of language, finding fragments of words and remnants of meaning that enable us to reshape them back into their original forms. It is as though we are retrieving and restoring pottery from the broken shards that are scattered throughout soil and dirt that has piled up over them over thousands of years.
In etymological terms: from the mounds of words, we now use only superficial or surface meanings, words that have somehow lost their original connection with their earliest creators/speakers/users.
Just like archaeologist consider a "mound of refuse" or a "pile of garbage" to be a treasure chest of information about how older civilizations lived and what tools they used, I see in our words, our dynamic use of words and the manner in which we use them (all too often in a kind of messy way - like a pile of garbage) a treasure chest of info.
The neat thing is, that in contrast to archaeological evidence such as broken pottery, bones, flint and metal ware from garbage mounds - things discarded - we STILL use linguistic archaeological fragments of the past 'daily' and 'lively' in our continuing need to communicate, overcoming our seeming separation.
Through our current and active language we are still connected - and not just in memory - to our ancestors, the inventors of sounds and words and script... the sages and philosophers, the physicist and scientists of yore..."
Question about human beings: I consider that each and every human, who lives, has ever lived and will ever lived, is - physically, psychologically and genetically - even if only in some small way completely unique. What do you think?
Children have mothers, too. Like Christianity with its trinity of three godheads, all male (spiritus in Latin is male), women have no place here. Dawkins erases us just as much as religions do.
So the genetics records when a being was living, the organism reflecting environment to change, and chooses to pass to the next generation from embryonic development.
You once wrote: “In its evolutionary role the gene inhabits eternity, or at least geological time. Its companions in the river of evolutionary time are other genes, and the fact that in any one generation they inhabit individual bodies can almost be forgotten.”
What you say about genes is also true of the sequences of language. As individuals, you and I have learned to listen, to speak, to read, and to write, but the systems of linguistic sequences we have mastered were here before we were born and will be here after we die. In the river of time, the fact that these sequences have inhabited our individual bodies can almost be forgotten.
As linguist Nikolaus Ritt says, “there is a sense in which languages are insensitive to the existence of their users as conscious beings.”
Richard, I would love to hear how you see language fidelity evolving via generative AI. Are we getting close to the language fidelity of DNA today, or are there still chasms to cross? I note that not only is the information likely to be passed down, but LLMs and the like may now make that information vastly more useful than it was before.
I hope that you will excuse my usurpation of your coinage, Dr. Dawkins. I think that I understand the intent. I consider the whole of our species's creations, our extended phenotype, to include all the memes, worthy of study.
Richard, you and I are about the same age and you are still my mentor. I am an historian and have enjoyed learning from you through your publications. I am eagerly awaiting this new book.
Thanks for the link. Fascinating. Yes, it is a "hot topic". I understand RD has had some discussions about it with Denis Noble, who thinks "Lamarck is back". There may be some videos on You Tube of them. Admittedly, I'm not convinced, but I certainly do have some questions, for example, on behaviours, presumed to be learned, but for which there seems to be no evidence of exposure to explain mimicry.
The classic example is the Dutch “Hunger Winter”. When the Germans retreated from the Netherlands, they took every possible foodstuff with them. The Dutch starved during the winter. The children gestated during this time have very different metabolisms - in particular, they hang on to calories more than the norm and therefore, in our times of plenty, tend to obesity and other diseases. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_famine_of_1944–1945
Trump, MAGA, the republican party continues its mass corruption of our language. Now we have AI, and texts everywhere on our phones and TV. Our common language is under siege. I studied Linguistics and agree languages change over time, but the lies, conspiracies, disinformation, and mal-information coming from republican mouthes are totalitarian in intent and confuse, dissemble, and deform our language.
The Storylines of the Australian First Nation People carry information from generation to generation.
- The Archaeology of Etymology -
As we trace the past for the roots and origins of words, it is as though we are digging deeper and deeper into the mounds of language, finding fragments of words and remnants of meaning that enable us to reshape them back into their original forms. It is as though we are retrieving and restoring pottery from the broken shards that are scattered throughout soil and dirt that has piled up over them over thousands of years.
In etymological terms: from the mounds of words, we now use only superficial or surface meanings, words that have somehow lost their original connection with their earliest creators/speakers/users.
Just like archaeologist consider a "mound of refuse" or a "pile of garbage" to be a treasure chest of information about how older civilizations lived and what tools they used, I see in our words, our dynamic use of words and the manner in which we use them (all too often in a kind of messy way - like a pile of garbage) a treasure chest of info.
The neat thing is, that in contrast to archaeological evidence such as broken pottery, bones, flint and metal ware from garbage mounds - things discarded - we STILL use linguistic archaeological fragments of the past 'daily' and 'lively' in our continuing need to communicate, overcoming our seeming separation.
Through our current and active language we are still connected - and not just in memory - to our ancestors, the inventors of sounds and words and script... the sages and philosophers, the physicist and scientists of yore..."
© 2002-2005 W. J. Borsboom
I plan to preorder The Genetic Book of the Dead the minute it’s available.
Question about human beings: I consider that each and every human, who lives, has ever lived and will ever lived, is - physically, psychologically and genetically - even if only in some small way completely unique. What do you think?
Once again, I thank you for sharing your expertise and wisdom clearly and, yes, poetically. At least to this old lady.
⁴ Horizontal Gene Transfer (HGT) is actually taking place sometimes.
A very recent study has gathered evidence that Mavericks are a means of transportation for HGT:
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.ade0705
This could indeed open the door for a whole new way of communication via the DNA language…
Richard, please let me know when your new book will be available intravenously, so I can save myself the effort of reading it! ;)
Children have mothers, too. Like Christianity with its trinity of three godheads, all male (spiritus in Latin is male), women have no place here. Dawkins erases us just as much as religions do.
So the genetics records when a being was living, the organism reflecting environment to change, and chooses to pass to the next generation from embryonic development.
Choice has no part of this.
You once wrote: “In its evolutionary role the gene inhabits eternity, or at least geological time. Its companions in the river of evolutionary time are other genes, and the fact that in any one generation they inhabit individual bodies can almost be forgotten.”
What you say about genes is also true of the sequences of language. As individuals, you and I have learned to listen, to speak, to read, and to write, but the systems of linguistic sequences we have mastered were here before we were born and will be here after we die. In the river of time, the fact that these sequences have inhabited our individual bodies can almost be forgotten.
As linguist Nikolaus Ritt says, “there is a sense in which languages are insensitive to the existence of their users as conscious beings.”
Richard, I would love to hear how you see language fidelity evolving via generative AI. Are we getting close to the language fidelity of DNA today, or are there still chasms to cross? I note that not only is the information likely to be passed down, but LLMs and the like may now make that information vastly more useful than it was before.
It’s all chatGPT all the time. Here’s what interesting happens when entering your prologue into chatGPT. https://chat.openai.com/share/eac34bb2-ffcc-4191-96b5-56a5dc90ec00
I hope that you will excuse my usurpation of your coinage, Dr. Dawkins. I think that I understand the intent. I consider the whole of our species's creations, our extended phenotype, to include all the memes, worthy of study.
Richard, you and I are about the same age and you are still my mentor. I am an historian and have enjoyed learning from you through your publications. I am eagerly awaiting this new book.
Thanks for the link. Fascinating. Yes, it is a "hot topic". I understand RD has had some discussions about it with Denis Noble, who thinks "Lamarck is back". There may be some videos on You Tube of them. Admittedly, I'm not convinced, but I certainly do have some questions, for example, on behaviours, presumed to be learned, but for which there seems to be no evidence of exposure to explain mimicry.
The classic example is the Dutch “Hunger Winter”. When the Germans retreated from the Netherlands, they took every possible foodstuff with them. The Dutch starved during the winter. The children gestated during this time have very different metabolisms - in particular, they hang on to calories more than the norm and therefore, in our times of plenty, tend to obesity and other diseases. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_famine_of_1944–1945
Thanks.
True decolinisation is colectomy, ie removal of the colon.
Languages are living things in that they change over time. Nothing you can do or say will change that fact.
Trump, MAGA, the republican party continues its mass corruption of our language. Now we have AI, and texts everywhere on our phones and TV. Our common language is under siege. I studied Linguistics and agree languages change over time, but the lies, conspiracies, disinformation, and mal-information coming from republican mouthes are totalitarian in intent and confuse, dissemble, and deform our language.