From Doing our Own Thing, by John McWhorter:
Language is exactly like singing and dancing. Printing and the spread of literacy happen to have created a First World in which the written version of language infuses our very souls, in a way that musical transcription only does for a few, and dance transcription for even fewer. But properly speaking, that is a historical accident. The capacity for language that we are, most likely, genetically specified for is an oral one. Just as we have no genetic endowment for driving, although many of us do it daily, we have no genetic endowment for reading (which in fact damages our eyes) or writing (which is hard on the hands and, on keyboards, now gives millions carpal-tunnel problems).In fact, most of the 6,000 languages in the world remain, for all intents and purposes, exclusively oral in their usage. Of course by now most of them have been transcribed onto paper in some way--brief word lists in some cases, longer word lists and short grammatical descriptions in many others. For hundreds of languages there are these plus, say, Bible translations and some transcriptions of folktales. But even in these cases, the very sight of the language on the printed page is something of a novelty for its speakers, commonly evoking a certain marvel and gratitude. For them, the language remains fundamentally oral, used causally at home or with friends. They rarely read it, especially since there is so little to be read--no newspapers, magazines, or novels. How deeply can a word list permeate daily life? Few of even us speakers of written languages are given to curling up with a dictionary and a cup of hot cocoa on a blustery night. Speakers of oral languages commonly use one of the world's "big" languages for reading and writing.
But these "Berlitz" languages are very much the exception among the 6,000 Only about two hundred languages are regularly taught in writing to children, and only about half of them are represented by piles of works on a wide range of subjects to the extent that we could say that they have a literature. For most of the languages in the world, if you learn it, it'd better be in order to talk to its speakers, a lot--because there's barely anything to read. Language is talked. If it's written, that's just an accident.
Is it really true that we've no genetic facility for reading? How come some kids learn to read so much faster than others, then?
Anyway, the book is fascinating so far. Highly recommended.
I'm not entirely sure how facility for reading would in itself be genetic. Although I think there could be a genetic ability for understanding and interpreting visual patterns or sequences. Maybe in prehistoric times dyslexics were the ones who got confused by sand-drawings or directions that involved star positions.
Written literacy has been common for less than one hundred years, and that only in the wealthiest societies. Half of humanity is still essentially illiterate. Less three hundred years ago, literacy was a specialized occupational skill. Worse, it was an occupational skill of monastic celibates. Of course there's no genetic component! How fast do you imagine evolution works, anyway!?!
Symbolic manipulation aptitude might have been evolutionarily important long enough to have been subject to natural selection, but even that's iffy.
Note: If, as extremely recent research indicates, human evolution has been directed via artificial selection rather than natural selection for the last 10K years, then it is much more plausible for symbolic manipulation aptitude to have a genetic component. Literacy, no.
An excerpt from Why Our Children Can't Read (McGuinness) that maybe be enlightening.
"Is it really true that we've no genetic facility for reading? How come some kids learn to read so much faster than others, then?"
You're conflating the idea of a genetic facility with that of an adaptation.
Reading ability is determined by a number of factors, some of which are certainly heritable. This is very different from saying that we are adapted to read. Reading is a cooptation of facilities evolved to do other sorts of stuff.
"How come some kids learn to read so much faster than others, then?"
Maybe some kids are just smarter than others.
"Language is exactly like singing and dancing." Is "exactly" the new "literally"?
"Is it really true that we've no genetic facility for reading? How come some kids learn to read so much faster than others, then?"
This is backwards. If humans have a genetic facility for a skill, everybody learns it (or is born with it). To a first approximation, everybody can recognize a face (i.e. distinguish faces from non-faces); humans are born with that skill. Everybody learns to see. Everybody learns to walk and talk.
In contrast, people have to be taught to read and write. Even with teaching, many people don't learn, or don't learn well.
The hardware that makes up a computer has intrinsic facility for playing a computer game. However, once the appropriate software is loaded, some computers outperform others.
Like that.
Just how does reading damage our eyes? Eyes "see" all the time that we are awake. What difference will the reading make?
"Language is talked. If it's written, that's just an accident."
Writer McWhortle seems to be accident prone:
"althoguh many of us do it daily...languages in teh world remain,...used causally at home or with friends."
Three misspellings or wrong words in a short essay and so far no commenters, to say nothing of the author, have mentioned them.
Twiss Butler
But let me rush to mention before someone else does that the writer's name is McWhorter, not McWhortle as I wrote it.
Many of the previous commenters have the right answer, according to the current opinion of researchers studying reading. The belief is that reading ability is a actually a bunch of more basic skills, including word recognition (at which dyslexics are bad), drawing correct inferences, understanding thematic relationships, and a whole list of other things.
So it’s not right, in principle, to call reading (or any complex behavior like it) innate, even if the complex behavior is strongly influenced by genetics. That's like calling "being a good basketball player" or "being a good economist" innate. Instead, the right way to think about it is that one's skill at converting visual patterns (which researchers call orthographic codes) to sound patterns (called phonological codes) might be genetically influenced. This genetic influence can make some better than others at this skill, and therefore at reading.
There is an innateness debate (of sorts) in the scientific literature on reading. The innate side argues that skill at converting visual patterns to sound patterns is governed by adaptations that are language specific (e.g. evolved for language use and are now being deployed when we read). The non-innate side argues that reading skill is not necessarily tied to language specific adaptations; instead reading skill is attributable to general learning mechanisms (like the ability to form complex webs of associations across two domains like visual information and auditory information).
I am a bit biased, but my opinion of the literature on this issue is that the non-innate side is better supported by the data. Plus, the innate side is only possible if language can be defined in terms of specific behaviors whose actual genetic cause can be identified. As of now, language is no more specific or genetically causable than "basketball playing."
""Language is talked. If it's written, that's just an accident."
Writer McWhortle seems to be accident prone:
"althoguh many of us do it daily...languages in teh world remain,...used causally at home or with friends."
Three misspellings or wrong words in a short essay and so far no commenters, to say nothing of the author, have mentioned them.
Twiss Butler
Posted by Twiss Butler | December 27, 2007 11:16 PM
Twiss,
Seriously, Thank You. If this, the quoted piece in the post, is the caliber of input that MM subjects herself to, it would explain much.
When I think of things we are genetically programmed for, I usually compare our abilities to a computer's. If it's something we can do better than a computer (e.g. recognizing objects in photos or live action, recognizing spoken words or sounds, speaking), then it's probably got a genetically programmed component. If it's something a computer can do better than us (e.g. math, reading (i.e. scanning a text document and associating words with their sounds or definitions)) then it's probably something that's not genetic, which is why we have to do it out long hand.
Why I think this is legit is that computers don't have a "recognize object" command. They have simple low-level functions like "add" and "compare". To recognize an object you need to code the operation using the low-level commands. This makes it both difficult and slow. But for a computer, doing math is native (it has an "add" command, etc.) so it's extremely fast. Similarly, reading is just textual comparisons, which a computer can do natively.
With humans, some things don't need to be taught procedurally. No one teaches you how to recognize objects that are in front of you. They say "ball" enough times when one goes in front of you and you figure out it's a ball. But with math or reading, there are all kinds of specialized teaching methods and procedures you need to follow (how many people can multiply 1234 x 589 without doing it out long-hand?). I think ultimately, reading falls under object recognition for familiar words, but when you hit a word you don't know, you need to sound it out, again following a procedure.
Is it really true that we've no genetic facility for reading? How come some kids learn to read so much faster than others, then?
Epicururs (300 years Before Circumcision of Christ) via De Rerum Natura:
As other commenters have already jumped in: Hands have not evolved for painting or typing and brains have not evolved for reading.
It has taken science 2000 years to figure out what Epicurus was on about? Many still do not know and understand? How should they - in Florida there is no evolution teachings but creationism on the menu. When you "create" something, like a gun, you have utility and purpose in mind. When you evolve something - there is no purpose. Plan economics vs free markets.
Puppy = sweet friend
Chicken = tasty food
Weeds = no purpose/utility
Believing in creationism and a master-plan has hence rather important implications on our value judgments and hence actions and behavior. However - all gods, also the human ones, have warned us that the Tree of Knowledge is not for us.
You're conflating the idea of a genetic facility with that of an adaptation. Reading ability is determined by a number of factors, some of which are certainly heritable. This is very different from saying that we are adapted to read. Reading is a cooptation of facilities evolved to do other sorts of stuff.
It fascinates to think that we may be seeing a fortunate skill (reading) becoming an innate one, though. If adept readers outbreed those who aren't so adept, or who can't read at all, then 10,000 years from now we may be calling reading innate (if people are still reading then).
That assumes, of course, that adept readers are outbreeding the rest, which given our current welfare state is iffy.
Given that the text quoted by Hugo Pothead is listed by the website he references as being written by an author who lived c.99-c.55 BC, it's rather curious that he claims that it comes from "300 years before the Circumcision of Christ," which would have been about 30 BC (assuming the circumcision was done at or shortly after birth, and ignoring the probable error used in the original calculation of the date of Christ's death, which still wouldn't provide the ~250 years needed to justify Hugo's statement). It's possible he actually meant "crucifixion," or 30 years instead of 300, I suppose.
Sweet Origin,
You have never asked yourself why De Rerum Natura is hosted on an Epicurus web site? Why it is called Epicurian Philosophy Online? Do you know who Lucretius is and who he is quoting. He explains it all himself in his poem.
Here is a hint. I have written:
Epicururs (300 years Before Circumcision of Christ) via De Rerum Natura..
via.. get it?
Or rather - do you know who Epicurus is and why so many, including the catholic church, have attempted to censor and destroy his writings?
Epicurus has lived from 341 BC to 270 BC. It is estimated that he wrote the original Nature of the World during his second half. Therefore ca 300 BC. Whatever you take BC to stand for.
Since we are on the subject of Epicurus.. Too few Americans understand why Thomas Jefferson called himself an Epicurian.
Wikipedia claims that:
Even Karl Marx's doctoral thesis, much like writings of Jefferson, was on "The Difference Between the Democritean and Epicurean Philosophy of Nature."
The truly great are beloved and hated from all sides?
Origen, why not lend Epicurus an ear when it comes to the nature of things?
There probably are significant variations in how easily children learn to read. Nobody really knows why. My guess would be:
Human beings are genetically variable, and these genetic variations lead to nontrivial phenotypic variations.
One phenotypic variation that's relevant to reading skill are the (currently obscure) set of biological traits that manifest as IQ, or "g". Higher IQ/g probably makes it easier for a small child to learn reading spontaneously.
Both genetic and environmental variation could therefore cause variable reading ability among children by causing variations in their basic intelligence. To the degree that environments are both equal and reasonably nuturing, the importance of genetic variation will tend to increase because environmental imputs are being "maxed out". To the degree environments aren't equal, we'll get lots of heated political arguments, but not much real science on deconvoluting what factors are quantitatively affecting what phenotypes.
In any case, the ability to read is a "preadaptation", like the ability of humans to do higher mathematics such as calculus or probability. There was no selective pressure specifically for any of those abilities back in the early days of Homo sapiens; instead, human evolution seems to have yielded these abilities in a supererogatory way.
In principle, another phenotypic variation, beyond general intelligence, might be some specialized module for reading skill arising local adaptation to reading in some human populations. What makes this implausible is not the genetics -- we actually know, now, that microevolution has significantly occured in humans in response to things like the availability of cow's milk as a food source. But the time scale is really not favorable for such adaptation; most of the human race was illiterate until about 400 years or so ago, at best in the most literate nations.
re: reading as genetic.
My sense is this is the belief of my "whole language" friends in Fairfax, VA (where a spelling book cannot be found in the best or worst of schools). Amazing how their test scores track early childhood parental involvement (the unpaid substitute teachers of our time). I wonder how many equivalent business opportunities exist? I'd like to find another business where the parents do my work and yet are happy to pay me (irrespective of their childrens' gains).
See:
http://www.city-journal.org/html/17_1_reading_first.html
Spoken language is genetic. Every society ever known had one. Hardly any of them were literate, that's a technology that someone has to invent. Reading and writing are very ancient technologies that happen to be easy to learn, at least in the form of phonetic alphabets. Memorize the sounds arbitrarily attached to a couple dozen symbols and, voila, you can read. We even know when the phonetic alphabet was invented, about 1600 BC in Phoenicia, modern day Lebanon. [The whole language crowd doesn't understand that it's a technology and persists in believing that literacy is genetic]