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On externalization and cognitive continuity in language evolution
Author(s) -
Fitch W. Tecumseh
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
mind and language
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.905
H-Index - 68
eISSN - 1468-0017
pISSN - 0268-1064
DOI - 10.1111/mila.12162
Subject(s) - externalization , cognitive science , cognition , focus (optics) , scholarship , dichotomy , psychology , dismissal , epistemology , linguistics , cognitive psychology , philosophy , social psychology , neuroscience , physics , political science , law , optics
In this commentary on Berwick and Chomsky's “Why Only Us,” I discuss three key points. I first offer a brief critique of their scholarship, notably their often unjustified dismissal of previous thinking about language evolution. But my main focus concerns two arguments central to the book's thesis: the irrelevance of externalization to language evolution and the discontinuity between human conceptual representations and those of other animals. I argue against both stances, using cognitive data from nonhuman species to show that externalization is not irrelevant to understanding the biology of language, and that many human conceptual structures have clear animal homologs.