Evolutionary pre-adaptations to human speech

What is it about?

Human language is a unique phenomenon, but its evolutionary origins are still uncertain. Here we explore some of the pre-adaptations that might have contributed to how human speech arose. Our comparative approach assumes that all features of a species are functional, and that these features can be compared with those of other animals, and are correlated with certain lifestyles. In this way, we attempt to reconstruct the different evolutionary pathways of humans & chimpanzees after they split from a common ancestor (6 or 5 mill.yrs ago?). Comparative studies as well as fossil data strongly suggest: early-Pleistocene human ancestors were coastal omnivores that regularly fed on easy-to-catch invertebrates, e.g. shellfish from beaches (e.g. Mojokerto H.erectus, Java, early-Pleistocene). This paper presents comparative data suggesting the various human speech skills may have had their origins at different times, and originally had different functions, e.g. possible preadaptations to speech include: - musical & duetting skills, already present in a variety of primate spp (loud sound production & imitation), - airway closure & voluntary breath-hold diving for collecting seafood (voluntary breathing control), - suction-feeding adaptations for the consumption of fruit juice or certain seafoods (fine control of oro-pharyngeal movements: lips, tongue & throat). The different evolutionary pathways of chimpanzees & humans might explain why chimpanzees lack language skills, and why human language is a relatively recent phenomenon (Pleistocene?).

Featured Image

Photo by Nhia Moua on Unsplash

Photo by Nhia Moua on Unsplash

Why is it important?

Reconsidering human evolution in the light of Homo's Plio-Pleistocene coastal disersals greatly improves our insight in how human speech evolved.

Perspectives