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  • Why only us? Language and evolution by Robert C. Berwick and Noam Chomsky
  • Ljiljana Progovac
Why only us? Language and evolution. By Robert C. Berwick and Noam Chomsky. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2016. Pp. 224. ISBN 9780262034241. $22.95 (Hb).

1. Chomsky’s Knot

It is a good thing that we linguists are discussing language evolution, for without linguists’ input, this important question cannot be properly addressed. Likewise, ‘like other biological phenomena, language cannot be fully understood without reference to its evolution, whether proven or hypothesized’ (Givón 2002:39, emphasis added). In that sense, Berwick and Chomsky’s book is important; being written by scholars of such great stature, it sends a clear message that this topic is both timely and relevant for linguists. While there has been a slight (tacit) shift from some of their previous claims, my conclusion is that B&C’s proposal still keeps them and many other linguists tied in a knot, a knot that prevents them from developing new hypotheses and angles to be explored. This leaves ample room for the alternative approaches to language evolution, the ones that B&C dismiss.

It is encouraging to see that B&C have softened, as least to some extent, their original stance on the emergence of language, as well as the vehemence of their criticism of opposing views. For example, while they do not acknowledge this, B&C have significantly shifted their estimated date of the emergence of language to up to 200,000 years ago (157), from the previous ‘just a bit over 50,000 years ago’ (Chomsky 2005). In this respect, they meet almost half way Dediu and Levinson’s (2013) estimate that language dates back to the common ancestor of humans and Neanderthals, to some 400,000–500,000 years ago (for sharp criticism of Dediu and Levinson’s claims, see e.g. Berwick et al. 2013). Not only that, but B&C no longer claim that Neanderthals did not have language. Instead, B&C now say that it is the ‘$64,000 question whether Neandertals [End Page 992] had language’ (50). This shift comes in the midst of a host of very recent findings in both archeology and genetics that point to a deeper timeline for the emergence of language. Such findings will continue to accrue and surprise us.

In this short review, I can only address a few claims among many made by B&C. I see two main threads streaming into what I call chomsky’s knot (on analogy with B&C’s references to ‘Darwin’s problem’ or ‘Darwin’s troubles’). The first thread is their claim that the only serious way to approach the question of language and its evolution is to adopt the most recent theoretical postulates of Chomsky’s framework minimalism (in particular, the strong minimalist thesis), which reduces syntax to a single optimal operation Merge: ‘UG [universal grammar] must meet the condition of evolvability, and the more complex its character, the greater the burden on some future account’ of its evolution (93). The second thread is the claim that ‘we simply do not have as much to explain’ (11): given how simple syntax must be,1 the evolution of syntax/language amounted to just one single, unremarkable event. In other words, according to B&C, (i) in order for syntax to be evolvable, syntax itself has to be extremely simple, and (ii) given that syntax must be super simple (as per (i)), syntax must have arisen through one single, minor mutation. This proposal is circular and entangled. It has kept many researchers tied in a knot, since this reasoning makes unclear what remains to be learned either about syntax or about the evolution of syntax.

2. Does merge combine concepts? merge, move, perfection, and more

B&C simply assume that there is in fact ‘the optimal situation’, contra appearances (of great complexity), and that ‘UG reduces to the simplest computational principles … This conjecture is sometimes called the Strong Minimalist Thesis (SMT)’ (94). The claim is that the ‘generative process is optimal’, based on ‘efficient computation’ (71), and that ‘this newly emerged computational system for thought … is perfect, in so...

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