The Math Gene (Devlin)

     Keith Devlin The Math Gene. (2000) An attempt to explain how humans are capable of mathematics. After reviewing brain functions and brain evolution, Devlin spends some time on language and the evolution of language. Finally, he hypothesises that gossip is the source of mathematical thinking. Why? Because gossip is about relationships and relationships between relationships, ie, about patterns. By exaptation, the human brain becomes capable of abstracting these patterns and investigating them (telling stories about them.) Devlin’s theory is plausible, and may be correct.
      I do quarrel with him about the idea that syntax is an either-or property of language. Protolanguage has a rudimentary syntax. Two word sentences have patterns like object-action, or property-object, or their inverses. This is true both of human infants’ protolanguage and of the protolanguage of apes who have been trained to use symbols or signing. It seems to me that a creature that can produce true language syntax for some utterances will be able to reason about its environment more complexly. It’s not necessary for all utterances to be syntactically complete. They aren’t when children make the transition to syntax: it’s not a one-day-to-the-next phenomenon. And, as I believe Bickerton and others have pointed out, pidgin utterances are often syntactically incomplete. It is the creation of a syntactically complete language by the children of pidgin speakers, based on their parents’ pidgins, that so impressed Bickerton, after all.
     An interesting book. *** (2001)