March 12th 2009

    I admit to ignoring scholarship on the subject of language. I prefer an eccentric understanding of how the first words might have entered consciousness.  

    In this vision the first words uttered cannot be a series of grunts.  Language – the sharing of complex thought - is more than variations on 'ugh'.  Language lies beyond fear or curiosity or encouragement.

    For many years I thought the first word would be an identifying word.  Like elephant, antelope, cat.  Recently I pictured the ancestors in their scattered bands contemplating quality.

    Not quality in the sense of 'supper with the family' – which since the invention of television has always been something of a nightmare – but quality in the sense of one moment following the next.  A fifth dimension in the space-time of consciousness.  Like slow, fast, faster  

    The other day I decided the 'ugh' of "sneaky quick witted cunning bastard" became the word mole.  And around the evening fire we would grunt in understanding. 

    I am one for whom language – the sharing of idea – is the single animal achievement.  Everything else we animals have done is no more than increasingly complicated photosynthesis.

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