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Why do Human Beings Speak so Many Languages?

posted by martyb on Tuesday July 18 2017, @12:19AM   Printer-friendly
from the Not-Enough-Babel-Fish dept.

AnonTechie writes:

People don't speak one universal language, or even a handful. Instead, today our species collectively speaks over 7,000 distinct languages.

And these languages are not spread randomly across the planet. For example, far more languages are found in tropical regions than in the temperate zones. The tropical island of New Guinea is home to over 900 languages. Russia, 20 times larger, has 105 indigenous languages. Even within the tropics, language diversity varies widely. For example, the 250,000 people who live on Vanuatu's 80 islands speak 110 different languages, but in Bangladesh, a population 600 times greater speaks only 41 languages.

Why is it that humans speak so many languages? And why are they so unevenly spread across the planet? As it turns out, we have few clear answers to these fundamental questions about how humanity communicates.

[...] Language diversity has played a key role in shaping the interactions of human groups and the history of our species, and yet we know surprisingly little about the factors shaping this diversity. We hope other scientists will become as fascinated by the geography of language diversity as our research group is and join us in the search for understanding why humans speak so many languages.

https://theconversation.com/why-do-human-beings-speak-so-many-languages-75434

Would you people care to speculate as to why there are so many languages ?

Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday July 18 2017, @01:37PM (7 children)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 18 2017, @01:37PM (#540933) Journal
    I went ahead at looked at the "books" link. Sounds good right?

    The Noam Chomsky Collection

    Haymarket Books is proud to present the Noam Chomsky Collection. The collection includes some of Chomsky’s most important writings, including:

    Rogue States
    The Washington Connection and Third World Fascism
    On Power and Ideology
    After the Cataclysm
    The Fateful Triangle
    Year 501
    Turning the Tide
    Pirates and Emperors, Old and New
    Propaganda and the Public Mind
    Rethinking Camelot
    Culture of Terrorism
    Powers and Prospects

    I see a whole lot of nothing about linguistics. I get like anyone who knows a little about Chomsky that he has done some research into human linguistics. But linking to his completely irrelevant political scribblings is not "asking someone who has studied it".

    just sayin'

  • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 18 2017, @02:14PM (6 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 18 2017, @02:14PM (#540945)

    "Chomsky that he has done some research into human linguistics"

    Jesus, is that an understatement.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 18 2017, @03:39PM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 18 2017, @03:39PM (#540981)

      His point was that none of the 12 books listed were about linguistics, Mr. Reading Comprehension. The list count of the books is higher than your IQ.

    • (Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday July 18 2017, @09:30PM (3 children)

      by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 18 2017, @09:30PM (#541172) Journal

      "Chomsky that he has done some research into human linguistics"

      Jesus, is that an understatement.

      Not at all. Just because he has political opinions you happen to like, doesn't make his linguistics research unusually remarkable.

      • (Score: 3, Insightful) by aristarchus on Tuesday July 18 2017, @11:56PM (2 children)

        by aristarchus (2645) on Tuesday July 18 2017, @11:56PM (#541236) Journal

        Khallow, you are doing it again.

        Just because he has political opinions you happen to like, doesn't make his linguistics research unusually remarkable.

        And just because Chomsky has political opinions that khallow doesn't like, . . . wait a minute, that might means that Chomsky is a remarkable linguistics researcher! But it does definitely means that khallow has no idea whom Chomsky is, other than a bête noire of the alt-wrong. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_structure [wikipedia.org]

        • (Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday July 19 2017, @12:02AM (1 child)

          by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday July 19 2017, @12:02AM (#541238) Journal
          You do realize that the original post was probably just ad spam for the Chomsky website, right?

          • (Score: 3, Funny) by aristarchus on Wednesday July 19 2017, @12:21AM

            by aristarchus (2645) on Wednesday July 19 2017, @12:21AM (#541251) Journal

            No, I do not realize this. Do you imagine that you do? Calm down, khallow, or I will say "Hillary" to you multiple times!