The Origins of Meaning
The Origins of Meaning
(Vol.1 of Language in the Light of Evolution)
James R Hurford,
Language Evolution and Computation
Research Unit,
Linguistics Department, University of Edinburgh
Published by Oxford University Press in August, 2007.
Interview with Chris Cummins about The Origins of
Meaning on
the New Books in Language website.
See Reviews of The Origins of Meaning
here:
PDF of dust jacket
PREFACE
Part 1: MEANING BEFORE COMMUNICATION
- CHAPTER 1 Let's agree on terms
- 1.1 Defining semantics with evolution in mind
- 1.2 Health warning about `concepts'
- 1.3 A scale from no-brainers to cognitive concepts
- CHAPTER 2 Animals approach human cognition
- 2.1 Induction, generalization and abstraction
- 2.2 Freewill, or at least some metacognition
- 2.3 Object permanence and displaced reference
- 2.4 Biological motion and animacy
- 2.5 Structured conceptual content and transitive inference
- 2.6 Semantic memory, a store of nonlinguistic knowledge
- 2.7 Sensory-motor declarative-imperative co-involvement in concepts
- CHAPTER 3 A new kind of memory evolves
- 3.1 Episodic memory in animals: knowledge of past and future
- 3.2 Episodic memory and Kantian analytic/synthetic
- CHAPTER 4 Animals form proto-propositions
- 4.1 The magical number 4 -- how big is a simple thought?
- 4.2 Predicate-argument structure in animal brains
- 4.3 Local and global attention to objects and scenes
- 4.4 Animal truth, reference and sense
- CHAPTER 5 Toward human semantics
- 5.1 A parsimonious Begriffsschrift for proto-propositions
- 5.2 Getting rid of individual constants
- 5.2.1 The principled unknowability of uniqueness
- 5.2.2 No clinching psychological evidence
- 5.2.3 Philosophers split both ways
- 5.3 Getting rid of ordered arguments and role-markers
- 5.4 One-place predicates over scenes and objects
- 5.5 Armchair ontology of objects, events and scenes
PART 2: COMMUNICATION: WHAT AND WHY?
- CHAPTER 6 Communication by dyadic acts
- 6.1 Roughly and readily defining `communication'
- 6.2 Pragmatic origins
- 6.3 Things animals do to each other
- 6.4 Getting the right environmental conditions
- 6.4.1 The physical environment and the communication medium
- 6.4.2 Social conditions
- 6.4.3 Birth and ontogeny
- 6.5 From innate to learned
- CHAPTER 7 Going triadic: precursors of reference
- 7.1 Early manipulation of attention
- 7.2 Indexical/deictic pointing
- 7.2.1 Begging and pointing in animals
- 7.2.2 Human pointing and linguistic deixis
- 7.3 Standardized alarm and food calls
- 7.4 Beyond innate symbols and learned deixis
- CHAPTER 8 Why communicate? Squaring with evolutionary theory
- 8.1 Bridges, bullets, monsters and niches
- 8.2 Evolutionary theories of altruism and cooperation
- 8.2.1 Cooperation in language
- 8.2.2 Kin selection and inclusive fitness
- 8.2.3 Reciprocal altruism -- tit-for-tat
- 8.3 Evolutionary theories of selfish communication
- 8.3.1 Communication for display of form
- 8.3.2 Communication for impressively relevant content
8.4 (Cultural) group selection
- CHAPTER 9 Cooperation, fair play and trust in primates
- 9.1 Mind-reading, a prerequisite for intentional cooperation
- 9.2 Cooperation
- 9.3 Fair play
- 9.4 Trust(-worthiness), groups, faces and a hormone
- 9.5 Wrapping up
- CHAPTER 10 Epilogue and prologue