The Meme Machine

88 THE MEME MACHINE
facial expressions that take on the grammatical functions of word endings, word
orders or inflexion.
This ‘language instinct’ as Steven Pinker (1994) calls it, singles us out
completely from every other species on the planet. As far as we know, no other
species has any kind of grammatically structured language – nor are they
capable of learning it. When psychologists first tried to teach language to
chimpanzees they failed because chimps simply do not have the vocal apparatus
to make the necessary sounds. However, they got on better when they trained
their chimps with methods that exploit their natural manual dexterity. One
chimpanzee, Sarah, has been trained to use a board containing various plastic
shapes that represent familiar objects and actions, while Lana and Kanzi press
buttons on a special keyboard. Most popular, however, has been the use of
signing, building on the fact that chimps have agile hands and make many
gestures in the wild. Among the many animals taught this way have been a
chimpanzee called Washoe and a gorilla called Koko, both of whom were
brought up with humans using American Sign Language.
At first it seemed as though Washoe, Koko and others really could sign.
They were credited with ‘sentences’ three words long, like a child of two years
or so. They even made up new words by putting signs together. But the
excitement and wild claims soon gave way under careful criticism from
psychologists, linguists, and native deaf signers who said that chimp signing was
nothing like the rich and expressive human sign language. Wishful thinking
probably accounts for much of the exaggeration. The consensus now seems to
be that chimps and gorillas can learn single signs or symbols, and use short
sequences of them appropriately – mostly to request things. Yet they do not use
grammar of any kind and remain oblivious to all the subtleties of sentences that
young children seem to take to without effort. Whereas young children just
seem to absorb the words they hear and turn them into language, chimps have to
be coerced, and rewarded to learn just a few paltry signs. Whatever they may be
thinking on the inside (and we should not underestimate that), they just do not
‘get’ the idea of true language. There is no comparison. It is as though the
chimps have to learn the words by the long slow route of ordinary learning –
trial and error, and reward and punishment – whereas we just seem to absorb it.
The human language capacity is unique.
So how did we get this unique ability’? Did it appear all at once in some
gigantic lucky leap of sudden evolution (Bickerton 1990)? Or did it appear
gradually along with our slowly growing brains? And when did language first