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It seems a little more than that even. I mean, I admit I couldn't quite follow all of it, but it seems to be suggesting that chimps can to a degree create reord

It seems a little more than that even. I mean, I admit I couldn't quite follow all of it, but it seems to be suggesting that chimps can to a degree create reorderings of their 'words' to make new meanings, in a sort of proto-syntax. After all, if human language is expressive because our abilities to use syntax and grammar to make complex meaning. Those things had to be built on something that came before.

winnit 4y ago
It's interesting because I've heard that one of the benefits Sanskrit poets had in their ability to introduce complex structural patterns in their poetry, is that the meaning of sentences is largely independent of their word-order - meaning the lines can be reordered to freely introduce rhyming schemes etc. Yet the language has many grammatical elements; gendered word endings and so on.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- vkazanov 4y ago
  This kind of relaxed word order is also typical for modern Baltic and Slavic languages. Words themselves have enough information encoded in word prefixes/suffixes/endings so that it's possible to decode even a randomly mixed up sentence. It will feel awkward, or stylistically wrong, but nevertheless understandable. This might help with poetry but comes at a price: it is superhard to internalise all the numerous word forms. I can't image learning Polish, Lithuanian or Russian being only exposed to English previously!
  - dragandj 4y ago
    It is not superhard. It’s not even hard. Every native speaker learned it easily ;)
  - kazinator 4y ago
    > It will feel awkward, or stylistically wrong. No it won't, because it's understood to be poetic. In English, it's a awkward if an adjective is put after a noun right? But you don't bat an eyelash if it's in a poem. "High upon the chimney stack, there I saw perched three crows black." (Don't search for that, I just made it up.) Moreover, in languages with case, reordering doesn't cause any ambiguities or confusion. You know which word is the subject and which the object in any permutation. (Not necessarily for all words, but most.) The speakers already enjoy considerable reordering freedom in everyday sentences already (non-poetic) where it plays roles in emphasis and such.
    - winnit 4y ago
      I actually disagree with your example. Taken ultra-literally, it could mean that 'I' was 'perched' and 'saw three black crows'. So I feel that 'crows black' was fine and French places adjectives after the word as standard. I have to rely on context to interpret the sentence, and that creates an iota of doubt which makes it read clumsily, or me read it clumsily. I think it's very nuanced and personal.
- Finnucane 4y ago
  Languages that use complex systems of conjugation and declension don't need to rely on word order as much to denote relationships between the words. In normal speaking, subject-verb-object order might still be used, but in writing, there's a lot of flexibility.
- biorach 4y ago
  what your saying is true of most highly-inflected languages
ProjectArcturis 4y ago
Are they words or phonemes?
- Finnucane 4y ago
  Somewhere in between? It seems that individual sounds are perceived by the chimps as meaningful signals, and that the combined bigrams and trigrams have additional meanings. Not sure it can be analogized to human speech more specifically than that.
hosh 4y ago
It's been shown that border collies are able to understand novel reordering to a limited degree. They are supposed to be as smart as five-year olds. And watching my 18-month old son and similar toddlers interact in the world, such reordering is something is learned well before five years old. Compare to parrot and corvids. Birds have evolved a brain more efficient than humans. Crows are able to work with abstractions, and pound-for-pound use less brain matter. And then there's the octopus and other cephelopods.

winnit 4y ago

It's interesting because I've heard that one of the benefits Sanskrit poets had in their ability to introduce complex structural patterns in their poetry, is that the meaning of sentences is largely independent of their word-order - meaning the lines can be reordered to freely introduce rhyming schemes etc. Yet the language has many grammatical elements; gendered word endings and so on.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
vkazanov 4y ago
This kind of relaxed word order is also typical for modern Baltic and Slavic languages. Words themselves have enough information encoded in word prefixes/suffixes/endings so that it's possible to decode even a randomly mixed up sentence. It will feel awkward, or stylistically wrong, but nevertheless understandable. This might help with poetry but comes at a price: it is superhard to internalise all the numerous word forms. I can't image learning Polish, Lithuanian or Russian being only exposed to English previously!
- dragandj 4y ago
  It is not superhard. It’s not even hard. Every native speaker learned it easily ;)
- kazinator 4y ago
  > It will feel awkward, or stylistically wrong. No it won't, because it's understood to be poetic. In English, it's a awkward if an adjective is put after a noun right? But you don't bat an eyelash if it's in a poem. "High upon the chimney stack, there I saw perched three crows black." (Don't search for that, I just made it up.) Moreover, in languages with case, reordering doesn't cause any ambiguities or confusion. You know which word is the subject and which the object in any permutation. (Not necessarily for all words, but most.) The speakers already enjoy considerable reordering freedom in everyday sentences already (non-poetic) where it plays roles in emphasis and such.
  - winnit 4y ago
    I actually disagree with your example. Taken ultra-literally, it could mean that 'I' was 'perched' and 'saw three black crows'. So I feel that 'crows black' was fine and French places adjectives after the word as standard. I have to rely on context to interpret the sentence, and that creates an iota of doubt which makes it read clumsily, or me read it clumsily. I think it's very nuanced and personal.
Finnucane 4y ago
Languages that use complex systems of conjugation and declension don't need to rely on word order as much to denote relationships between the words. In normal speaking, subject-verb-object order might still be used, but in writing, there's a lot of flexibility.
biorach 4y ago
what your saying is true of most highly-inflected languages

ProjectArcturis 4y ago

Are they words or phonemes?

Finnucane 4y ago
Somewhere in between? It seems that individual sounds are perceived by the chimps as meaningful signals, and that the combined bigrams and trigrams have additional meanings. Not sure it can be analogized to human speech more specifically than that.

hosh 4y ago

It's been shown that border collies are able to understand novel reordering to a limited degree. They are supposed to be as smart as five-year olds. And watching my 18-month old son and similar toddlers interact in the world, such reordering is something is learned well before five years old. Compare to parrot and corvids. Birds have evolved a brain more efficient than humans. Crows are able to work with abstractions, and pound-for-pound use less brain matter. And then there's the octopus and other cephelopods.