On 24 Apr 2014, at 12:26, Richard Ruquist wrote:
Microbes provide insights into evolution of human language
April 23rd, 2014 in Biology / Cell & Microbiology
Gram-stained Pseudomonas aeruginosa bacteria (pink-red rods).
Credit: GFDL, CC-by-sa
Big brains do not explain why only humans use sophisticated
language, according to researchers who have discovered that even a
species of pond life communicates by similar methods.
Dr Thom Scott-Phillips of Durham University led research into
Pseudomonas aeruginosa, a type of bacteria common in water and soil,
which showed that they communicated in a way that was previously
thought to be unique to humans and perhaps some other primates.
The bacteria used combinatorial communication, in which two signals
are used together to achieve an effect that is different to the sum
of the effects of the component parts. This is common in human
language. For example, when we hear 'boathouse', we do not think of
boats and houses independently, but of something different - a
boathouse.
This type of communication had never been observed in species other
than humans and some other primates, until colonies of Pseudomonas
aeruginosa were shown to be using the same technique - not, of
course, with spoken words but with chemical messengers sent to each
other that signalled when to produce certain proteins necessary for
the bacteria's survival.
By blocking one signal, then the other, the researchers showed if
both signals were sent separately, the effect on protein production
was different from both signals being sent together.
Dr Scott-Phillips, a research fellow in evolutionary anthropology at
Durham University, conducted the research in collaboration with a
team of experts in bacteriology from the universities of Nottingham
and Edinburgh.
He commented: "We conducted an experiment on bacterial
communication, and found that they communicate in a way that was
previously thought to be unique to humans and perhaps some other
primates.
"This has serious implications for our understanding of the origins
of human communication and language. In particular, it shows that we
can assume that combining signals together is unique to the primate
lineage."
More information: 'Combinatorial communication in bacteria:
Implications for the origins of linguistic generativity', Scott-
Phillips et al, published in PLOS One, 23 April 2014. www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0095929
Provided by Durham University
"Microbes provide insights into evolution of human language." April
23rd, 2014. http://phys.org/news/2014-04-microbes-insights-evolution-human-language.html
The contrary would have astonished me a lot, but it is nice this is
confirmed and studied (I was sure it was). Comparison with language
might be slightly stretched as there is no symbolic role in the
messages, but may be it can make sense (I am not sure, I will read the
paper ... but that does not seem really in his topics). I have few
doubts that our own cells communicate in very sophisticate chemical
ways, and there are evidences that plants does communicate through
their roots, may be even through bacteria. (But no proof of such
explicit double "words" nuancing, although again, its non existence
would be astonishing). I would have bet this was already discovered on
Escherichia Coli, but not in that apparently explicit way.
Hmm... I'm not sure that they verified enough that the two compounds
don't react to get a third molecule, which would trivialize the
discovery.
So interesting, but has to be continued and confirmed, ...
Bruno
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