The ape and the first word: Understanding the origins and evolution of the first linguistic structures in the human clade through comparative research

语言定义了人类，但它的进化却无法科学解释。大猿（我们的近亲）大概可以和（大多数）不能用声音做什么（即人类如何主要编码语言）阻碍了进展。这个想法来自于20世纪60年代的历史项目，这些项目未能教会猿类说话。然而，至关重要的是，当时人们对类人猿的自然发声能力、发声倾向、偏好或局限性一无所知。我最近的研究发现，类人猿对发声的控制程度远远超过了迄今为止人们所理解的水平，事实上，它们发出的是类似于元音的发声和类似于辅音的无声发声，而猩猩则进一步将其融合成类似于音节的组合。该项目将使用这些组合作为人类进化支中出现的第一个原始语言结构的活模型。这样一来，我们将能够第一次重建语言中原始元音和原始辅音（套用达尔文的话）的“温暖的小池塘”中聚集的条件，并揭示催化语言起源的力量。我将解决5个主要的理论，技术和技术驱动的目标。(1)辅音的出现引发了语言的进化吗？我们将比较猩猩的辅音-元音样组合与灵长类元音-元音样组合，以确定一旦我们的谱系中出现辅音样呼叫作为生成合成信号的构建块，信号动态和可进化性方面发生了什么变化。(2)学习是如何影响最初的原始语言结构的？使用原始的范式在野生猩猩种群，我们将研究学习如何影响（2.1）使用和移位参考，（2.2）声学和语义内容和（2.3）组织和句法内容的第一个原始字的人类祖先。(3)原音节的产生需要什么水平的发声控制？我们将通过最先进的基于远程视频的心率传感技术来量化唤醒与控制的水平，这实际上涉及猿类的元音和辅音样产生。(4)如何为后代加强、加速和保存对类人猿发声行为的研究？我们将建立第一个全球性的大型猿类声音数据库，在全球范围内免费开放。(5)在类人猿的大脑中进化出了什么样的结构规则，通过将信号串在一起来产生和传递信息和意义？我们将探索哪些主要的计算机算法可以生成与野生类人猿产生的信号串最相似的信号串。总之，这些目标将打开新一代新的关键见解的大门，以解决语言进化的古老问题，并帮助理解为什么在地球35亿年的生命中，语言只在我们的直接祖先血统中进化。

Language defines being human, but its evolution defies scientific explanation. Progress has been hampered by what great apes (our closest relatives) presumably can and (mostly) cannot do vocally (i.e. how humans predominantly encode language). This idea derives from historical projects in the 1960s that failed to teach apes to talk. Critically, however, there was no knowledge then about great apes' natural vocal repertoire, their vocal predispositions, preferences or limitations. My work has recently uncovered that great apes exert control over vocal production to a level far beyond what has been hitherto appreciated, and that they produce, in fact, voiced vowel- and voiceless consonant-like calls, which orangutans further meld into syllable-like combinations. The project will use these combinations as living models for the first proto-linguistic structures to have emerged within the human clade. Doing so, we will be able, for the first time, to reconstruct the conditions gathered in language's "warm little pond" of proto-vowels and -consonants (to paraphrase Darwin) and uncover the forces that catalysed language onset. I will tackle 5 major theory-, technique- and technology-driven objectives. (1) Did the rise of consonants trigger language evolution? We will compare orangutan consonant-vowel-like combinations with primate vowel-vowel-like combinations to identify exactly what changed in terms of signal dynamics and evolvability once consonant-like calls became available within our lineage as building blocks for generating composed signals. (2) How did learning affect the first proto-linguistic structures? Using an original paradigm across wild orangutan populations, we will investigate how learning impacted the (2.1) use and displaced reference, (2.2) acoustics and semantic content and (2.3) organization and syntactic content of the first proto-words of human ancestors. (3) What level of vocal control did proto-syllable production require? We will quantify, via state-of-the-art remote video-based heart rate sensing technology, the level of arousal vs. control that is in fact involved in vowel- and consonant-like production in apes. (4) How can the study of great ape vocal behaviour be enhanced, accelerated and preserved for future generations? We will build the first global database of great ape vocal data with free open-access worldwide.(5) What structural rules evolved in the great ape brain to produce and transmit information and meaning by stringing signals together? We will explore which major computer algorithms can generate signal strings most similar to those produced by great apes in the wild. Together, these objectives will fling open the door to a new generation of new key insights into the age-old question of language evolution and help understand why, in 3.5 billion years of life of Earth, language only evolved in our direct ancestral lineage.