【TED】是一个会议的名称，它是英文technology,entertainment, design三个单词的首字母缩写。它是社会各界精英交流的盛会，这里有当代最杰出的思想家，这里有当代最优秀的科学家，这里有迸发着最闪耀的思想火花，这里孕育着最光辉的梦想。

Mark Pagel
Using biological evolution as a template, Mark Pagel wonders how languages evolve.



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Hints：
fuss
trait
chimpanzees
termites
shovel
crack
psychologists
anthropologists
Now all this fuss about a single one of our traits tells us there's something worth explaining. And that is how and why did this remarkable trait evolve, and why did it evolve only in our species? Now it's a little bit of a surprise that to get an answer to that question, we have to go to tool use in the chimpanzees. Now these chimpanzees are using tools, and we take that as a sign of their intelligence. But if they really were intelligent, why would they use a stick to extract termites from the ground rather than a shovel? And if they really were intelligent, why would they crack open nuts with a rock? Why wouldn't they just go to a shop and buy a bag of nuts that somebody else had already cracked open for them? Why not? I mean, that's what we do. Now the reason the chimpanzees don't do that is that they lack what psychologists and anthropologists call social learning. They seem to lack the ability to learn from others by copying or imitating or simply watching. As a result, they can't improve on others' ideas or learn from others' mistakes -- benefit from others' wisdom. And so they just do the same thing over and over and over again. In fact, we could go away for a million years and come back and these chimpanzees would be doing the same thing with the same sticks for the termites and the same rocks to crack open the nuts.
我们刚刚这番关于语言这一特性的长篇大论，无非是要说有些东西值得去解释。那就是：语言这一奇妙特性是如何演变的及其原因，以及为什么只在人类中演变？为获得以上问题的答案，先要做点意料外的工作。我们必须先研究黑猩猩使用工具的能力。这些黑猩猩正在利用工具。这被认为是它们智力的一个表现。但是如果它们真的聪明的话，为什么它们要用根棍子把白蚁从地面里取出，而不是用铲子挖呢？如果它们真的聪明，为什么自己要用石头砸开坚果呢？为什么它们不去商店买上一袋坚果？在那里已经有砸好的坚果为它们准备好了。为什么呢？因为那些是人类才能做的。 黑猩猩不那么做的原因是：它们缺乏心理学家和人类学家所谓的社会学习能力。它们似乎缺乏通过照搬、模仿或者仅仅观察而向别人学习的能力。理所当然，它们无法改进他人的想法，或者从别人错误中吸取教训，汲取别人的智慧。所以它们只是单纯做同一件事，重复一遍又一遍。事实上，如果我们能跨越一百万年，然后再追溯回来，这些黑猩猩肯定还在做着同样的事，用同样的棍子抓着白蚁，用同样的石头砸着坚果。