Question about before there was language?

Question

This has been bugging me for the longest time. You know how you think in your head with words; like if you speak english then the voice in your head is speaking english, if you speak spanish or whatever it's spanish, well before people had language, like the first people who were capable of concious thought, did they have a voice in their head? How could they if they didn't have a language? Did pictures just run through their minds or something else?

Answer 1

such a good question!!

I have no idea about the "voice" in their head but I think they would probably think of pictures.
We're all still doing it anyway. That's what we do when we read after all?
We don't read the words and understand "house" because it says house, we imagine a house. Sometimes consciously, sometimes sub-consciously..

If someone tells us a story on the phone we don't understand what they're saying because of the words. We understand because we know what the words stand for.
If they said they got a puppy... we immediately start to imagine a picture of a dog, and fill the picture in as we get more details. It's colour etc.

Ever heard about a friend of a friend and when you finally meet them you think oh! you don't look like I expected. :)

Hmm you got me thinking about this whole voice thing though.
If it was a lion or some kind of threat I imagine they would hear the noise. Like a Roar, or a volcano erupting.
If they were thirsty they'd probably hear a bubbling stream or something.
A very animated picture if you will.

I remember roughly how language was developed though.
If they saw a lion for example they would shout imitating the lion's roar to warn others of what was about. They learned that this particular vocal noise equalled danger, run! After all, it's not that hard to understand. Then it got developed to mean that more precisely, this vocal noise stood for "a lion"
They came up with more particulart "grunts" and noises which turned into actual words. By using the same one that helped them understand eachother and live easier .

It just continued to get more developed from the first basic vocal noises we were capable of.

Answer 2

I don't think it's true that "you think in your head with words". The obvious exception is when you wake up and remember a dream that you've just had. Your brain can re-run as much of the dream as it remembers, like a fast-forward video, and you are thinking along with the remembered action, but it's going far too quickly for any words to keep pace with it.

I'll bet that team sports players don't "think in words" in high-speed competitive situations either, they just form a picture in their heads of where they want to be in the next moment or two, then go do it. Early humans could easily have hunted cooperatively by thinking in moving pictures like that.

Answer 3

Language was gradually developped. If there was no language, there would be no voices in their heads. They were more like animals.

Interesting thought ;-)

Answer 4

How about people born deaf? They obviously don't think in spoken words, but they clearly do think just like anyone else. language can help us to think, but it doesn't seem to be necessary. Good question though!

Answer 5

Ask a chimpanzee. Scientists have shown that chimps communicate and can learn language. But obviously they don't talk...

Answer 6

I imagine they would have had conscious thought, but not in the way we percieve it. They would have had their own way of communicating because, after all, language is just how we communicate. From this I imagine they would have their conscious thought.

Answer 7

They are not any laws. You can use it or now not. ex: Il parle bien l'anglais. Il parle bien anglais. Both are proper. l' change "los angeles langue" (=the language). --> Il parle bien los angeles langue anglaise. Which is proper. Your first illustration will also be : Tu parles l'espagnol ? But you need to use sure article while the language is discipline of the verb. --> L'anglais est ....