Re: Philosophy of Science/ID

Steve Clark (ssclark@facstaff.wisc.edu)
Mon, 22 Jan 1996 19:19:50 -0600

Steve JOnes writes:
>Oller & Omdahl point out that human syntactic language capacity is
>encoded in our DNA:
>
>"Moreover, the problem of
>biogenesis and the origin of the human language capacity are linked at their
>basis by more than just a remarkable analogy. It turns out that the human
>genome must include the essential characteristics of the entire conceptual
>system that we find manifested in the great variety of languages and their
>uses, but within rather narrow limits, by human beings throughout the world.
>Apparently human beings, and only humans, are specially designed to
>acquire just the range of language systems that we see manifested in the
>world's five thousand-plus languages.

This is not a surprising revelation. Very specific neurological regions of
the brain control speech. They are so specific that some neurological
traumas leave the patient unable to speak, yet they can still sing! Given
this neurological basis for speech, why is it surprising that there is also
a genetic basis for the capability?

>What I wonder about, is there a "High Noon" approaching for the
>atheists, in the shape of the Human Genome Project? If human language
>has been "hard-wired" into our DNA, when the entire genome has been
>unravelled, will scientists find there in the section specifying human
>language, such an improbable degree of design that it be analogous to
>a message saying "GOD WAS HERE!"?

What they will likely find are genes that regulate the development of
neurolgical connections that have pleitropic effects on brain function.
There will not likely be a genetic "section specifying human language".

Steve
__________________________________________________________________________
Steven S. Clark, Ph.D. Phone: (608) 263-9137
Associate Professor FAX: (608) 263-4226
Dept. of Human Oncology and email: ssclark@facstaff.wisc.edu
UW Comprehensive Cancer Ctr
University of Wisconsin
Madison, WI 53792

"It is the glory of God to conceal a matter, but the glory of kings
to search out a matter." Proverbs
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