Words into Mouths – Fingering the Leap to Language

An NYT feature explores the impetus that gave man the edge to evolve from animal to language (the only characteristic that differentiates us from animals). A debate taking in Chomsky and Pinker asks which came first as a communicated symbol – gesture or word? “Dr Michael Corballis, a psychologist at the University of Auckland, believes the gesture came first, in fact as soon as our ancestors started to walk on two legs and freed the hands for making signs.”