TED2007
Murray Gell-Mann: The ancestor of language
Murray Gell-Mann om sprogets herkomst
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Efter at have talt om fysikkens elegance ved TED2007, giver den fantastiske Murray Gell-Mann os et hurtigt overblik over en anden kær interesse: At finde vores moderne sprogs herkomst.
Murray Gell-Mann - Physicist
Murray Gell-Mann brings visibility to a crucial aspect of our existence that we can't actually see: elemental particles. He won the Nobel Prize in Physics for introducing quarks, one of two fundamental ingredients for all matter in the universe. Full bio
Murray Gell-Mann brings visibility to a crucial aspect of our existence that we can't actually see: elemental particles. He won the Nobel Prize in Physics for introducing quarks, one of two fundamental ingredients for all matter in the universe. Full bio
Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.
00:13
Well, I'm involved in other things, besides physics.
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Jeg involverer mig i andre ting end fysik.
00:17
In fact, mostly now in other things.
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Lige nu mere i andre ting, faktisk.
00:19
One thing is distant relationships among human languages.
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Én ting er fjerne forbindelser mellem menneskesprog.
00:24
And the professional, historical linguists in the U.S.
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Og de professionelle, historiske lingvister i USA
00:28
and in Western Europe mostly try to stay away
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og i Vesteuropa prøver som regel at holde sig væk
00:31
from any long-distance relationships, big groupings,
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fra fjerne forbindelser; store grupperinger,
00:35
groupings that go back a long time,
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grupperinger som går lang tid tilbage,
00:38
longer than the familiar families.
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længere end de velkendte familier.
00:41
They don't like that. They think it's crank. I don't think it's crank.
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Det kan de ikke lide; de synes det er søgt. Jeg synes ikke det er søgt.
00:45
And there are some brilliant linguists, mostly Russians,
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Og der findes nogle dygtige lingvister, mest russere,
00:48
who are working on that, at Santa Fe Institute and in Moscow,
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som arbejder med dette på Santa Fe Intistuttet og i Moskva,
00:52
and I would love to see where that leads.
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og jeg glæder mig til at se, hvad det fører til.
00:56
Does it really lead to a single ancestor
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Fører det virkelig til én enkelt forfar,
00:59
some 20, 25,000 years ago?
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der eksisterede for 20-25.000 år siden?
01:02
And what if we go back beyond that single ancestor,
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Og hvad hvis vi går endnu længere tilbage end den ene forfar,
01:05
when there was presumably a competition among many languages?
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hvor der sandsynligvis har været konkurrence mellem mange sprog?
01:09
How far back does that go? How far back does modern language go?
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Hvor lang tid skal vi så tilbage? Hvor langt går moderne sprog tilbage?
01:13
How many tens of thousands of years does it go back?
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Hvor mange titusinder af år går sproget tilbage?
01:16
Chris Anderson: Do you have a hunch or a hope for what the answer to that is?
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Chris Anderson: Har du en anelse eller forhåbning for, hvad svaret er?
01:19
Murray Gell-Mann: Well, I would guess that modern language must be older
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Murray Gell-Mann: Tja, jeg vil tro at moderne sprog må være ældre
01:22
than the cave paintings and cave engravings and cave sculptures
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end huletegninger, huleindgraveringer og huleskulpturer
01:26
and dance steps in the soft clay in the caves in Western Europe,
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og sporene af dansetrin i den bløde ler i hulerne i Vesteuropa
01:31
in the Aurignacian Period some 35,000 years ago, or earlier.
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fra Aurignacienperioden for cirka 35.000 år siden, eller endnu før.
01:37
I can't believe they did all those things and didn't also have a modern language.
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Jeg kan ikke tro, at de gjorde alle disse ting uden også at have et moderne sprog.
01:40
So, I would guess that the actual origin goes back at least that far and maybe further.
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Så jeg gætter på, at den faktiske oprindelse går mindst så langt tilbage, måske længere.
01:45
But that doesn't mean that all, or many, or most
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Men det betyder ikke at alle, eller mange af, eller de fleste
01:48
of today's attested languages couldn't descend perhaps
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af nutidens talte sprog ikke kan nedstamme
01:52
from one that's much younger than that, like say 20,000 years,
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fra en forfar meget yngre end det, eksempelvis 20.000 år,
01:56
or something of that kind. It's what we call a bottleneck.
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eller noget i den stil. Det er dét, vi kalder en flaskehals.
02:00
CA: Well, Philip Anderson may have been right.
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Chris Anderson: Philip Anderson har nok haft ret.
02:01
You may just know more about everything than anyone.
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Du ved nok mere om alt end nogen andre.
02:04
So, it's been an honor. Thank you Murray Gell-Mann.
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Så det har været en ære. Tak skal du have, Murray Gell-Mann.
02:06
(Applause)
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(Klapsalve)
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Murray Gell-Mann - PhysicistMurray Gell-Mann brings visibility to a crucial aspect of our existence that we can't actually see: elemental particles. He won the Nobel Prize in Physics for introducing quarks, one of two fundamental ingredients for all matter in the universe.
Why you should listen
He's been called "the man with five brains" -- and Murray Gell-Mann has the resume to prove it. In addition to being a Nobel laureate, he is an accomplished physicist who's earned numerous awards, medals and honorary degrees for his work with subatomic particles, including the groundbreaking theory that the nucleus of an atom comprises 100 or so fundamental building blocks called quarks.
Gell-Mann's influence extends well beyond his field: He's a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Council on Foreign Relations. He also serves on the board of the Wildlife Conservation Society and is a director of Encyclopedia Britannica. Gell-Mann, a professor emeritus of Caltech, now heads the evolution of human languages program at the Santa Fe Institute, which he cofounded in 1984.
A prolific writer -- he's penned scores of academic papers and several books, including The Quark and the Jaguar -- Gell-Mann is also the subject of the popular science biography Strange Beauty: Murray Gell-Mann and the Revolution in 20th-Century Physics.
Murray Gell-Mann | Speaker | TED.com