There's a concept in evolutionary biology that a population genome will change over time due to stochastic processes, but certain loci will change more or less than this neutral background rate, and you can infer something about these loci from that variance.
The loci that differ rapidly can sometimes be inferred to be under selection, and the loci that are more conserved can sometimes be inferred to be important for regulatory or developmental processes.
If memes are cultural units analogous to genes, is language analogous to a population genome? Words are loci, sentences are alleles, and speech and writing are how the genome reproduces and persists through time.
Can we make similar inferences from observations of language use?
Can we make similar inferences from observations of language use?
Language use will naturally change over time due to stochastic processes, but certain changes concerning the use or meaning of a word or concept might change more or less over time when compared to this neutral background rate.
Are there words or concepts that have remained unduly stable over time, and are these more important to the structure of our language and culture than they might appear on the surface?
Are the words and concepts that change the most rapidly currently under some sort of cultural selection? Is this quantifiable?
Is political polarization causing restricted meme flow between sympatric cultural/language populations? Are we witnessing a cultural speciation event?
Is political polarization causing restricted meme flow between sympatric cultural/language populations? Are we witnessing a cultural speciation event?
Kojumbo
genius
genius
Cognates are like homologous genes, and loanwords are essentially horizontal gene transfer. Grammar is the chromosomal structure and specific regulatory apparatus.
Can we go the other way? Is there a language analogue to transposons? Maybe something like expletives.
I feel like I'm onto something here. This is what happens when I decide to tweet at 4am instead of sleeping.
I feel like I'm onto something here. This is what happens when I decide to tweet at 4am instead of sleeping.
If languages are more like population genomes than individuals, then competition between languages would be more a question of ecological niche space and species selection rather than the stricter evolution (natural selection, allele frequency) happening within the population.
I guess that I've known about evolutionary linguistics for a while, but I never really put much thought into how certain concepts from evolution and population genetics might map so clearly onto language features.
Meme flow, indeed.
Meme flow, indeed.
I've been thinking about this all day and it's actually been really distracting. I couldn't concentrate during my evolution lecture on population genetics.
