Murray Gell-Mann: Do all languages have a common ancestor?

Translator: Elliott Goodman Reviewer: Tanja Daub

Well, I'm involved in other things, besides physics.

Cetera praeter res physicam mihi placent.

In fact, mostly now in other things.

pleraque nunc cetera.

One thing is distant relationships among human languages.

Inter linguas cognatio est una ex his.

And the professional, historical linguists in the U.S.

Ac docti linguistae historiales Civitatibus Foederatis

and in Western Europe mostly try to stay away

Europaeique plerumque vitant

from any long-distance relationships, big groupings,

cognationes diffusas familiasque magnas

groupings that go back a long time,

familias cascas,

longer than the familiar families.

cascior quam familias suetas.

They don't like that. They think it's crank. I don't think it's crank.

Monstrosas arbitrantur. Immo ego haud monstrosas arbitror.

And there are some brilliant linguists, mostly Russians,

Perdocti linguistae, fere Russi,

who are working on that, at Santa Fe Institute and in Moscow,

id petunt in instituto Sanctae Fidei et Moscua,

and I would love to see where that leads.

et consummationem videre me iuvet.

Does it really lead to a single ancestor

Accedetne ad matrem solam

some 20, 25,000 years ago?

XX aut XXV milium abhinc annos?

And what if we go back beyond that single ancestor,

Si etiam matrem solam excedemus,

when there was presumably a competition among many languages?

dum fortasse multae linguae se certent?

How far back does that go? How far back does modern language go?

Quo usque tandem continuat? Quo tempore lingua moderna continuat?

How many tens of thousands of years does it go back?

Quot milium annorum continuat?

Chris Anderson: Do you have a hunch or a hope for what the answer to that is?

Chris Anderson: Coniecturamne aut spes responsi habes?

Murray Gell-Mann: Well, I would guess that modern language must be older

Orator: Ut mihi videtur, lingua moderna vetustior

than the cave paintings and cave engravings and cave sculptures

quam picturae inscriptaque simulacrique in speluncis

and dance steps in the soft clay in the caves in Western Europe,

et vestigia saltatione in creta in spelunca Europae Occidentalis

in the Aurignacian Period some 35,000 years ago, or earlier.

aetate Aurignacia XXXV millium abhinc annos, fortasse antehac.

I can't believe they did all those things and didn't also have a modern language.

Homines omnia fecisse sed lingua moderna caruisse non credo.

So, I would guess that the actual origin goes back at least that far and maybe further.

Ergo mater vera saltim huc continuat et fortasse latior.

But that doesn't mean that all, or many, or most

Immo non sequitur id quod omnes, aut multae aut plurimae,

of today's attested languages couldn't descend perhaps

linguarum modernarum venire

from one that's much younger than that, like say 20,000 years,

propriore quae XX millium abhinc annos nata est possunt.

or something of that kind. It's what we call a bottleneck.

Angustiae appellantur.

CA: Well, Philip Anderson may have been right.

CA: Philippus Anderson recte fortasse dixit.

You may just know more about everything than anyone.

Plura conctorum quam cuncti tu scias.

So, it's been an honor. Thank you Murray Gell-Mann.

Honor apud nos. Murraius Gell-Mann, gratias tibi.

(Applause)

(plausus)