Language Evolution in Humans and Ancient Microbes: What can human language acquisition tell us about the origin of genetic information?

Abstract

This paper seeks to encourage dialog on a question with a deceptively simple surface. When we find linguistics and genetics using the same vocabulary to describe their central phenomena, is this because the phenomena are meaningfully similar? Are we encountering a superficial analogy, enjoying the benefits of a good metaphor or recognizing some deeper principles of information organization and transfer? We approach this broad topic by focusing attention on the ancient evolutionary events that created a system of genetic coding, soon after the origin of life on our planet. Specifically we examine a progression of three topics: whether genetic code-words are arbitrary signifiers for the objects they encode (amino acids); how evolutionary biologists have deduced clues about the evolution of genetic coding by studying the complex end-product; and the current scientific paradigm for the origin of genetic information. Our suggested points of connection suggest encouraging insights from each side (linguistics to evolutionary biochemistry and vice versa), though our primary aim is to ask for further help exploring how linguistics can reshape thinking within evolutionary biology.