Eli5: How did language develop? And on top of that how did a written language develop?

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Basically what i am asking is how were people suddenly able to understand each other and form words for things? Also how did they then take those words and create letters and writing in a way that other people could understand?

Another question I have is when did languages actually develop and how do we even know?

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Anonymous 0 Comments

The most important thing to understand is that they were not “suddenly” able to understand each other. It was a slow process over tens or hundreds of thousands of years.

It starts with the fact that there is an evolutionary advantage to being able to communicate the presence of danger to others. Most animal species and even some plants have developed this ability.

Over time, many animals found it advantageous to be able to communicate other kinds of things, like the location of food, or the ability to refer to a specific individual (Dolphins have unique names for other members of their pod)

The slow march towards greater complexity in communication resulted in the evolution of complex spoken and written languages, based on the needs of the cultures where they evolved.

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