That's a very selective interpretation of what GP said, in fact I don't see how you even got to that conclusion.

"We" as a species is a far different entity than any single individual who is temporarily or even permanently impaired. And GP didn't even mention such impairment.

Humans had completely mastered fire by about 200,000 years ago - after 800,000 years of experimentation.

Speech is dated to around 60,000 years ago, though some say we started down that path 200,000 years ago: right when we mastered fire.

Probably due to the need for profanity after getting burnt.

I can't in good conscience upvote short form jokes on HN, but that got a laugh out of me.

The need for profanity came much earlier - due to smashed thumbs, gouged fingers, etc. while learning to make primitive stone tools.

How does it make sense to say that speech developed 60 kya when Mitochondrial Eve and Y-Chromosomal Adam are commonly dated 200+ kya? Not to mention the recent advances within the past few years that more or less prove Neanderthals and Denisovans spoke as well. With that information Homo heidelbergensis almost certainly spoke as well and if I could bet on it, I would advocate that the smart money would be on Homo Erectus having some level of speech too. In fact a recent paper argues that case: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13752-025-00521-8 It's unfortunately not on SciHub though so I can't attest to it.

How can we date the origin of speech?

Genetic drift between humans and the next closest species to us in the brain an gene areas that seem to affect speech. That includes neanderthal and other hominoid species that are now extinct.

You can't really know for sure, but the typical argument (c.f. Chomsky & Berwick) is there was an enormous explosion in "cultural" products then. Before then, we don't see figurative art, and after we see all sorts of crazy things.

That's a pretty thin reed. Chomsky does a fair bit of argument by assertion and displays of confidence. And he's committed to this idea that language emerged in one massive mutation and thus functional analyses of language are pointless. This is a weird stance for a scientist to take.

I don't understand why you are hostile to me explaining the idea. In any case, you can read their book to see the arguments they use (which are not just assertions, anti-chomskyans just ignore or strawman everything he says). For example, it's not a massive mutation, but specifically a very very small one: the theories called "minimalism" for a reason.

Probably not to you explaining the idea, but to Chomskys ideas that have not been panning out well lately.

Genetically is seems it's very unlikely there is a single gene spot that explains human language but a confluence of different factors feeding back into one another in linage we do not have genetic access to at this time. We've done a bit of gene testing around this now, and single gene flips aren't near enough. I think the best analogy would be like playing a video game where you have to flip a number of switched to the correct position to get the system to work together.

Again, I don't think you understand the substance of the claim. Have you read the book? Mutations don't need to be single gene flips and I don't understand why you think Chomsky thinks that. He compares it to the evolution of the first photorecepetive cell, e.g. a qualitative jump, but that the mechanism is likely quite simple in order for that qualitative jump to be possible.

People really do flagrantly misrepresent his claims.

Why are the protesters in Berlin holding signs in English?

Half of everyone in Germany can speak English. It's mandatory to learn in schools. In Berlin that percentage is even higher. So it's no obstacle. And they don't want to limit the visibility of the protest to only Germany.

Germany is one of the more native-language-enforcing countries in Europe. I've been to Slovenia and half of everything is actually written in English, unlike Germany or France where everything's written in the local language.

Because they want to have the eyes of global press on Germany

Instead of the eyes of their own politicians? Are their goals to actually effect change in Germany or to disparage Germany in the eyes of the global press?

Almost every German politician, most of the police and half the population of Germany speaks English, even though it shouldn't be used for official business. It's no barrier.

Language is also a cultural signifier. English might not be a barrier, but protesting in English certainly communicates that the protesters care not for German culture.

Isolating itself from the world isn't part of German culture either

> Instead of the eyes of their own politicians?

Politicians? It is messages for the voters, and they are leftist politics (so their voters doesn't understand German)

I suggest using Enzo to clean up your submission. Most people here would tell you they don't like AI writing, but a near complete lack of punctuation and capitalization is worse.

I came to the comments because the web page for Enzo explains everything except what the hell it does. Then I couldn't understand the gp comment either.

For a moment I though I was having a stroke.

enzo is platform which clubs all the free available api services and provides you with a interface where you can chat write code research or talk just like any normal ai service but its totally on your terms meaning everthing it does you can see or modify according to your need

mate learn to write english

I wonder if this is a peculiar attempt to write in a style that is the complete opposite of how Claude writes.

I independently came to that conclusion after noticing that my comments on some controversial subjects will slowly acquire upvotes, then nose dive 2 or 4 votes very quickly. At first I thought that some mods might have double-value votes (Hi Cowboy Neal!) but then I realized it's sometimes 4 successive downvotes, not only 2.

I've frequently encountered this same thing. Often the downvotes come a day later, but quickly.

I've seen this, I tend to attribute it to a different part of the world waking up.

Same, but there are other explanations than voting rings

I assume it's just the mods, not voting rings. It's usually comments that run counter to the HN-approved ideology.

When a pattern is repeated many times, it is not a fallacy to recognize that pattern at the begining.

If I see a tiger crotched in the bushes, is it a fallacy to gather my children and head back to the cave?

Pattern recognition is not a fallacy.

When has this happened before? Presumably you have several examples near to hand since it's "a pattern".

I personally live in a country with a large religious population that rejects the smartphone, so thankfully I personally have not encountered a situation where needing a smartphone is vital. However we've seen many people right here on HN mention how some specific vital service - often government or banking - does require a smartphone.

In my HN Threads feed, the very next item is another HN user mentioning how they have difficulty paying for parking spaces without a smart phone, from this very page. Search "and sadly accept the cost of our principles" on this page to find it.

But I have no interest in winning internet arguments. You win, the cookie isn't worth it to me.

How do people without smartphones pay for parking?

We don't, and sadly accept the cost of our principles. What I generally do, is to put on the blinken lights, and try to hurry up. Up to about 20 minutes or so, it generally works alright.

People tell me this all the time. Yet I've never had a WhatsApp account and I do just fine.

The only problems I've had were a single barber that accepts reservations over WhatsApp exclusively - so I go to the barber two shops over and don't need a reservation. And some women from dating apps refuse to talk on the phone before talking over WhatsApp. That's fine, there are plenty of fish in that sea.

  > Headphone jack for special music

Actually, this phone does have a headphone jack.

The best ice cream I ever had was at a small shop in Athens that had unsweetened ice cream.