I found this so interesting in my dream that I woke up, and (unusually) still found it interesting even after that. Thinking about it, the development of ostensive capacity in language must have been a big evolutionary leg-up. That, and deixis. With ostension and deixis, you can do most of the practical things needed for a huntery-gathery life. You can tell stories, too. You can get a long way, in fact, without the need for abstract concepts. Although, of course, you can't dream about languages that lack ostension.
Ostensibly
I found this so interesting in my dream that I woke up, and (unusually) still found it interesting even after that. Thinking about it, the development of ostensive capacity in language must have been a big evolutionary leg-up. That, and deixis. With ostension and deixis, you can do most of the practical things needed for a huntery-gathery life. You can tell stories, too. You can get a long way, in fact, without the need for abstract concepts. Although, of course, you can't dream about languages that lack ostension.
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