I'm surprised there aren't any comments on this yet. Maybe there just aren't enough people interested in linguistics. Which is a sad thought, but ah well. I happened to come across your blog in doing research for a paper I'm writing for my linguistics class. I'm doing a sort of analysis of your protolanguage theory as presented in Language and Species (1990). I think it's an interesting theory, despite its flaws (some of which are addressed in Lingua ex Machina). Nonetheless, the reason I'm commenting is because I find your section on Hauser and the uniqueness of humans as a species very interesting. I think you make an excellent point - that the question is not about humans being the only species with language (a concept I still don't really approve of) but rather about how humans came to have language. I think humans have a real tendency to put our species on a pedestal as being the superior race. But is that really justified? The fact that humans are essentially incapable of effectively communicating with other species necessarily means that we can have no real understanding of the culture and life of those species. Barbara Gowdy wrote a novel called The White Bone which is written from the perspective of an elephant. That sounds a little ridiculous, but I think it raises some important questions about how we view ourselves, especially in relation to other species. Anyway, I'm going to stop procrastinating and get back to my work. Thanks for writing this blog, I'm sure your other entries will be equally intriguing.