Re: Spanish & Portuguese

> [Sasha]: Do you mean that children have the inborn predisposition to
> learn the language (or language type) of their parents easier and
> quicker than other languages?
> ...
> [Sasha]: I deeply doubt that it could work. Too weak is the connection
> between the language and the biological peculiarities of the speakers,
> too quickly (in biological scale) languages change, too big is the
> grammatical difference between apparently related languages (take
> English and Russian).
>
> [Gerry]: Actually I think the connection between language and biology is
> far from weak,

[Sasha]:
Do Afroamerican's babies start to speak English later than those whose parents
came from England?

> the quickness with which languges change is in the eye of
> the beholder,

This supports my doubts. For the population genetics 1 generation is a "quantum
of time", almost nothing. Climatic changes with the periodicity of millenia and
millions years - this is a process with which biological changes can be well
synchronised.

> and the grammatical differences between English and
> Russian are not that great!

Unfortunately, Russian pupils suffering from English irregular verbs or tenses
like Future In The Past Perfect Continuous (absolutely absurd from the poin of
view of Russian grammar) don't know this. They would feel some relief.
Up to now I rack my brains over the problem: what an article to use? "The"? Or
"a"? Or none? Or both at once?

> [Gerry]: ... Actually there's an entire
> area of study devoted to "consciousness studies". Are you aware of it?

Not, unfortunately. I would be grateful if you briefly informed me about their
main ideas and conclusions.

Sasha.