ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Murray Gell-Mann - Physicist
Murray Gell-Mann brings visibility to a crucial aspect of our existence that we can't actually see: elemental particles. He won the Nobel Prize in Physics for introducing quarks, one of two fundamental ingredients for all matter in the universe.

Why you should listen

He's been called "the man with five brains" -- and Murray Gell-Mann has the resume to prove it. In addition to being a Nobel laureate, he is an accomplished physicist who's earned numerous awards, medals and honorary degrees for his work with subatomic particles, including the groundbreaking theory that the nucleus of an atom comprises 100 or so fundamental building blocks called quarks.

Gell-Mann's influence extends well beyond his field: He's a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Council on Foreign Relations. He also serves on the board of the Wildlife Conservation Society and is a director of Encyclopedia Britannica. Gell-Mann, a professor emeritus of Caltech, now heads the evolution of human languages program at the Santa Fe Institute, which he cofounded in 1984.

A prolific writer -- he's penned scores of academic papers and several books, including The Quark and the Jaguar -- Gell-Mann is also the subject of the popular science biography Strange Beauty: Murray Gell-Mann and the Revolution in 20th-Century Physics.

More profile about the speaker
Murray Gell-Mann | Speaker | TED.com
TED2007

Murray Gell-Mann: The ancestor of language

Мюррей Гелл-Манн тилдердин тегини жөнүндө сүйлөйт.

Filmed:
944,446 views

TED 2007 конференцияда физиканын сулуулугу боюнча сүйлөгөндөн кийин укмуштуу Мюррей Гелл-Манн анын башка кызыккан нерсеси - азыркы замандагы тилдердин жалпы тегин табуу жөнүндө кыскача сүйлөйт.
- Physicist
Murray Gell-Mann brings visibility to a crucial aspect of our existence that we can't actually see: elemental particles. He won the Nobel Prize in Physics for introducing quarks, one of two fundamental ingredients for all matter in the universe. Full bio

Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.

00:13
Well, I'm involved in other things, besides physics.
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Физикадан башка мен бөтөн нерселерди да изилдеп жатам.
00:17
In fact, mostly now in other things.
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Чындыгында, азыр аларга убакытымдын көпчүлүгүн кетирем.
00:19
One thing is distant relationships among human languages.
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Алардын бири - бул адам тилдердин алыс мамилелери.
00:24
And the professional, historical linguists in the U.S.
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АКШнын жана Батыш Европанын
00:28
and in Western Europe mostly try to stay away
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адис тарыхый лингвисттери
00:31
from any long-distance relationships, big groupings,
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алыс мамилелерди, чоң топторду, жана
00:35
groupings that go back a long time,
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тааныш тил бүлөлөрдөн байыркы топторду
00:38
longer than the familiar families.
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изилдөөдөн көбүнчө качып жүрүшөт.
00:41
They don't like that. They think it's crank. I don't think it's crank.
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Алар аны жаман көрөт. Бул кербездик деп ойлошот. Бул кербездик эмес деп ойлойм.
00:45
And there are some brilliant linguists, mostly Russians,
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Санта Фе институтунда жана Москвада мыкты лингвисттер,
00:48
who are working on that, at Santa Fe Institute and in Moscow,
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негизинен орустар, ошону изилдеп жатышат.
00:52
and I would love to see where that leads.
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Ошо изилдөөлөр эмнеге жеткирет экенин көргүм келет.
00:56
Does it really lead to a single ancestor
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20-25 миң жыл мурун тилдердин
00:59
some 20, 25,000 years ago?
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бир жалпы түпкү атасы бар болгону туурабы?
01:02
And what if we go back beyond that single ancestor,
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Ошо бир түпкү атасынан мурунураак заманында карасак
01:05
when there was presumably a competition among many languages?
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мүмкүн ушу убакытта көп тилдердин арасында мелдеш болчу.
01:09
How far back does that go? How far back does modern language go?
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Ошол качан болчу? Азыркы тилдер канча жашта?
01:13
How many tens of thousands of years does it go back?
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Канча миң жыл мурун ал бар болчу?
01:16
Chris Anderson: Do you have a hunch or a hope for what the answer to that is?
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Крис Андерсон: Жообу эмне экенин болжолуңуз барбы?
01:19
Murray Gell-Mann: Well, I would guess that modern language must be older
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Мюррей Гелл-Манн: Менин оюмча азыркы тилдер
01:22
than the cave paintings and cave engravings and cave sculptures
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үңкүр сүрөттөн да, үңкүр скульптуралардан да,
01:26
and dance steps in the soft clay in the caves in Western Europe,
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35000 жыл мурда Ориньяк доорудан Батыш Европанын
01:31
in the Aurignacian Period some 35,000 years ago, or earlier.
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үңкүрлөрдө топуракта бий кадамдардан да эскирээк.
01:37
I can't believe they did all those things and didn't also have a modern language.
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Ушундай нерселерди азыркыдай тилсиз жасоо мүмкүн эмес деп эсептеймин.
01:40
So, I would guess that the actual origin goes back at least that far and maybe further.
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Ошентип, менин оюмча тилдин чын теги ушундай байыркы же андан да байыркыраак.
01:45
But that doesn't mean that all, or many, or most
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Бирок ошондой болсо да
01:48
of today's attested languages couldn't descend perhaps
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мүмкүн азыркы текшерген тилдерин көбү
01:52
from one that's much younger than that, like say 20,000 years,
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эртерээк, мисалы 20000 жыл, тилден болуп чыккан.
01:56
or something of that kind. It's what we call a bottleneck.
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Ошол мүмкүнчүлүгү бизге эң чоң кыйындык.
02:00
CA: Well, Philip Anderson may have been right.
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Крис Андерсон: Мүмкүн Филип Андерсон туура айткан.
02:01
You may just know more about everything than anyone.
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Сиз башка кишилерден бардык нерсе боюнча көбүрөөк билесиз го.
02:04
So, it's been an honor. Thank you Murray Gell-Mann.
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Бул мен үчүн чоң урмат. Ыракмат, Мюррей Гелл-Манн.
02:06
(Applause)
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(Кол чабуулар)
Translated by Tilek Mamutov
Reviewed by Aijan Jumukova

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ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Murray Gell-Mann - Physicist
Murray Gell-Mann brings visibility to a crucial aspect of our existence that we can't actually see: elemental particles. He won the Nobel Prize in Physics for introducing quarks, one of two fundamental ingredients for all matter in the universe.

Why you should listen

He's been called "the man with five brains" -- and Murray Gell-Mann has the resume to prove it. In addition to being a Nobel laureate, he is an accomplished physicist who's earned numerous awards, medals and honorary degrees for his work with subatomic particles, including the groundbreaking theory that the nucleus of an atom comprises 100 or so fundamental building blocks called quarks.

Gell-Mann's influence extends well beyond his field: He's a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Council on Foreign Relations. He also serves on the board of the Wildlife Conservation Society and is a director of Encyclopedia Britannica. Gell-Mann, a professor emeritus of Caltech, now heads the evolution of human languages program at the Santa Fe Institute, which he cofounded in 1984.

A prolific writer -- he's penned scores of academic papers and several books, including The Quark and the Jaguar -- Gell-Mann is also the subject of the popular science biography Strange Beauty: Murray Gell-Mann and the Revolution in 20th-Century Physics.

More profile about the speaker
Murray Gell-Mann | Speaker | TED.com