we still can are not completely sure whether species as distant as our direct ancestor, homo erectus,and also our first cousins, neanderthals, really had language. but i'm pretty sure, i just have a feeling they probably did have protoal languages. and in order to have a language, you have to have a vocabulary. that is what you call real language. you have to have a vocabulary that's flexible, and you need to be able to select objects and name them, you know, with a sound particularly. since we are an audio/visual species. one of the group, one of the very few in the world. most species in the world are pheromoneal, and our being audio/visual, incidentally, makes it possible to have a language. if we weren't audio and visual, we involve a language. -- we couldn't evolve a language. we don't know what ther into immediateuate -- intermediate steps were, but we know that one of the most powerful instinctive drives, propensities to learn parts of human nature, is that of chirp to learn language, as you know. i mean, this is as impulsive in a child as it is to form groups. so that's not a