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Social dynamics

Emergence of language

Nature Physics volume 3, pages 758–760 (2007)Cite this article

Our social behaviour has evolved primarily through contact with a limited number of other individuals. Yet as a species we exhibit uniformities on a global scale. This kind of emergent behaviour is familiar territory for statistical physicists.

On the eve of statistical mechanics, Maxwell and Boltzmann were guided by social statistics in the development of the kinetic theory of gases. Even earlier, data from births, deaths, marriages and crimes had been crucial in the development of statistics in the seventeenth century. Such social numbers triggered passionate debates among philosophers and scientists. So the idea that human societies can be studied using the tools and methods of physics is not new, but only in the past few years have physicists shown renewed interested in understanding and, to some extent, explaining phenomena occurring in social contexts. Is a new discipline about to be born?

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, 'Sapienza' Università di Roma and SMC, INFM-CNR, Piazzale A. Moro 2, Roma, 00185, Italy

    Vittorio Loreto

  2. Complex Networks Lagrange Laboratory, ISI Foundation, Viale S. Severo 65, Torino, 10133, Italy

    Vittorio Loreto

  3. Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Pleinlaan 2, Brussels, B-1050, Belgium

    Luc Steels

  4. Sony Computer Science Laboratory, 6 rue Amyot, Paris, 75005, France

    Luc Steels

Authors
  1. Vittorio Loreto
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  2. Luc Steels
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Loreto, V., Steels, L. Emergence of language. Nature Phys 3, 758–760 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphys770

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