In a brief, tightly focused, and insightful article, Gans looks that the scene of the origin of language in Condillac's Essay on the Origin of Human Language. Two children alone in the desert get hungry and remember a tree with fruit they go to, think of it at the same time, and look at each other and see into each other's mind and with what ever word or gesture they use at that moment, language is born. It is a myth for the ages, and roots us in need and in looking to each other to fill that need--sympathetic and sensitive beings. This motivation in sentiment, which is what Gans focuses on, is a really obvious and solid refutation of the characterization of Condillac as the ultimate sensationalist or if you prefer sensualist, rooting everything we are in our sensations and perceptions. That's the material--we shape it not with ways of seeing but with ways of feeling. Chronicles of Love & Resentment 178 and 179. ( )