ABSTRACT
What are Names?—It has been said that the sole con dition for the enormous mental development of man as compared to the lower animals is in his invention of lan guage. Perhaps it would be better to say his extension of language, for even animals have the elements of lan guage. Psychologically considered, language is an asso ciation, such as we have described, between common ob jects, actions, or feelings and certain sounds, visual sym bols, or as in the case of Helen Keller, tactual sensations. The great fact that led to the extension of language was its marvellous usefulness. One has only to think of the great difficulty, the enormous waste of time and energy, that we experience in attempting to communicate with a person who does not understand our language, in order to see something of the significance of language for the race.
