That was a very long read and a had lot of interesting stuff too. The lack of recursion in the Pirahã language may probably have a connection to lack of the numeric system (yes, they don't count !!), though the author disagrees with this angle.<p>Some things seem conflicting, though. The author says the language lacks numeric system (which involves recursion) and quantifiers, but the people are involved in trade (Brazil nuts for consumables) with other groups (river traders) and believes that they have been doing so for a long time. Puzzling how they could have done this without quantifying !<p><i>So I don't think that the fact that they lack numbers is attributable to the linguistic determinism associated with Benjamin Lee Whorf, i.e. that language determines our thought—I don't really think that goes very far. It also doesn't explain their lack of color words, the simplest kinship system that's ever been documented, the lack of recursion, and the lack of quantifiers, and all of these other properties.</i><p>.....<p><i>The Brazilians the Pirahãs most often see have boats, and they just come up the Pirahãs' river to buy Brazil nuts. In exchange, they bring machetes, gunpowder, powdered milk, sugar, whiskey and so forth. The Pirahãs are usually interested in acquiring these things....They don't accumulate Western goods, but if you've got consumables, the Pirahã might buy, say, two pounds of sugar, pour it in a bowl and eat it all at once. They're not going to put it on the shelf and save it; they'll just eat it when they get it.</i><p>Also, I don't understand the "they were sent away" part, in the quote below..<p><i>The crucial thing is that the Pirahã have not borrowed any numbers—and they want to learn to count. They asked me to give them classes in Brazilian numbers, so for eight months I spent an hour every night trying to teach them how to count. And it never got anywhere, except for a few of the children. Some of the children learned to do reasonably well, but as soon as anybody started to perform well, they were sent away from the classes. It was just a fun time to eat popcorn and watch me write things on the board.</i><p>Who sent them away ? Why ?