A Darwinian overview of language - as that tool for our survival

In these plague/virus ridden days we employ language for our survival

in the UK 'social distancing'...at least 6 feet apart....the length of a broom'

Consciousness and thought are not distinct kinds; they are inextricably linked to the use of language. 

Language is the practice of using long and complex strings of noises and marks to successfully adapt to one’s environment.

If language is at all a break in the continuity between other species and humans, it is only insofar as it is a tool that humans have at their disposal, which amoebas and spiders and the like do not. 

Nevertheless, just as other species have developed the tools of night-hunting, migration and hibernation to adapt to environmental change, we have used language as a tool for our survival