Consider this problem:

What is the process that creates the words in a language covering meaning’s little pieces?

Consider, for example, the semantic space for “written material” over, say, length, audience, content, substrate, etc. In English there are many words here: memo, note, book, journal, blogpost, novel, article, scroll, monograph, volume, chapter, manuscript, text, codex, diary. At some point in history, none of these words existed. At some point in history, no words at all existed, and of course no “written material” in any language.

The four corners of semantic space are covered thus with words (density may vary). What did this evolving from nothing look like?

Consider this solution:

This solution says that new words appear in order to cover specific new little pieces of meaning.

Consider another solution:

This solution says that new words appear in order to divide the meaning of the previously undifferentiated.

The biggest difference between these two solutions is about the first words. In the first solution, new words at the beginning of time had tiny pieces of meaning, roughly of the same size as new words at the end. In the second solution, new words at the beginning of time had very large domains of meaning, very different from new words at the end.

Is one of these more correct than the other?