I'm sorry, but I don't think I can think decently of anyone who puts down Philosophy as "pointless wankery." How dense can you be?
Let us examine. Higher cognition, as opposed to what? Lower cognition of other animals? Some philosophers hold that humans are the same as other animals, except we do everything with a higher sophistication. All animals, have some degree of cognition, we just happen to have a higher degree of sophistication when it comes to cognition. So who's point are you trying to prove? Mine? That's great bro.
Also, what in hell do you mean by "abstract language." If anything human beings have a concrete and established language. A lot of people think that the establishment of a concrete language is a step forward. However, not all people think so.
Have you ever met very sensitive people who can know a lot about someone by just looking at them? You know, those people that look at someone and instantly know when they like the person or not and are correct about their intuitions? Many scientists believe that this is the way most animals communicate with themselves without having to have an actual language. Some philosophers even claim that having a language is actually a step backwards. By being stuck to verbal communication, we have deprived ourselves as humans of sensitivity. Imagine if we could communicate with each other simply through looks and body language like animals do (or so some scientists claim). Now we have a mixture of body language mixed with a concrete language, at the expense of human sensitivity.
Anyways, you'll probably dismiss all of this as "pointless wankery." But it is quite more pointless to try to argue with someone who'll refuse to learn the more finer details of human intelligence. We call that ignorance.