Full Idea
The emergence of our sense impressions into our consciousness, the ability to fix them and, as it were, exhibit them externally, increased proportionally with the need to communicate them to others by means of signs.
Gist of Idea
We became increasingly conscious of our sense impressions in order to communicate them
Source
Friedrich Nietzsche (The Gay (Joyful) Science [1882], §354)
Book Reference
Nietzsche,Friedrich: 'The Gay Science', ed/tr. Kaufmann,Walter [Vintage 1974], p.299
A Reaction
He says in the same section that such ideas (plus his thoughts on consciousness) are the essence of his 'Perspectivism'. In effect, knowledge is not an individual activity, but a team game