Interesting read because it puts in writing things I've thought. I would rotate the F in my brain to determine if it's mirrored for example. One thing he needed to touch on was people who are born deaf. Someone can't think in an audible language without having heard one, but they are obviously conscious
I don’t know if I agree with it, but I think his vision of ‘mentalese’, the ‘language of thought’ is beautiful. He says that we have a mental life that is divorced from English, Spanish, Hopi-whatever, ‘simpler and richer’ than our dialects could ever be, and that the words we say are just translations. According to Pinker---“Any particular thought in our head embraces a vast amount of information. But when it comes to communicating a thought to someone else, attention spans are short and mouths are slow.” Perhaps writers and poets are just better at it than others.
That which was inspiring, and altogether humbling, was the example of the grown human beings with no ability of spoken or written language. They had a strong sense of community and were even able to entertain each other with elaborate pantomimed stories.
Personally, I can’t tell whether I think in words or just feelings. As I am typing this I am aware of the way I “say” each word in my head as I type it, but I don’t know if I am thinking of each word separately as I go or if I have some general idea already and my hands and brain are working together to make it known.
While there is no scientific evidence that languages shape their speakers’ way of thinking. We can agree to Whorf’s statement that, “We cut nature up, organize it into concepts, and ascribe siginifances as we do, largely because we are parties to an agreement.” (Did you see what I did there ;-) . He continues by boldly saying, “…we cannot talk at all except by subscribing to the organization and classifications of data which agreement decrees.” To me, I find that puzzling and fascinating.
On page 64 he mentions how creative people insist that their most inspired moments are inspired by mental images and not words. I believe it to be this idea that gives artists and musicians the ability to create something that delivers a story or emotion to the viewer with the use of very few to no words at all.
Going off of this point, I thought it was interesting that he explained visual communication and learning before he explained the various ways that we view symbols. It was kind of funny to me, because he was explaining how we comprehend symbols as he was writing symbols that only people that understand English could understand. He did lose me towards the end of this point, but it was a very intriguing: almost like Inception.
Something that I considered while reading this article was the fact that if language leads to thought and it could not be the other way around; shouldn’t all language be the same? Wouldn’t we then always have one exact word for what we wanted to convey like in Newspeak? In addition, how could language be constantly changing if it were what created thought?
The story of Ildefonso was heartening, as it showed that even without access to language, a person can contain a great number of memories and thoughts. When he was given the means to convey those thoughts and memories he did so gladly, but the fact remains that they existed before he had language.
. It’s hard to tell if the majority of what I think about is in a language. I think about a lot of things. I think about things I need to do, and things I should be doing, such as homework or housework, but I don’t think I’m always talking to myself in my head. I believe we think in feelings as much, or more than we think in words. Humans are emotional creatures, and most everything we do provokes an emotional response, and not necessarily responses that involve language.
Dialogue between two close people is the hardest thing to write. These people bring up things from the past with minimal words, they reference people near them with a slight glance. The more two people know each other, the less their conversations would make sense to anyone who has not been with them from the beginning of their relationship. English, or whatever language they speak, isn’t the thing that guides their communication.
I think that what Pinker asserts in his essay makes a lot of sense. He pulls in a lot of outside sources, like the experiment with the infants, to solidify is argument about how powerful our minds are. Which complicates the idea of language because language is a construct of the human mind.
I think it is interesting how we find article adjectives so important when speaking and writing, but when I think there is no need for them. Pinker brings up that outside a particular conversation the words "a" and "the" are synonyms and meaningless. He says "there's no place in one's permanent mental database." In our heads when already understand the specifics, therefore, "a" and "the" create no contextual change as they do when speaking.
Interesting read because it puts in writing things I've thought. I would rotate the F in my brain to determine if it's mirrored for example. One thing he needed to touch on was people who are born deaf. Someone can't think in an audible language without having heard one, but they are obviously conscious
ReplyDeleteI don’t know if I agree with it, but I think his vision of ‘mentalese’, the ‘language of thought’ is beautiful. He says that we have a mental life that is divorced from English, Spanish, Hopi-whatever, ‘simpler and richer’ than our dialects could ever be, and that the words we say are just translations. According to Pinker---“Any particular thought in our head embraces a vast amount of information. But when it comes to communicating a thought to someone else, attention spans are short and mouths are slow.” Perhaps writers and poets are just better at it than others.
ReplyDeleteThat which was inspiring, and altogether humbling, was the example of the grown human beings with no ability of spoken or written language. They had a strong sense of community and were even able to entertain each other with elaborate pantomimed stories.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I can’t tell whether I think in words or just feelings. As I am typing this I am aware of the way I “say” each word in my head as I type it, but I don’t know if I am thinking of each word separately as I go or if I have some general idea already and my hands and brain are working together to make it known.
ReplyDeleteWhile there is no scientific evidence that languages shape their speakers’ way of thinking. We can agree to Whorf’s statement that, “We cut nature up, organize it into concepts, and ascribe siginifances as we do, largely because we are parties to an agreement.” (Did you see what I did there ;-) . He continues by boldly saying, “…we cannot talk at all except by subscribing to the organization and classifications of data which agreement decrees.” To me, I find that puzzling and fascinating.
ReplyDeleteOur whole existence, our beginnings, everything we know are all based upon that principle.
DeleteOn page 64 he mentions how creative people insist that their most inspired moments are inspired by mental images and not words. I believe it to be this idea that gives artists and musicians the ability to create something that delivers a story or emotion to the viewer with the use of very few to no words at all.
ReplyDeleteCody Baggerly
Going off of this point, I thought it was interesting that he explained visual communication and learning before he explained the various ways that we view symbols. It was kind of funny to me, because he was explaining how we comprehend symbols as he was writing symbols that only people that understand English could understand. He did lose me towards the end of this point, but it was a very intriguing: almost like Inception.
ReplyDeleteSomething that I considered while reading this article was the fact that if language leads to thought and it could not be the other way around; shouldn’t all language be the same? Wouldn’t we then always have one exact word for what we wanted to convey like in Newspeak? In addition, how could language be constantly changing if it were what created thought?
ReplyDeleteThe story of Ildefonso was heartening, as it showed that even without access to language, a person can contain a great number of memories and thoughts. When he was given the means to convey those thoughts and memories he did so gladly, but the fact remains that they existed before he had language.
ReplyDelete(Emily Callan)
. It’s hard to tell if the majority of what I think about is in a language. I think about a lot of things. I think about things I need to do, and things I should be doing, such as homework or housework, but I don’t think I’m always talking to myself in my head. I believe we think in feelings as much, or more than we think in words. Humans are emotional creatures, and most everything we do provokes an emotional response, and not necessarily responses that involve language.
ReplyDeleteDialogue between two close people is the hardest thing to write. These people bring up things from the past with minimal words, they reference people near them with a slight glance. The more two people know each other, the less their conversations would make sense to anyone who has not been with them from the beginning of their relationship. English, or whatever language they speak, isn’t the thing that guides their communication.
ReplyDeleteI think that what Pinker asserts in his essay makes a lot of sense. He pulls in a lot of outside sources, like the experiment with the infants, to solidify is argument about how powerful our minds are. Which complicates the idea of language because language is a construct of the human mind.
ReplyDeleteI think it is interesting how we find article adjectives so important when speaking and writing, but when I think there is no need for them. Pinker brings up that outside a particular conversation the words "a" and "the" are synonyms and meaningless. He says "there's no place in one's permanent mental database." In our heads when already understand the specifics, therefore, "a" and "the" create no contextual change as they do when speaking.
ReplyDelete