"Different than......".

TomK,

The operating theatre was just an example. Your workplace would be another. The idea that appropriate standards of precision in language have to be maintained in a specific social context such as a workplace doesn't seem any more problematic to me than insisting on standards of punctuality or of cleanliness when handling food. The point is that these particular uses of language aren't right or wrong in themselves; they just get the job done in that particular situation.

It seems entirely appropriate to expect schools to prepare people to function in such environments, but not to teach them that one kind of language is 'right' and another 'wrong'.

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but not to teach them that one kind of language is 'right' and another 'wrong'.

That is the job of HiFi internet forums!

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The existence of language is not a pre-requisite for the evolution of thought. The ability to communicate that thought however, does require a common language.

These unqualified ex-cathedra statements rebut my argument, but do not refute it.

How exactly does thought, of any complexity, exist without language? Language is not synonymous with the spoken or written word or indeed any obligation to communicate by these means, or by gesture or diagrammatically. Experiments with many species suggests that they understand much more than they can convey. How do you suppose they learn,'remember' or plan, if not with a formal mental structure based on an internal language?

I propose that language, expressed or not, is the engine of evolution of thought. Communication of thought is optional, and so must be considered a secondary function.

Fraser

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Originally posted by David Scott?:

I understand - and even admire - your reasoning, but as language is not a single player game, I don't think it would be possible to say anything more fundamentally incorrect.

Why presume that language did not start as a 'single-player game'? Surely in distant times, it is reasonable to theorise that some anthropoid was ahead of the curve in deciding that a given object, say, was worth ascribing a phonetic representation. If they could convey this object to others by demonstration, gesture or diagram and then link it to the phonetic representation, you then have a means of verbal communication i.e. language as a multi-player game. However, like the universe itself, the language would have started as a singularity.

The thought came first, the communication might or might not follow.

Fraser

Fraser,

It seems reasonable to assume that certain kinds of thinking are only made possible by Language, but it's hard to say exactly where the dividing line would be and harder to find grounds for making the judgement that humans could think in these ways before spoken language developed. As far as animals go, I'm always fascinated by the complexity of the nests made by weaver birds and I'm absolutely certain that a weaver bird would be unable to explain how it did it. Does this mean that the bird must have a private language which enables it to do the 'thinking' required to build the nest?

The essence of language as we know it is social convention and it's hard to see how such a thing could possibly arise outside a social context. To hypothesise the existence of a never-observed 'silent' language of individual thought which preceded social language (presumably you would argue it was its prototype) is quite unnecessary unless you can demonstrate that creatures with no spoken language are capable of thinking in ways that absolutely require a knowledge of a language. Good luck with that. If you can please do. It would be really fascinating.

Fraser,

My last post was not a reply to the one above it which I hadn't seen.

I absolutely recommend you read Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations. If you stick with it I think you'll have a fantastic time. Your last short post raises so many issues it's hard to know where to start. I suppose my response would be something like this.

The situation you describe is very very different from the evolution of a fully fledged private and unspoken language which allows access to complex modes of thought, which seemed to be what you were talking about before.

I doubt if language would begin by naming things, but that aside, why would your anthropoid want to name anything outside a social context? Wouldn't it be more likely to grunt at one of it's fellows in order to evoke a particular response? (passing a rock for example) If we imagine the development of more and more differentiated grunts and vocalisations applicable in a wider range of situations aren't we imagining the birth of language?

However language developed it's not likely to have been a one off invention, but even if there is (was) an individual who made the first genuine linguistic sound, language didn't start off as a single player game because of that any more than rugby did because William Webb Ellis picked up the ball and ran with it. That was a public act in a social context and it wasn't a game until the others joined in.

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That is the job of HiFi internet forums!

Quite.

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Originally posted by Fraser Hadden:
I propose that language, expressed or not, is the engine of evolution of thought. Communication of thought is optional, and so must be considered a secondary function.

I agree that communication of thought is optional and extend that by saying that not all communication is about thought. However all communication does require language.

My unqualified 'ex-cathedra' statement is based on what I would consider to be a commonly held understanding of what language is.

Please can you define, or direct us to a definition of the word/concept of "language", that defines it in relation to thought not communication?

Is birdsong language?

It is obviously complex and presumably incorporates a signalling or messaging component,

If so (and all the courtship dsiplays/shrieks of pain and warning throughout the animal kingdom) then perhaps language derives initially not from thought but instinct. Showing pain, fear, the desire to mate etc are not complex thoughts, but they are basic and important things to communicate. Increasingly complex interactions with the world, and with others of your species presumably offer potential for more sophisticated communication if you have the cognition to develop it.

I remember reading an article about the development of mathematical constructs in primitive societies. I may have forgotten the details but it described a tribe where they had no vocabulary for numbers greater then 20 (the numbers of fingers and toes). It seemed to the researchers this was not because they had not invented such words but because larger amounts had no importance. They had a concept for 'lots' and 'very large amounts' and these were all they needed. In their world they had 3 or 4 children but the village consisted of 'lots' of people; knowing the exact number was not of any extra utility.


Bruce

Hi David,

Could you clarify why you doubt that language began with naming things? That goes against linguistic understanding as it's developed over the past couple of centuries in as much as one of the few things there is consensus on us that all language began by the naming of things and actions and the most fundamental distinction between languages is whether the object or the action comes first.

What have you been reading that I've missed?

Muke

quote:

Originally posted by Mike Hughes:

Could you clarify why you doubt that language began with naming things?

Muke

Chris

Mike,

If I've read anything you haven't it would be Wittgenstein, which is hardly recent. And of course you may well have read him. I don't know what the things you've read have to say, but my feeling is that the kind of scenario Fraser described where an individual who has no language somehow manages to look at something and say to himself' I think I'll call that a stone" is pretty implausible.

It seems much more likely (and here I'm massively indebted to Wittgenstein) that the sort of thing that went on would be that people would be engaged in some kind of shared work which came to be co-ordinated by a number of commands each of which called for a particular action in response. If the response to one of these commands was to say, hand the speaker a rock, would the sound involved be the name for a rock in that language? It might become that as the language developed, but I think initially at least its relationship is with the situation and action of handing the rock to the speaker. Naming - ie saying "this called X" and then using the word to refer to the thing in any context - just seems more abstract and sophisticated.

quote:

Please can you define, or direct us to a definition of the word/concept of "language", that defines it in relation to thought not communication?

I'll have a go at a definition, though obviously it favours my theory of the primacy of thought over communication.

How about "a codified method of storing memory and planning executive action".

As the brains of most species are 'small', the method would involve data compression - which, indeed, we see in human language where even the most recondite terms have multiple applications.

I have been watching 'my' squirrels reclaiming buried nuts and observing them moving, say, 20 metres between caches with pretty much millimetric accuracy. I don't think that there is a visual stimulus which is the key to this - I do mow the lawn periodically, thus altering its appearance to local inspection and the beasts' eyesight seems too poor for them to use, say, triangulation using more distant points of reference. Similarly, the distance would seem to preclude olfaction as the means of identifying a long-buried hoard, I conclude, thus, that they do memorise - and precisely. The means of memory could just be 'pulses' released at a given stimulus in a correctly-sequenced and spaced stream - i.e. a barely-modified reflex - but this would be fantastically uneconomical of memory capacity. Hence my theory of that memory is stored as codified experience with a degree of data compression. I then propose that executive - as opposed to reflex - action would be codified and compressed in the same way.

Wodja think?

Fraser

I think you're unjustifiably conflating 'thought' with 'language' and then being led astray by the figurative possibilities of the latter term. I don't think you're describing a language at all.

I agree with David and like him do admire your reasoning but just don't think what your describing is a language. Who creates the codified message? What if your code is different to my code? It may not matter to the individual but it would matter to the group.

Guys, read some linguists for goodness sake. It's all laid out for you. What we know and what we don't.

I have read Wittgenstein. Very interesting but more thought provoking than conclusive I would say.

I can see the arguments as to how language might have started but nothing I've read here changes what linguists have long concluded. All language DID start from names and actions. The key decision then is which precedes.

Mike

Mike,

Demonstrate that you've understood something I've said and then refute it please. Or at least engage with it.

I'm not suggesting you can't just that you haven't. If the books you've read are as good as you say it should be easy.

I'm quite serious about this. Ideas interest me and if you can show me I'm wrong, rather than just assert it, I'd be grateful.

Mike,

I don't think i've taken issue with anything that you've said. In fact I agree with most, if not all, of what you've said.

My assertion is purely that the purpose of language is to facilitiate communication and that it must evolve to remain relevant and functional.

Surely this isn't at odds with your position?
Cheers
Chris

David,

I shall try and rise to the challenge but I post from a phone on the go so lengthy stuff sometimes goes awry. Apologies in advance if this doesn't actually happen but I'll try.

King Size,

No, I agree entirely as do linguists.

quote:

Originally posted by David Scott?:
I think you're unjustifiably conflating 'thought' with 'language'

I am not conflating two discrete entities at all. I am proposing that they are the same thing! Thought must be codified and stored and the code is language, whether communicated or kept to oneself.

Try planning a supermarket trip, in your head, without using words. Tricky.

Fraser

Fraser,

Clearly some modes of thought are facilitated by language, but it's a real leap in the dark to suggest that it all is. Why do you assume that people thought in these ways before they developed a spoken language?

You use the word language too carelessly I think.

I am not assuming. I am proposing a mechanism. That 's all!

My homespun definition: "a codified method of storing memory and planning executive action" doesn't seem carelessly framed, even on review.

Fraser

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Originally posted by King Size:
Who creates the codified message? What if your code is different to my code? It may not matter to the individual but it would matter to the group.

Isn't this my point? The individual creates their own message and our codes will differ a bit - you and I will not (do not) think in quite the same way, even though we are both English-speakers.

It is only at the point of communication that a common form of expression must be adopted. We are doing this now, and it is not working that well, despite the fact that I'm sure we are both quite clear about our own viewpoints. The codified thought comes first and the communication second, both temporally and in terms of its quality. That is, thought is the finer-grained entity and the interface between thought and communication is 'lossy' while that between thought and language is broadly in lockstep for a given level of individual intellect.

Fraser

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Originally posted by Fraser Hadden:
It is only at the point of communication that a common form of expression must be adopted.

...and it is at that point that language enters the equation. We agree that what comes before is codified but I don't believe it is a language. It might well be a structure/code that enables you/I to understand our surroundings but it is only when that knowledge/structure/code is shared that a language is formed.

Of course I accept that inherent in this statement is the belief that language requires both an 'encoder' and a 'decoder'.

A common form of expression exists between us (language) but our perception and understanding of our environment is clearly different.

PS - I feel like i'm back at university

I feel a computer analogy coming on.

I view the memory/executive planning as analogous to machine code, and expressed communication as analogous to an Interpreted Language (Basic, C, Java etc). That is, we reverse-compile in order to communicate.

I think that you would class the latter only as 'language', while I would class the machine code as language too.

Is this a fair representation of your view?

Fraser