Scivillage.com Casual Discussion Science Forum

What is the miracle of language?  Imagine if you had no language, no words for things, or feelings, or values.  What do you know and what can you know without language?

Here is a link about a man who was 27 years old before he became aware that things have names and people can use words for thinking and communicating what they think.  This discovery changed his life in profound ways, including his connection with human beings.  

Quote:https://neuroanthropology.net/2010/07/21...-language/
There’s something magical that happens between humans and symbols and the sharing of symbols.

What if the force behind our evolution was the word?  As we use neurons they grow.  Did sounds evolve into symbolic language, before our frontal lobe separated us from other primates?  In the beginning was the word, and civilizations believed the power of the word was magical.   

In answering the question of what we can know without language, can we consider dogs will eat away at cancer it smells on a person.  Why?  What does a dog know through smell?   What controls a dogs' behaviors?  What makes us different?  

Some primates can be taught language and they do pass this language on to their young.  We do not yet know what will happen if this continues for several generations.  What do you think?

Quote:The amazing thing is that the look on his face was as if he had never seen a window before. The window became a different thing with a symbol attached to it. But it’s not just a symbol. It’s a shared symbol. He can say “window” to someone else tomorrow who he hasn’t even met yet! And they will know what a window is. There’s something magical that happens between humans and symbols and the sharing of symbols.

In the earlier 20th century, Wilfrid Sellars (among others) revived the importance that Kant placed on the role of concepts in being aware of and discriminating objects (not just in understanding / interpreting them). Even before signs and words, though, concepts or an equivalent may still be mediated by items that are pre-linguistic.

Eric M. Rubenstein: "Stepping back from the Myth of Jones, here are some of the significant points. The thesis of Psychological Nominalism claims that to be aware of something, x, one must have a concept for x. But there is a flip side to this. If one has a concept of x, one can be aware of x’s. With the concept of x in hand, that is, you can notice all sorts of things you didn’t notice before you had that concept. For instance, a physicist looks at a puff of smoke in a cloud chamber and sees an electron discharged. She comes to have non-inferential knowledge of something we might not, as she has certain concepts we don’t as laypeople, as well as an ability to apply them directly to her experience. In other words, perception is concept-laden, and depending on what concepts you have, you can perceive different things. ([Wilfrid] Sellars wasn’t the first to articulate this connection, but his development of it made for a revolutionary understanding of thinking and perception)." http://www.iep.utm.edu/sellars/


Teed Rockwell: In "the Structure of Knowledge" Sellars attempts to clarify this distinction between thought and sensing by saying that musicians and composers have two different ways of thinking about their art. They can think about sound (i.e. linguistically) and they can also non-linguistically think in sound. He then makes the following conclusion from this, which seems to contradict many of his other statements.

Quote:There is much food for thought in these reflections. . . But the fundamental problems which they pose arise already at the perceptual level. For as we shall see, visual perception itself is not just a conceptualizing of colored objects within the visual range-a 'thinking about' colored objects in a certain context--but in a sense most difficult to analyze, a thinking in color about colored objects ( Sellars 1975 p.305)

Sellars was certainly right that this sense was most difficult to analyze, and the more he wrote on this subject, the more obvious the difficulty became. This paragraph actually seems to be implying that Sellars believed that sensations are different from both the linguistic and the non-linguistic thoughts we have about them. This seems to leave us with three categories of mental events, exemplified by 1) linguistic thoughts about sound 2) non-linguistic thinkings in sound, and 3) Audial sensations. One wonders how many more mediating entities would have to be posited if we continued along these lines. And what function would the completely non-cognitive sensation perform if we had both linguistic and non-linguistic concepts? Why not just say that the world caused the non-linguistic concept, and eliminate the non-cognitive sensation as an unnecessary middle step? Clearly there was a tension in Sellars' thinking on this point that was very difficult for him to resolve.

This tension is completely absent, however, in Rorty's interpretation of Sellars. His initial description of the problem, nicely captures the essence of Sellars' distinction between knowledge and sensation.

Quote:Sellars invokes the distinction between awareness-as- discriminative behavior and awareness as what Sellars calls being "in the logical space of reasons, of justifying and being able to justify what one says." Awareness in the first sense is manifested by rats and amoebas and computers; it is simply reliable signaling. Awareness in the second sense is manifested only by beings whose behavior we construe as the uttering of sentences with the intention of justifying the utterance of other sentences (Rorty 1979 p. 182)

But Richard Rorty's description of the relationship between these two kinds of discriminative behavior ignores Sellars' ambivalence, describing him as being, like [Daniel] Dennett, firmly committed to the idea that all awareness is linguistic.

Quote:Either grant concepts to anything (e.g. record-changers) which can respond discriminatively to classes of objects, or else explain why you draw the line between conceptual thought and its primitive predecessors in a different place from that between having acquired a language and being still in training (ibid. p.186)

Rorty imagines Sellars placing this dilemma before those who reject the claim that all awareness is a linguistic affair. But it can easily be placed before Sellars himself during those times he is trying to salvage some kind of non-cognitive consciousness for sensations/experience. There is no point in criticizing Rorty's Sellars scholarship; the texts are ambiguous enough that his resolution of the ambiguity is as accurate as any. But the other resolution of the ambiguity--saying that there are two different kinds of awareness, which follow different rules--can be more fruitful if we combine it with certain insights from Dewey... --The Hard Problem is Dead; Long live the hard problem


Teed Rockwell: Rorty's grouping of computers with rats and amoebas [...] shows that he considers the distinction between the linguistic and the non-linguistic to be merely the distinction between the complex and the simple. Computers are of course much simpler than we are (at the moment). But regardless of their simplicity they are still devices designed to help us function in the logical Space of Reasons. In contrast, a connectionist system can be as complex as a logic or language-based computer, and far more skillful at what it does best. It is a common mistake to assume that only simple functions can be performed without verbal processing, and thus we describe sensations with the pejorative term "raw feel". One of the things we have learned from the scientific study and philosophical analysis of neural networks is that their kind of discriminative signal processing can be more complex than what most computers do, and that in us it is far more complicated than in rats or amoebas. The fundamental principles that govern this kind of processing are not linguistic, which is why humans with "know-how" can often do things that they cannot explain, even to themselves. And even animals possess cognitive processes that enable them to be skillful enough to avoid predators, remember where they have stored food, and recognize kin, all without any help from that awareness which is a linguistic affair. --The Hard Problem is Dead; Long live the hard problem

(Nov 28, 2016 07:48 PM)Carol Wrote: [ -> ]What if the force behind our evolution was the word?  

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." - John 1:1

(Nov 30, 2016 12:05 AM)Syne Wrote: [ -> ]

(Nov 28, 2016 07:48 PM)Carol Wrote: [ -> ]What if the force behind our evolution was the word?  

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." - John 1:1

I wonder where they got that idea, (Medu Netjer). Egyptians, perhaps?

(Nov 29, 2016 02:56 AM)C C Wrote: [ -> ]

Quote:The amazing thing is that the look on his face was as if he had never seen a window before. The window became a different thing with a symbol attached to it. But it’s not just a symbol. It’s a shared symbol. He can say “window” to someone else tomorrow who he hasn’t even met yet! And they will know what a window is. There’s something magical that happens between humans and symbols and the sharing of symbols.

In the earlier 20th century, Wilfrid Sellars (among others) revived the importance that Kant placed on the role of concepts in being aware of and discriminating objects (not just in understanding / interpreting them). Even before signs and words, though, concepts or an equivalent may still be mediated by items that are pre-linguistic.

Eric M. Rubenstein: "Stepping back from the Myth of Jones, here are some of the significant points. The thesis of Psychological Nominalism claims that to be aware of something, x, one must have a concept for x. But there is a flip side to this. If one has a concept of x, one can be aware of x’s. With the concept of x in hand, that is, you can notice all sorts of things you didn’t notice before you had that concept. For instance, a physicist looks at a puff of smoke in a cloud chamber and sees an electron discharged. She comes to have non-inferential knowledge of something we might not, as she has certain concepts we don’t as laypeople, as well as an ability to apply them directly to her experience. In other words, perception is concept-laden, and depending on what concepts you have, you can perceive different things. ([Wilfrid] Sellars wasn’t the first to articulate this connection, but his development of it made for a revolutionary understanding of thinking and perception)." http://www.iep.utm.edu/sellars/


Teed Rockwell: In "the Structure of Knowledge" Sellars attempts to clarify this distinction between thought and sensing by saying that musicians and composers have two different ways of thinking about their art. They can think about sound (i.e. linguistically) and they can also non-linguistically think in sound. He then makes the following conclusion from this, which seems to contradict many of his other statements.

Quote:There is much food for thought in these reflections. . . But the fundamental problems which they pose arise already at the perceptual level. For as we shall see, visual perception itself is not just a conceptualizing of colored objects within the visual range-a 'thinking about' colored objects in a certain context--but in a sense most difficult to analyze, a thinking in color about colored objects ( Sellars 1975 p.305)

Sellars was certainly right that this sense was most difficult to analyze, and the more he wrote on this subject, the more obvious the difficulty became. This paragraph actually seems to be implying that Sellars believed that sensations are different from both the linguistic and the non-linguistic thoughts we have about them. This seems to leave us with three categories of mental events, exemplified by 1) linguistic thoughts about sound 2) non-linguistic thinkings in sound, and 3) Audial sensations. One wonders how many more mediating entities would have to be posited if we continued along these lines. And what function would the completely non-cognitive sensation perform if we had both linguistic and non-linguistic concepts? Why not just say that the world caused the non-linguistic concept, and eliminate the non-cognitive sensation as an unnecessary middle step? Clearly there was a tension in Sellars' thinking on this point that was very difficult for him to resolve.

This tension is completely absent, however, in Rorty's interpretation of Sellars. His initial description of the problem, nicely captures the essence of Sellars' distinction between knowledge and sensation.

Quote:Sellars invokes the distinction between awareness-as- discriminative behavior and awareness as what Sellars calls being "in the logical space of reasons, of justifying and being able to justify what one says." Awareness in the first sense is manifested by rats and amoebas and computers; it is simply reliable signaling. Awareness in the second sense is manifested only by beings whose behavior we construe as the uttering of sentences with the intention of justifying the utterance of other sentences (Rorty 1979 p. 182)

But Richard Rorty's description of the relationship between these two kinds of discriminative behavior ignores Sellars' ambivalence, describing him as being, like [Daniel] Dennett, firmly committed to the idea that all awareness is linguistic.

Quote:Either grant concepts to anything (e.g. record-changers) which can respond discriminatively to classes of objects, or else explain why you draw the line between conceptual thought and its primitive predecessors in a different place from that between having acquired a language and being still in training (ibid. p.186)

Rorty imagines Sellars placing this dilemma before those who reject the claim that all awareness is a linguistic affair. But it can easily be placed before Sellars himself during those times he is trying to salvage some kind of non-cognitive consciousness for sensations/experience. There is no point in criticizing Rorty's Sellars scholarship; the texts are ambiguous enough that his resolution of the ambiguity is as accurate as any. But the other resolution of the ambiguity--saying that there are two different kinds of awareness, which follow different rules--can be more fruitful if we combine it with certain insights from Dewey... --The Hard Problem is Dead; Long live the hard problem


Teed Rockwell: Rorty's grouping of computers with rats and amoebas [...] shows that he considers the distinction between the linguistic and the non-linguistic to be merely the distinction between the complex and the simple. Computers are of course much simpler than we are (at the moment). But regardless of their simplicity they are still devices designed to help us function in the logical Space of Reasons. In contrast, a connectionist system can be as complex as a logic or language-based computer, and far more skillful at what it does best. It is a common mistake to assume that only simple functions can be performed without verbal processing, and thus we describe sensations with the pejorative term "raw feel". One of the things we have learned from the scientific study and philosophical analysis of neural networks is that their kind of discriminative signal processing can be more complex than what most computers do, and that in us it is far more complicated than in rats or amoebas. The fundamental principles that govern this kind of processing are not linguistic, which is why humans with "know-how" can often do things that they cannot explain, even to themselves. And even animals possess cognitive processes that enable them to be skillful enough to avoid predators, remember where they have stored food, and recognize kin, all without any help from that awareness which is a linguistic affair. --The Hard Problem is Dead; Long live the hard problem

That post was so awesome I could cry for joy.  

I would say, all awareness is not linguistic, but wow do I comprehend the tension!   The book "Emotional Intelligence" speaks of our thinking brains shutting down in an emergency because thinking slows down our reactions.  Our brains can process information much faster we are not thinking about them.  Also, a dancer absolutely must let go of thinking or the movements are jerky and awkward.  A dance must be learned in the muscles and then one movement follows the other effortlessly.  But would we call this awareness?  

If when we are responding to an emergency without thinking, or dancing without effort, would call that being aware?

(Nov 30, 2016 01:51 AM)Secular Sanity Wrote: [ -> ]

(Nov 30, 2016 12:05 AM)Syne Wrote: [ -> ]

(Nov 28, 2016 07:48 PM)Carol Wrote: [ -> ]What if the force behind our evolution was the word?  

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." - John 1:1

I wonder where they got that idea, (Medu Netjer). Egyptians, perhaps?

I would say believing there is magical power in words is common to all speaking humans.  Many, if not all, also saw magical power in the image of an animal or person.   We can know this through anthropology, and practices of primitive people today.  

I tend to cry when someone else is crying.  We also tend to yawn when someone else yawns and we share this with primates who bed at the same time.  Herd animals may signal when they want to move to the river by looking in the direction of the river, and when enough do this, the whole herd moves- a kind of democracy in decision making. 

I suspect, our intense reliance on language actually interferes with our awareness.  Such as when we receive subliminal messages, we may not be "aware" of why we feel hungry or sleepy or sexually aroused.   We can cancel these desires with words telling ourselves how to behave and giving ourselves explanations of we should not act on an impulse.   Chimps have this ability to some degree, but baboons tend to be very impulsive.  This instinct to respond to stimulus could make a picture of food seem magical because it causes a desire for what is seen in the picture.  A duck hunter may put a duck decoy in the lake to attract ducks and the duck is not using language when it responds to the visual perception of another duck.  Humans can create a desire just by thinking of something, and so they conclude god created the world.  That delay between stimulus and action is greater for humans and separates us from the rest of the animals.   

Somehow something changed in our brains when we began using words.  Here is an explanation of how language is responsible for our evolution.   It begins explaining our brain cells develop as we use them, and it we if don't use them they atrophy and die.   What we learn from the beginning of our lives, sets the stage for what we can learn.  

Quote:http://www.childrenofthecode.org/interviews/deacon.htm

I think this is the case with language itself. As it’s passed from generation to generation it has a kind of self organizing and evolution-like character to it.That is also part of where the structure comes from, where it picks it up on the fly, so to speak. We have to work that into our stories. That is really the impetus for the book I wrote. The Symbolic Species captures the essence of that idea in its subtitle, The Co-evolution of Language in the Brain. Ultimately, my argument was that language itself was part of the process that was responsible for the evolution of the brain. I mean that in the following sense.

Imagine the evolution of beavers. Beavers are aquatic animals today but they are aquatic because of what beavers in the past have done. That is, beavers have created their own world to some extent. They’ve created an aquatic world by building dams and blocking up streams and turning them into small lakes. Beavers’ bodies have evolved in adaptation to the world that beavers created. It’s a kind of complex ratcheting effect in which what you do changes the environment that produces the selection on your body. 

I think language is, in a sense, our beaver dam. Language has changed the environments in which brains have evolved. That changes the picture radically because now one can look at the brain, so to speak, with an inside out perspective of the problem and ask the question, “What’s different about human brains and how might that difference tell us something about the forces that shaped it?” If those forces include language then the brain itself is a wonderful signature, a wonderful trace for the forces that helped it evolve in this complicated interaction. The title, The Symbolic Species, captures this notion that we are a species that in part has been shaped by symbols, in part shaped by what we do. Therefore, our brain is going to be very different in some regards than other species' brains in ways that are uniquely human.  

Magical powers in words? No, I don't think it's a common belief.  Perhaps, a belief passed down through generations.

While it has often been emphasized that syntax and language are what most separate us from higher apes, syntax and language are most likely more recent developments that emerged long after the more fundamental ability to understand and use arbitrary symbols non-syntactically. Symbolic cognition must have preceded syntactic and linguistic cognition.—Peter Tse

What do you think about this idea?  He's a mini Timothy Leary, but occasionally a few interesting thoughts pop into his head.

Can We Change the Past?

(Dec 6, 2016 07:58 PM)Secular Sanity Wrote: [ -> ]Magical powers in words? No, I don't think it's a common belief.  Perhaps, a belief passed down through generations.

While it has often been emphasized that syntax and language are what most separate us from higher apes, syntax and language are most likely more recent developments that emerged long after the more fundamental ability to understand and use arbitrary symbols non-syntactically. Symbolic cognition must have preceded syntactic and linguistic cognition.—Peter Tse

What do you think about this idea?  He's a mini Timothy Leary, but occasionally a few interesting thoughts pop into his head.

Can We Change the Past?

Your first argument is perfect for this discussion and I disagree with you about it not being common for humans to associate words with magical power.  I know Wikipedia is not everyone's favorite source of information but I agree with what said about words and the supernatural being universal.  

Quote:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_(paranormal)

Magic and religion are categories of beliefs and systems of knowledge used within societies. Some forms of shamanic contact with the spirit world seem to be nearly universal in the early development of human communities.

We first see this in cave art that is believed to be about rituals and a belief in supernatural powers, or a spirit realm and the ability to connect with life on a spiritual level.  

As for your second argument, "syntax and language are most likely more recent developments that emerged long after the more fundamental ability to understand and use arbitrary symbols non-syntactically."

There is reason to believe this transition is what separated the modern man from the Neanderthals, and of course earlier branches in the human tree.  Both originated in Africa, but the modern man came out Africa later, and they were much more successful.  It is considered possible their greater ability to succeed was language.    The following is in harmony with the previous link about how language determines our evolution.  

Quote:https://www.mpg.de/623578/pressRelease201011021
 "When we compare the skulls of a Neanderthal and a modern human newborn, the Neanderthal’s face is already larger at the time of birth. However, most shape differences of the internal braincase develop after birth," explains Gunz. Both Neanderthals and modern human neonates have elongated braincases at the time of birth, but only modern human endocasts change to a more globular shape in the first year of life. Modern humans and Neanderthals therefore reach large adult brain sizes via different developmental pathways.

I have to ask why did homo sapiens evolve and not Neanderthals?  There is so much genetic evidence of Neanderthals in modern man, they were thought to be very much like us, and therefore, absorbed into our gene pool rather than exterminated by modern man.  

Is it possible the increased evolution in favor of language was about population density?  Our advanced knowledge is possible because accumulated knowledge can be transmitted from one generation to the next.  However, isolated people do not get near the exposure to knowledge as people in large cities with strong commerce ties. The more we connect with different people, the more we learn.  Neanderthals were isolated and I speculate that made their evolution a dead end?  

---

That you tube is very thought provoking and I probably will spend a lot of time checking out related ones. Given the limits of my knowledge and understanding it would be wise for me stay silent, but what fun would that be?

Of course, we can change our understanding of the past, and we can change how we react to our present by changing our personal drama, but isn't it a stretch to say we can change the past? We can not bring back the Neantherdrals or any extinct species. We can not replay our history making the native Americans the winners of the fight for land and values and beliefs, with the Europeans submitting to the will of the aboriginal people, putting all the gold and oil and other minerals back in the ground. We are not on the planet God gave us, but one we have created for ourselves, and that may or may not be good for humanity? Humanity may realize the day when it wishes it could turn back time, but it may be too late.

I think with language we can change our personal drama and maybe the consciousness of our society, but I don't think we should believe we can literally change the past.

Oh my goodness, "literally"? "Literal" is a study of words and that is not the same thing as a study of physical being and change, but our minds can confuse the two. We can think studying a holy book is equal to studying manifestation and knowing God's truth and will. With such a thought we are no longer brothers of the bears and wolves and of one spirit.

The Online Etymology Dictionary
Look up literal at Dictionary.com
late 14c., "taking words in their natural meaning" (originally in reference to Scripture and opposed to mystical or allegorical), from Late Latin literalis/litteralis "of or belonging to letters or writing," from Latin litera/littera "letter, alphabetic sign; literature, books" (see letter (n.1)). Related: Literalness.

(Dec 6, 2016 08:58 PM)Carol Wrote: [ -> ]Is it possible the increased evolution in favor of language was about population density?  Our advanced knowledge is possible because accumulated knowledge can be transmitted from one generation to the next.  However, isolated people do not get near the exposure to knowledge as people in large cities with strong commerce ties. The more we connect with different people, the more we learn.  Neanderthals were isolated and I speculate that made their evolution a dead end?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neandertha...r#Language

Watch these two videos and tell me what you think.

Peter Tse - Search for Meaning

Yuval Noah Harari - Why Humans Run the World

Before I watch the videos, I want to post this information about how modern man may have differed from Neanderthals.

Quote:https://www.edge.org/conversation/laurie...s-glitches
The hypothesis right now is that what makes humans special is the fact that nonhuman animals can't get out of their current here and now; they can't get out of the facts of the world. That means they can't think about counterfactuals, they can't think about the future well, they can't think about the past well. They also can't take others' perspectives in the same way that we can. But, as with all these hypotheses, we could be wrong.  

                             
I want to thank CC for about http://www.aldaily.com/ because is where I found the link explaining the research being done, to test the hypothesis.  I think it is likely that Neanderthals did not evolve the ability to out of their current here and now.  Especially the ability to take other's perspective would make modern humans more successful than Neanderthals if they could not do that, because our success depends on how well we can work together.  
How can we think about what we think and know someone else may not think the same, without language?  Without language, everything is as it is, and there is no alternative to that, right?

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(Dec 7, 2016 12:15 AM)Secular Sanity Wrote: [ -> ]

(Dec 6, 2016 08:58 PM)Carol Wrote: [ -> ]Is it possible the increased evolution in favor of language was about population density?  Our advanced knowledge is possible because accumulated knowledge can be transmitted from one generation to the next.  However, isolated people do not get near the exposure to knowledge as people in large cities with strong commerce ties. The more we connect with different people, the more we learn.  Neanderthals were isolated and I speculate that made their evolution a dead end?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neandertha...r#Language

Watch these two videos and tell me what you think.

Peter Tse - Search for Meaning

Yuval Noah Harari - Why Humans Run the World

 I think this is higly possible

[/url]

Quote:Steven Mithen (2006) speculates that the Neanderthals may have had an elaborate proto-linguistic system of communication that was more musical than modern human language, and that pre-dated the separation of language and music into two separate modes of cognition. He called this hypothetical lingual system 'hmmmmm' because it would be Holistic, manipulative, multi-modal, musical, and mimetic.[17]

[url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neanderthal_behavior#cite_note-17]

The link posted above this reply will make sense out of why a proto-languistic system is not equal to modern man's communication, however, would be part of the evolution between ape and modern man.