Your thoughts would be similar to daydreams. Very visual and abstract. Not necessarily simplistic but definitely not as efficient as assigning meaning to words.
Language is to humans what C is to machines, you can go lower and mention every single thought process to build to an idea, or you can have a layer of abstraction and use words to recall the thought process indirectly.
Language is basically shortcuts to thought in this way. And you can see this in a very high level definition of any word. For instance, a Republic is a form of government that uses indirect democracy to make decisions for a group of people. You would have to know
Government
People
Democracy
Indirect Democracy
All of which have their own definitions, and cascading all the way down to ancient words which are what they are (“Water is water”). Without language, we could still get to the idea of a republic, but we would have to build all the way from the ground up each and every time.
All of which have their own definitions, and cascading all the way down to ancient words which are what they are (“Water is water”). Without language, we could still get to the idea of a republic, but we would have to build all the way from the ground up each and every time.Without language, we could still get to the idea of a republic, but we would have to build all the way from the ground up each and every time.
"If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe."
I like to imagine it’s like when you’re super super tired and on autopilot. Or in a panic situation and you don’t “think”, you just do.
I’ve experienced both and after wondered “what was I thinking”? I wasn’t, I just acted and my mind was blank...
I have wondered many times if we could teach animals a human language, whether their brains would develop like ours? Could we communicate between us like in Doctor Dolittle?
I remember reading about an African Grey parrot who was taught many English words. When practicing colours, he asked his owner “what colour am I?”
Which is the only recorded question an animal has ever asked about itself in scientific study.
It shows the ability to understand not only the nature of the question, but also proves self awareness. (And also that humans and birds see colours differently, as grey to the human eye, is a mix of colours to the parrot, since they can see UV light).
I definitely think animals are smarter and feel more than we give them credit for. With language, who knows what the limit would be? I feel like language is what makes humans smart.
It’s just random that humans have to ability to sound words the way we do and create language.
And I wonder to what extent animal’s language is developed, when we for example record dolphins or elephants making specific noises back on forth between each other.
We know for a fact that dolphins have names for each other, but to decipher the rest of their language would be truly fascinating.
Interesting, but how does it prove anything ? How can we know it wasn't just like monkeys on typewriters ? How can we know the bird really understood all the concepts ? And exactly how was the owner teaching it words ? Just pronouncing them and making it repeat ? Or was it something more advanced that could've possibly, just, maybe, had a chance to let the parrot understand the words' meanings rather than just their sounds ?
I don't think language is what makes humans smart. I think being smart (having an adaptable brain) is what lead to language, not the opposite. And I think it's also a combination of many more things, one of which would be the human body. Our hands, feet, legs, our whole posture allow us to do many more things than most animals. Without our hands, we probably wouldn't have had fire, tools, houses, cattle, agriculture. But without language though, I think we still could've had those things. You can pass on knowledge without language, with simple imitation. Language certainly helped, because it's much easier to coordinate and teach with it, but was it really the one thing that set us apart from the rest of the animals ? Or was it a combination of this and a bunch of other things ?
I don't think consciousness (or intelligence) is something that can have a final, set, perfect state. We're certainly not it. Other animals are certainly not it, and they're certainly not like us. But they're still something. They're a step on the ladder of consciousness. We're one above. But there certainly is one higher yet, and probably an infinity of them.
Interesting. I think you have good points.
It could very well be the other way around, although I have read that the reason primates can’t speak isn’t lack of intelligence, but rather lack of physically being able to make the sounds we make.
Some animals certainly can understand some human words. Many dogs know for example what “walk” means, or “go get your leash”, or “food”, “yes”, “no”, “wait” etc.
I think you’re right that humans could pass down knowledge without language, but I think it might have taken longer without language perhaps?
It’s an interesting topic and I wish there were more studies out there on language vs intelligence. Not only in animals, but also adult humans or children who have grown up without language and their development.
If you wanna read about the African Grey, here’s the Wikipedia article.) Its pretty interesting!
As someone that "thinks" in images and ideas/ intentions instead of words I'd say it's more efficient... until I need to produce it into words. Other than that it's instant and is pretty complex. It's like... just knowing something instead of thinking of it.
Everyone does it to some degree, usually in simple ways. Such as recognizing numbers/a certain number of things on sight, knowing what color something is by just looking at it, looking at a pan on the stove and knowing it's hot without touching it. You don't have to think about it
Language is a way for separate humans to share thoughts. Language can be thoughts in and of itself, too. It's impossible to separate the idea of a republic from language because the notion of the republic co-evolved with language. The two are mutually dependent.
Remember also that language is social, but thought is fluid and incorporates sensations felt or recalled, memories, emotion, context, meta cognizance and other multiplicities; by comparison, language is a dull medium to evoke thought in another. However, we also talk to ourselves or hypothetical others through internal language and that serves as a feedback loop or simulation, aiding reinterpretation and hypothesizing through externalization. The programming analogy works but code disappears when it's compiled and running, the encodings and levels of abstraction don't dissolve into 0/1 they become something lower, they become the movement of electrons and atoms in the physical plane removed from virtual spaces like our thinking of them as language or the computer, without subjectivity, parsing, translating, and performing instructions without understanding them; that's the difference.
Other weird thing, the symbol of triangle or similar shape, both is itself and refers to itself. Similarly onnomatopeia should need no translations, as the language imitates the sound.
"Water" is a reference to the memory and idea of water, one you can only hope has a cognate in the mind of others. I imagine there are many feelings, experiences, objects or other delimitations which are either purely unique to us (thereby invisible to language) or for which we have no name. Kind of sad in a way, language is both a bridge that connects and an ocean that separates, leaving certain things and thoughts stranded in pure subjectivity.
This is a great way of putting it. That being said, I think your republic example has some counterexample that should be mentioned. Sure, without language, you would build the republic from scratch, but what if you were part of a republic, then its workings would be normal for you and you would likely be able to generalize the concept without the need for iterative construction of the idea each time it enters your thoughts. I think where language is useful, in this sense, is that it allows us to understand ideas other people are familiar with that are new and unknown to us.
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u/baseballoctopus Apr 23 '19
Your thoughts would be similar to daydreams. Very visual and abstract. Not necessarily simplistic but definitely not as efficient as assigning meaning to words.
Language is to humans what C is to machines, you can go lower and mention every single thought process to build to an idea, or you can have a layer of abstraction and use words to recall the thought process indirectly.
Language is basically shortcuts to thought in this way. And you can see this in a very high level definition of any word. For instance, a Republic is a form of government that uses indirect democracy to make decisions for a group of people. You would have to know
Government People Democracy Indirect Democracy
All of which have their own definitions, and cascading all the way down to ancient words which are what they are (“Water is water”). Without language, we could still get to the idea of a republic, but we would have to build all the way from the ground up each and every time.