is the reduction of language constricting the thought of society

[freaky nut]

is this true? for instance the way we think is through language, if we did not have it how would we think? therefore does a devolving language suggest a simplification/ reduction of complex thought? is it political influenced? (re 1984, G.Orwell) or is it culturally and socially produced? are text messages or emails a source for a possible devolution of language? (ie becoming increasingly abbreivated and reduced)

[Athelwulf]

Most people don't think through language, but through pictures, concepts, and metaphors.

Simplifying something doesn't mean you're devolving it, and a simplified language doesn't reduce complex thought. The Chinese language is one of the simplest major languages in the world, and the Chinese are just as capable of complex thought as the rest of us.

That a written language is being abbreviated and reduced says nothing of the spoken language which it represents. A written language is simply a visual representation of a spoken one, and it can be as simple or as complex as you please. Again, look at the Chinese language: very simple when spoken, very intricate when written.

[Dinosaur]

Language is required for both communication and for complex thought processes. You require either words or corresponding internal abstract symbols, pictures, whatever.

Imagine carying on a conversation without having words like: House, tree, car, Charlie Brown, et cetera. You would have to describe a house, tree, car, Charlie Brown, et cetera every time you wanted to reference the object, person, whatever. A simple conversation would be so complex that it would be unintelligible.

Just as you could not carry on an intelligible conversation without a language, you could not think about anything but the simplest concepts without getting confused.

[Roman]

I don't think we're losing any more language than we're gaining.

Laser and scuba were once acronyms. Now one's a verb.

[Athelwulf]

Language is required for both communication and for complex thought processes. You require either words or corresponding internal abstract symbols, pictures, whatever.

I understand communication, and articulating complex thought into something which can be communicated, but I don't understand why you need a method of communicating your complex thoughts in order to have them in the first place. For example, I would say that I think in concepts, pictures, and metaphors rather than words and sentences.

Imagine carying on a conversation without having words like: House, tree, car, Charlie Brown, et cetera. You would have to describe a house, tree, car, Charlie Brown, et cetera every time you wanted to reference the object, person, whatever. A simple conversation would be so complex that it would be unintelligible.

Just as you could not carry on an intelligible conversation without a language, you could not think about anything but the simplest concepts without getting confused.

Do you have some source concerning this? I don't think that I think in words much, but if I'm wrong, I'd like to know.

I don't think we're losing any more language than we're gaining.

I don't think we're losing any appreciable amount of language, period.

[redarmy11]

I understand communication, and articulating complex thought into something which can be communicated, but I don't understand why you need a method of communicating your complex thoughts in order to have them in the first place. For example, I would say that I think in concepts, pictures, and metaphors rather than words and sentences.

What pictures did you use to formulate that response?

[Roman]

I don't think we're losing any appreciable amount of language, period.

Losing? No.
But going out of style....

[Athelwulf]

What pictures did you use to formulate that response?

I remember thinking about some sort of cypher, and using it to decrypt something (language is a "cypher" for your thoughts). And then I thought about the fact that something that's encrypted is still there even if the cypher is gone.

Concepts: encryption, decryption. Pictures: a cypher. Metaphors: language is a cypher.

[redarmy11]

ur wierd.

Concepts: u; wierdness.

[Roman]

I think in words, like a proper person.

[Athelwulf]

I think in words, like a proper person.

Really?

So when you think of how to describe your house to someone, you imagine the words "house", "big", "red", etc., instead of picturing your big red house?

[Roman]

Really?

So when you think of how to describe your house to someone, you imagine the words "house", "big", "red", etc., instead of picturing your big red house?

As a big red house.
How would you interpet "estimates that the frequency of heteropaternal superfecundation among dizygotic twins whose parents were involved in paternity suits was approximately 2.4%"

[Athelwulf]

As a big red house.
How would you interpet "estimates that the frequency of heteropaternal superfecundation among dizygotic twins whose parents were involved in paternity suits was approximately 2.4%"

While I read, the words that I know or can figure out make me picture their referrent. For example, "heteroparental" makes me think of a couple made up of a man and a woman. The pictures and concepts run together to form the entire thought that the sentence conveys.

Now, here's a good, and related, example that I just thought of that shows we think more often in pictures than in words. While I read a book, the words make me picture what the words are talking about, and as I read along, the pictures tie together to form the story. Then after I'm done reading the book, I can remember it by thinking about what happened. What's more, it's easiest to remember it through thinking about what happened, because I remember how the story went. If I try to remember through the words in the book, it doesn't get me far, because I often don't remember how the words went.

I could translate my memory of the story into words which would have a similar effect to the words from the book. But I'm still thinking mostly through concepts, pictures, and metaphors in order to acheive this.

[redarmy11]

wierdo

[Roman]

I read in words. When I go into recall, I can remember where words were located that contain the info I'm looking for– top of the page, side of the page, etc. I remember words. Like any normal person.

[Makaveli]

language is constricting the though ot society.. the fact of the matter is that language centers develop earlier and faster than do the areas responsible for quantitative and abstract thought. there is a substantial body of research to support this.language does infact play a vital role in thought

[Fraggle Rocker]

This question is brought up on SciForums a couple of times a year. These days I'm what passes for the resident linguist here so you can take my word for it or do the research.

According to psychologists who study such things, most people do in fact think predominantly in words. I'm sure most of you out there have actual sentences running through your minds.

That's not to say everyone and that's not to say all the time. I'm a musician and I can spend quite a long time thinking in music. Artists and sculptors think in visual images. Dancers and athletes think in movements. Carpenters, plumbers, gardeners... lots of craftspeople put together the building blocks of their trade in their heads the way we put together words as our building blocks.

And as Athelwulf points out, when anyone thinks of a familiar physical object, he gets a visual image rather than words. The same is true of familiar physical experiences. But life gets more complex with every generation and most of us arguably spend most of our time thinking about abstractions. Unlike Athelwulf, I'll wager that when most of us think about artiodactyls (if we think about them at all) we don't visualize a parade of giraffes, pigs, moose and cattle. We're thinking about the number of toes and the commonalities in their digestive systems and how remarkable it is that whales have been discovered to be descended from hippopotamuses.

Still even artists and craftspeople spend quite a bit of time falling back on words, particularly for problem solving.

• "If I put this valve over here I'll get backflow."
• "If I leap from this position I'll knock my partner over."
• "If I try to slide a C major chord into a D minor seventh I'll need three separate keyboards and I only have two hands."

I don't know how mathematicians think. I was once considered a math prodigy and I assure you that my thoughts were sentences straight out of a math book. "x equals square root b squared minus four a c over two a." Or perhaps that's why I never made the transition from prodigy to mathematician, maybe they think these thoughts more abstractly. I actually found it hard to think in math without writing it down because the formulas were clearer on paper. How do you distribute the "square root" and "over" in my example in a linear sentence without using Polish notation?

The Chinese language is one of the simplest major languages in the world, and the Chinese are just as capable of complex thought as the rest of us.

Westerners are fond of calling Chinese "simple" because it doesn't have the particular kind of complexity that our languages have. Inflections. Parts of speech. Paradigms of tense, mood, person, number, case, etc. A table of a couple of dozen prepositions to express every conceivable type of relationship.

To us that is "grammar." But "grammar" is the set of rules for putting words together to express meaning. Our rules of grammar are few and general, and are therefore constraining in a certain way. In Chinese the rules of grammar are many and specific. There may an individual rule for putting a particular group of words together. If there is (and you did it right), you've formed a compound word; if not (and you did it right), a clause. These are constraining in a different way.

The process of learning Chinese is easier to follow than the process of learning English, but it is a longer process.

[Dinosaur]

A long time ago I read an article which claimed that there are three types of internal processing.

• Some people think using words. Typically, but not exclusively journalists, writers, et cetera.
  
• Some think using pictures. Typically but not exclusively, artists, photographers, sculptors, et cetera.
  
• Some think in some unknown abstract symbols. Typically, but not exclusively mathematicians, engineers, et cetera. This group (to which I belong) cannot describe much about their thought processes because they cannot draw pictures or write an essay about their internal thought processes.

I suspect that everyone makes some use of the third mechanism in order to deal with abstract concepts.

I have often wondered how I can dream in color, but cannot create a mental image of anything when I am awake. If told to describe my father, I can use words, but I do not have an image of him in my mind as I am saying the words. I am not aware of the words internally until I say them. I am obviously a member of the third group.

[spidergoat]

Is the dictionary getting bigger? Aren't they adding new words every year? How do they keep track if old words fall into disuse? Is the total number of words in common use stable, increasing, or decreasing? Is the vocabulary variable with geography?

[Fraggle Rocker]

Vocabulary varies more with profession (e.g. geekspeak) and avocation (e.g. hip-hop), and a little bit with age, than with geography. TV has practically obliterated the chasm between Northern and Southern American English, and in concert with the internet even the differences between British and American English are being leveled. Latin American Spanish is rapidly tending toward one standard dialect as TV shows are shot with actors from multiple countries and viewed throughout the hemisphere.

The dictionary is getting bigger because there are more specialties with their own vocabularies. Everything from skateboarding to the environmental movement have their own jargon. So I don't know about your question regarding words in "common use." Clearly the vocabulary of the average human being has increased over time because we once had no language at all. Do people who live in more complicated societies know more words? I'm tempted to say it's "obvious" that you and I need a larger vocabulary than someone in the Stone Age, but it's not really obvious.

The OED is still considered a reliable authority on usage so if they say a word is obsolete we all trust them. However, they focus on the written language. Still, considering the conversational, unexpurgated style of today's print media I doubt there are any old words that we still speak which do not show up in print.