Perception

The following is based on a discussion held concerning an article in the March, 2006 issue of Scientific American. The article can be found on page 34 and describes the relationship between language and perception. While truly understanding the argument held below needs one to read the original article in the journal as well as the first response made to the article (below is actually the fourth response to the article in a series of responses on an online message board), you can still get a grip on the abstract, but somewhat interesting thoughts that are provoked by college-level philosophy classes. The following was written for, in particular, a Philosophy of Science class. Enjoy.





I agree with the majority of your posts in reference to this language/ interpretation of reality topic. In fact, I will go further and state that many linguists (or, at least people with knowledge of multiple languages) go as far as to point out English as the or, at least, one of the best languages to use when great detail is needed. This is because English has an endless array of adverbs and adjectives- objects that many other languages lack in such a supply as English has. However, I don’t know if this means that English speakers understand reality differently then those that speak other languages as much as it proves a model that states that English speakers can better describe the reality that they perceive. That being said, I am going to have to go and review the Sci Am article as well as the Wikipedia links that you provided because I am sure there is some sort of scientific data used to back up the claim that English speakers are actually perceiving reality more completely then others (such as the left side/right side brain examinations that you mentioned)…

Now, all that being said, you are touching on a subject that I have abstractly thought about many times, although usually when I am much less sober then I am now. But, really, a good majority of everything in the world boils down, by definition, to a man-made word. For example, while we can break down the Hydrogen and Oxygen compound of water, it is only called “water” because we say so. I mean, does a bird know that he is a bird? I know this is a very abstract thought process going on here and, surely, I am going to have to expand on at a later time (which just gave me GREAT reason to get bombed real soon) to really describe why this idea has intrigued me. But it does tie into your posts, because- if my own thoughts do hold weight- then it helps to prove the theories that you have posted here true. If everything is little more then words at the core, then those of us with a language of more words, or at least more descriptive and more scrutinizing words could very well understand everything at a more descriptive and scrutinized level….

I hope this was *at all* followable…