Theiling Online    Sitemap    Conlang Mailing List HQ   

Re: OT: Helen Keller & Whorf-Sapir

From:Caleb <cph9fa@...>
Date:Thursday, August 12, 2004, 8:37
--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Chris Bates
<chris.maths_student@N...> wrote:
> There was an article in the new scientist (I think) saying they'd
tested
> English babies (that didn't speak properly yet) getting them to
group
> similar items together, where the relevant similarity was loose v
tight
> containment (which is a distinction that you almost have to make in > Korean but not in English), and then English adults I think, and
they
> found that the babies performed much better at grouping them
together
> correctly than the adults. I might be getting some of the details > confused.. they might have tested Korean people too... This seems > relevant to the question since they were suggesting that all people
are
> capable of making the same distinctions, but the language they speak > guides them to give more thought etc to certain notions rather than > others. So I guess they were arguing that their experiment
supported the
> weak form not the strong form, that language guides (to a certain > degree) but doesn't limit thought. > The problem I see with your question though is that no one
experiences
> the world in the same way anyway, so deviation from a "standard"
view
> wouldn't be abnormal even for a speaking person. Your question
about how
> she percieves the world is just as futile as my question about how
you
> percieve it... you can't describe your perception properly, and I
doubt
> if you could I would understand, because your whole world view is
made
> up of a lifetime of experiences. It's similar to the old problem
about
> colours.. we both agree what red is, but how do I know your red is
the
> same as mine? What if the way you see red is how I see blue? etc.
That's a good point. I guess I was sort of wondering if there would be anything fundamentally different about the two interpretations. Some type of hurdle that would have to be jumped to make the leap from a touch-based language to a word-based one. Like I said, these I just some random thoughts I had. I didn't even know there was a strong vs. weak form (or I'd forgotten if I once knew). ~Caleb