Anyone ever notice

[baconbit]

The English langauge and most other languages probably all are made up of words with no meaning or subjective meanomgs. By made up of i mean the foundatoin of it consists of such words.

What does to, by, do, if, all pronouns, and other such words really mean. If they have meanings there meanings may contain a word thats meanign contains it so they mean each other btu what do either of them mean i the first place. Then most words contain these words so no word really has a meaning.

Then there are the subjective words such as real, good, bad, ugly, pretty, cute, funny, smart, normal. and many more. All of those words have meanings that change depending on what a person thinks. Just like theones with no meanings these words can be found all over the place.

So what does anyhting anyone says really mean.

 

[Talula]

Eh, ok then.

 

[chevre]

Uh, yeah. Natural languages are full of ambiguities, but it doesn't matter, because humans are good at determining the correct meaning anyway. This is one reason it's so hard to write a good computerized translator.

 

[Darkfinn]

Okay... yeah, sure.

 

[BromeTeks]

I concur with chevre. The human language center is really advanced, so we can easily determine the meaning of ambiguous and subjective words.

 

[Boogeyman]

Latin is the root language. From it, all romantic languages come.

 

[Fire2box]

Thoughts are just electrical signals so do computers think?

 

[Boogeyman]

Thoughts are just electrical signals so do computers think?

Do robots dream of electric sheep?

 

[Charlie]

I think most of the understanding comes from the body language.

A good deal of what we actually say seems to be just filler.

 

[Chillhouse]

Latin is the root language. From it, all romantic languages come.

I thought english was germatic based?

 

[h3g3l]

The English langauge and most other languages probably all are made up of words with no meaning or subjective meanomgs. By made up of i mean the foundatoin of it consists of such words.

What does to, by, do, if, all pronouns, and other such words really mean. If they have meanings there meanings may contain a word thats meanign contains it so they mean each other btu what do either of them mean i the first place. Then most words contain these words so no word really has a meaning.

Then there are the subjective words such as real, good, bad, ugly, pretty, cute, funny, smart, normal. and many more. All of those words have meanings that change depending on what a person thinks. Just like theones with no meanings these words can be found all over the place.

So what does anyhting anyone says really mean.

At its base, you have two camps:
1. "Ideas and Language are the same thing. To utter something is to invoke it and make the Idea real."
2. "Ideas and Language are different things, with Language acting as a crude stand-in or representative for the Idea."

If you're a fan of #1, you have a very difficult road ahead. If you're a fan of #2, as I am, you can describe language as a crude approximation for the thing, the Idea, and suggest that this is the best tool we have, though crude, to describe something to another person.

So, we ascribe meaning where there is none for the purpose of sending out crude approximations and notions about our surrounding mental and physical topology.

 

[Boogeyman]

I thought english was germatic based?

ALL ROMANTIC. LANGUAGES.


Besides, I never denied germanic.

 

[Fire2box]

Do robots dream of electric sheep?

nope, since they never go to sleep.

 

[Boogeyman]

nope, since they never go to sleep.

It's a book, friend.

 

[PostTenebrasLux]

At its base, you have two camps:
1. "Ideas and Language are the same thing. To utter something is to invoke it and make the Idea real."
2. "Ideas and Language are different things, with Language acting as a crude stand-in or representative for the Idea."

If you're a fan of #1, you have a very difficult road ahead. If you're a fan of #2, as I am, you can describe language as a crude approximation for the thing, the Idea, and suggest that this is the best tool we have, though crude, to describe something to another person.

So, we ascribe meaning where there is none for the purpose of sending out crude approximations and notions about our surrounding mental and physical topology.

I suppose, for a number of reasons, that I'd fall in line with number 2 as well. Simply put, the same idea can be expressed in various languages (although imperfect translation occurs).

What really interests me are aspects of language, including body language, which are understood across cultures, and even species. Example: when my 1 year old relative isn't getting something he wants, he growls like a wolf. Seems to be an effective behavior for him recently. I assume our complicated verbal languages developed out of basic forms like his.

 

[h3g3l]

I suppose, for a number of reasons, that I'd fall in line with number 2 as well. Simply put, the same idea can be expressed in various languages (although imperfect translation occurs).

What really interests me are aspects of language, including body language, which are understood across cultures, and even species. Example: when my 1 year old relative isn't getting something he wants, he growls like a wolf. Seems to be an effective behavior for him recently. I assume our complicated verbal languages developed out of basic forms like his.

Now this is interesting. If you look at facial expression research (e.g. Motsumoto, and Paul Eckert(?)), you see that they are static across cultures. And this is fairly "new" knowledge, from the 1970s.