Rishon Rishon

Thought and Language

In my last post I talked about two ways of representing thought: words and pictures. There are others, among them what are usually called formal languages. While you might think that formal languages are artificial, or maybe highly structured, languages which are nonetheless languages much like natural languages, I challenge you with this observation: Formal languages cannot be spoken (and understood) in more than a trivial sense. They can only be understood to any degree of complexity when written down – so maybe they are pictures! (Since we are talking about thought, the way human beings understand them is critical to my definition of what they are.) I hope you agree with me that it is absurd to call mathematical notation and computer languages kinds of pictures! Nevertheless, they do help us think.

One of the remarkable things about natural languages, the point, I think, that Amritas was making here and here, is that though they differ incredibly, they all seem to be equally capable of expressing thought. As I understand it, there have been quite a few attempts to find cases where language influences thought, without success. (If I am not mistaken, this is known as the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis.) The only area where languages differ in a way that is relevant to thought is vocabulary, and this is easily remedied.