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Elaboration 4.3

In the case of one of Russell's absurdities, the reader is reminded of his schooldays. As schoolboy, doing an exam, one has to answer a question naming the two divisions of a subject. Due to nervousness or bad preparation, one knows only one of them, and makes up the second in such a way that it seems not, but is exactly the first. Asked: 'What are the two functions of language?' it is then as if Russell answers?"Language has two primary purposes, expression and communication". It is obvious, that communication is exactly the same as expressing one's mind (feelings, ideas, opinions, notions and other synonyms). The correct answer, the one that the teacher would have given, should be: 'The two purposes of language (in man) are a) a tool for thinking, and b) a tool for communication. The first one is by far the most utter important one. In a (theoretical) Avignon or Aveyron child, one that has been reared by wolves, outside a glimmer of external intelligence, it is without doubt that it would have formed thought-symbols for the objects and activities in its environment. They would be clumsy symbols, true, but without it he could not think. In the same way have born blind and born deaf people totally different internal ideation, though, they learn to use standardized speech sounds or letters. The secondary function, communication, came into being and was steadily improved only AFTER an internal language had developed. Phylogenetically then, there was first an internal, personal, idea-syncratic (idea is idio) language in use for thinking. Then, the early invention of man was developed, the first standardization, the first intelligent act (co-operation). It was found that alongside the idea-syncratic systems, there was a possibility to standardize sounds and gestures (physical entities) as an intelligent extension of the naturally grown standards of crying, laughing, growling, the baring of teeth, etc. Of course, the system was based on the pair, on the pulse, on sound/no-sound, i.e. on a steady rhythm of repeated pairs, of marking time, and on tone, which is also pulse, rhythm. (The difference between tone and rhythm is solely in the frequency, like the radio/light waves are only in frequency different). When this lingual system became more and more complex (is refined), it came as a shock to the mind that thinking in that language was a considerable improvement of the former clumsy method of thinking. Man, then, as we do still, started thinking in words. There, unfortunately, it stopped, just one step over random. Today, there is little serious effort to improve the primitive, inconsistent, stupid system, and certainly there is little enthusiasm for improvement. G. B. Shaw, it is said, instituted a reward for persons who did significant work in merely a tiny facet of cleaning up (rationalize) language, namely the phonetic writing of the spoken sounds. I do not know if ever the reward was given out. The two functions of language remain however, first to work with ideas, and second to communicate ideas. As honest scientist I would say: it need not be the truth about language, it is only a better theory.
next up previous
Next: Elaboration 4.4 Up: Elaboration 4 Previous: Elaboration 4.2
Ven 2007-09-11