Language: The Structure of Thought

I have the unique experience of having been romantically involved with (or married to) three teachers of the deaf. Not all at the same time, mind you, like some sign language convention gone primal, but stretched out over almost 20 years of my life.

I have never understood the reason for this, and probably never will. But being exposed to people who spend their lives bringing language to those who can't hear has given me the the inspiration and understanding which I will share now with you.

If I were to choose the worst sense to lose, personally I would choose the sense of vision. To me, not being able to see would be a true horror.

My teachers of the deaf tell me otherwise. They say that for a child unable to hear spoken language, actual brain development is impaired. Why? Because language is the structure of thought.

A World Without Sound

Imagine being someone who has never heard a sound. Your brain is filled with visual information, but how do you organize it?

Some things are easy. One day you see a brick wall, the next day you see a drywall wall. You eventually notice that they are similar. They separate spaces. They protect us. We can't walk through them. They look different but in many ways they are the same.

If you were never able to hear the word "wall", or any word for that matter, your mind might, or might not, develop an internal impression which would represent the general class of things you can't walk through.

Here is where a word would come in very handy. If you could hear sound, you could easily attach the two wall experiences with a common sound. That sound is a word. A single syllable can become a quick abbreviation for the commonality between a collection of full fidelity visual and tactile impressions.

Think Google. You can enter any word or phrase into the search bar, and Google will dump piles of information in your lap, all organized around a few typed characters. What then, if characters or words don't exist? How do you tell the computer what to retrieve?

Even Google Images requires a word in order to retrieve the image. No word, no information.

Words Are Symbols

Words, then, are symbols. They represent real-world things in an easy way. They help us organize our information. They allow us to create cubbyholes so we can store similar or related ideas. They help us see that some things are parts of other things rather than standing alone.

Here is a definition of knowledge, from Wikipedia:

"Knowledge is an appreciation of the possession of interconnected details which, in isolation, are of lesser value."

The stepping stone between knowing isolated details and appreciating the richness of interconnection, is words.

Most four year olds have accumulated hundreds of words which have helped them assimilate the world around them in an organized way. Every day these wildly fertile minds connect things internally through play and life, creating a mushrooming web of knowledge and understanding.

The rapidly expanding web of understanding is a multi-media experience. A visual impression connects with a tactile impression, which connects with an audio impression, which connects with a tangible result, which gets filed away with words and sounds. Take away the words and sounds, and you have a crippled filing system.

Concepts

There is a world beyond, and more complex than the organization of tangible things. This is the world of concepts. I like this definition of a concept from the University of Washington:

A concept is an abstraction or symbol that represents similarities or common characteristics in phenomena.

A phenomenon, according to Princeton University, is any state or process known through the senses....

One might infer that a word, therefore is a concept, because it is a symbol representing commonality in observed things. I say yes, in its simplest form, but there is more.

First comes the word abstraction. Again, per Princeton, an abstraction is the process of formulating general concepts by abstracting common properties of instances. Sounds circular, no?

The key in all of this, is that a more complex concepts involves creating or abstracting commonalities between states, processes or instances.

This is far beyond walls. This can describe the intricacies of everyday life, and the most intricate of all, interaction with people. Try to formulate logical deductions without words. It won't happen. Try to share complex nuances of feelings without words. Very tough.

Words in Business

Business transactions are deals built upon presumed understandings. Parties trade things in exchange for other things. Each party represents their offering to the other party using words.

Are the words that you use clear? Do they precisely express your intentions and expectations in business agreements? If not, crisp them up. Words are not only the the building blocks of knowledge, but are fundamental in trade.


Mark Meshulam offers
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