tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14072474.post8893466951624898587..comments2023-11-03T06:36:27.305-04:00Comments on Phronesisaical: Networked Ordinary Languagehelmuthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09069600766378586919noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14072474.post-87404631289307761672010-02-20T00:35:53.031-05:002010-02-20T00:35:53.031-05:00You're right. "Tags" was misleading....You're right. "Tags" was misleading. I guess I'm specifically talking about google, but it could be put more broadly. But that would just make me more confused.<br /><br />There's no big point here. Just Friday morning musing. Maybe it doesn't hold up as having any coherence at all. It certainly presumes that evolution is somehow suspended such that a very human technological product in the world is somehow not a human technology. That makes the idea nonsensical from the get-go. <br /><br />But I'm not taking it all that seriously. Just wondering how ordinary language might develop if hominids began the long slog towards modern language with internet technology already in existence, like trees and birds. Maybe they/we would just bang on the machines with rocks for a hundred millenia or come to worship them as gods. As more complex language developed and as humans learned more and more about the technology would we see similar evolutionary paths as with our actual modern languages? Or would it be something radically different? <br /><br />Honestly, it's a half-baked thought, and I'll cry uncle before I have to defend it any further.helmuthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09069600766378586919noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14072474.post-86567595487259551832010-02-19T17:24:51.307-05:002010-02-19T17:24:51.307-05:00"tags" had me thinking in terms XML and ..."tags" had me thinking in terms XML and database querying.MThttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02341704109256270557noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14072474.post-91188844300483935202010-02-19T17:24:13.227-05:002010-02-19T17:24:13.227-05:00Anyway, how much is Google about tags? Fundamental...Anyway, how much is Google about tags? Fundamentally it searches for text, not formatting.MThttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02341704109256270557noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14072474.post-28241990999918421872010-02-19T17:17:42.992-05:002010-02-19T17:17:42.992-05:00I guess I'm having a hard time imagining what ...I guess I'm having a hard time imagining what you mean--still. Do these cyborgs interact with the Web like we do by typing at a computer interface? By thought? Do they "speak" in the real world or only online? Is the language Internet-ready or must it be transcribed like the language we speak?MThttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02341704109256270557noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14072474.post-24054419035459651312010-02-19T15:42:47.788-05:002010-02-19T15:42:47.788-05:00I find the question of brain wiring and language s...I find the question of brain wiring and language structure fascinating and unknown enough just as it is.<br /><br />How is it, for example, that some languages are highly inflected and others not? And that if we learn one in infancy, we can still learn the other? Even more so for agglutinative versus other languages?Cheryl Roferhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11082102629165547210noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14072474.post-72975014171809516292010-02-19T14:18:44.198-05:002010-02-19T14:18:44.198-05:00Besides, as some linguists and cognitive scientist...Besides, as some linguists and cognitive scientists have it, the brain must be wired already to carry the basic structure of natural language upon which our actually existing languages are built. What if that wiring was not what it is but something else?helmuthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09069600766378586919noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14072474.post-49902859859215604142010-02-19T14:16:00.216-05:002010-02-19T14:16:00.216-05:00Realist. Okay, I guess I should make clear that th...Realist. Okay, I guess I should make clear that this hypothetical would require that we are descended from cyborgs or something like that. I know Google couldn't be created otherwise. But the point here is what if we started to evolve natural languages from a world in which the internet was already put here by cyborgs, God, Vishnu, particularly smart and dexterous bonobos, etc?helmuthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09069600766378586919noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14072474.post-3245670498591718102010-02-19T13:11:25.490-05:002010-02-19T13:11:25.490-05:00Sometimes I think I can play music out of my ass.Sometimes I think I can play music out of my ass.MThttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02341704109256270557noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14072474.post-69383683101254723202010-02-19T13:06:49.598-05:002010-02-19T13:06:49.598-05:00I think this is not a first-language option, incid...I think this is not a first-language option, incidentally, unless we're talking about a descendant species of cyborgs. Language reflects our experience of the world and I think a child needs to experience that correspondence to learn it. Human infants can't experience or theorize the internet.MThttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02341704109256270557noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-14072474.post-16545439754231904312010-02-19T12:59:23.598-05:002010-02-19T12:59:23.598-05:00I think we'd need something like diacriticals ...I think we'd need something like diacriticals for speech, which could act as tags. Tonality as in Chinese spoken language might work, or hand signs as in ASL, or maybe we'd need both two together to be able to efficiently denote diverse parameters or coding unambiguously with one tag. But you couldn't talk and type at the same time and telephones would be a lot less useful.MThttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02341704109256270557noreply@blogger.com