A rose by any other name

Language may not be the best basis for understanding truth

[This is essay three in my series about the nature of reality - to be turned into a book upon completion - if you want to start from the beginning here is the preface and then introduction.]

Photo by Shannon Baldwin on Unsplash

Unless we are dropped by a stork into the forest and raised by wolves, from the moment we are born, human language shapes our understanding of the world. Our experience is described for us by those who raise us (and whose experience in turn was described by those who raised them). We are given labels and names for everything from our teeny tiny toes to the stars in the skies. 

Through language we learn the stories of others and formulate our own. And every single thing about the world that we believe - whether it’s the name of that shining orb in the sky or the story of the speed of light - we only know because someone has spoken it into existence. As linguist and author Steven Roger Fischer points out in his book, A History of Language (the source of most of the historical information in this essay), “More than any other of life’s faculties, it is language that tells us who we are, what we mean and where we are going. 

Because of how intrinsically our use of language is linked to both our brain and our social development, language is not just a communication tool. It actively creates our experience of reality. And in today’s digital realm where words inform every aspect of our personal, professional and social lives, it's important to realize that relying on it exclusively has the potential to constrain, skew or otherwise hamper our understanding of the world.

Language - the medium of information exchange - is neither a recent nor human creation. Earth’s earliest organisms used chemo-communication as the language that helped them find others of the same species and procreate with them. Everything from ants to elephants use highly sophisticated languages, be they chemical, kinetic or acoustic. The infrasound emitted by crocodiles, elephants and ocean waves and the ultrasound above our hearing range used by insects, bats and dolphins convey reams of information, the importance of whose contents we are oblivious to. Many languages still await our discovery of them, like that of the whalesong only heard once electronic sensing devices in the 1950s detected their existence.

While human syntax dates back a million years or more, language as we know it evolved only in the past couple hundred thousand years. Prior to the development of the breathing apparatus and neural pathways that allow our current use of language, humans had highly functioning cerebral systems, and while language was a gift that enabled the organizational abilities to undertake vast sea crossings and complex hunts in harsh climates, it came with a cost. It reduced our ability to communicate through chemical and body signals, limiting our perception of and interaction with our surroundings.

As our language evolved, we moved from only using words like fish, fire, fingers which were directly associated with the world around us to a higher order vocabulary entirely disconnected from it - words like to, which, because and why.  Further limitations developed around twelve thousand years ago with the practice of permanent agriculture, which bound language to geographical origin. And the advent of the graphic expression of human speech in the last few thousand years removed humans even more from each other by making it possible to convey information without requiring direct interaction, thus eliminating the non verbal cues that convey (and some might say are necessary to understand) meaning.

As our use of language grew, so too did the domination of certain forms of it and further losses in understanding. The widespread acceptance of the Greek alphabet meant the erasure of other writing methods, each with their own unique abilities to describe local conditions. As regional dialects became subsumed by more “successful” forms of language, intricate meanings were lost. Kummerspeck, gigil. and my favourite, greng-jai require cumbersome and lengthy translation attempts that still can’t quite capture the meaning conveyed in the origin language, and were German, Tagalog, and Thai to fall into disuse as countless other languages have, such concepts would be lost completely. When we lost Yaghan we lost mamihiapinatapai - a word awkwardly translated into English as a look shared by two people, each wishing that the other would initiate something that they both desire but which neither wants to begin. 

Language became able to do far more than communicate necessary data about for our survival. It also developed into a powerful tool of persuasion. Gilgamesh of Sumeria used it to spread his name in an act of self promotion not unlike those of today’s social media influencers. Ancient rulers in 200 BC used it so pervasively that one account describes “officialese” as contaminating nearly all ancient Egyptian and Mayan texts.  And widespread disinformation (the label to which it is applied always based on the perspective of the labeller) shows us that language can be used to obfuscate or mislead as often as it is to inform.

In today’s world, language can separate us from each other in many ways. Communication between older generations and younger ones gets hampered due to evolving vernacular that renders each hard to understand by the other. Everyone from online gamers to street gangs use slang or coded language with fellow insiders. And even when we do speak the same language, we dramatically overestimate our ability to correctly interpret what others are saying. Each of us uses language our own way, with our own particular expressions and nuances. The phrase “What did I say?!” has been uttered with exasperation many times when we don’t understand why someone else was upset by our words, because we regularly infer and deduce meaning during our conversations far beyond the literal words we are presented with. Misunderstandings that arise from our assumptions can be hilarious in the right setting of a television show, comedy bit like The Three Stooges “Who’s On First”, or in our own lives - if quickly exposed. Too often though they are cleared up too little, too late, or not at all, causing either temporary or lasting damage to political, business and personal relationships. 

It’s not just interpersonal relationships that can be affected by believing language represents truth. Some research even suggests that words are physically harmful to health. Inequalities may be created, exacerbated and perpetuated by language when used to prevent those with low literacy levels from attaining positions of power and wealth. Even one’s accent in their native tongue has been used to discriminate, especially in places like the United Kingdom, where George Bernard Shaw in his 1916 play Pygmalion opined in that “It is impossible for an Englishman to open his mouth without making some other Englishman hate or despise him“. 

Widespread deployment of euphemisms in the military context means language can be used to desensitize people to violence. Terms like collateral damage, friendly fire or impaired combat personnel, the latter railed against by Winston Churchill during a military briefing, are common in descriptions of war. What is called an invasion instead of a liberation, or vice versa, is determined by the side using the term. Even using the word conflict to describe a military action disguises the violence of the battlefield. 

Finally, language can be weaponized to dehumanize people so as to spread the fear that leads to violence or hatred as happened to the most extreme degree in Nazi Germany and Rwanda yet exists in subtler forms around the world - like during political campaigns in Western democracies. 

When we read too much into language, we literally begin war. The ancient association of one’s family with one’s language has given rise to countless wars and less violent yet harmfully divisive conflicts over language here in Canada (English and French) as well as southern neighbour United States (Spanish and English). Wars are fought by those who have countless similarities, but almost universally lack a common language as a unifying feature between them.

All of what I have just presented is a cautionary observation of language, not an indictment. Language is merely a tool that can be wielded many ways. It can create beauty, forge bonds, lead to a deep feeling of being understanding, and allow the story-telling that both defines and brings us together as a species. And when used in song and games in 1914 in the trenches of Belgium and France, it briefly stopped a war and turned enemies into friends.

So powerful is language that it is considered a divine intervention, bestowed on us by God or Gods in countless cultures around the world, including the Judeo-Christian one. In Genesis God is said to have given Adam the ability to speak and communicate, and some native cultures describe even more fascinating origins. I find particularly applicable the story of the Iroquois confederacy, which involves Sky woman - the divine being who fell from the sky and landed on the back of the turtle. The twins who she birthed, Good Mind and Bad Mind, argued over whether humans should be given the gift of speech. Flint, the Bad Mind, argues against it, but Good Mind prevails and thus speech is bestowed, and perhaps in some ways, Bad Mind has been using language alongside Good Mind ever since.

As we enter a new era of communication through AI, it becomes more important to see language not as a medium of truth but a descriptor of a perspective. We want language to be a useful tool for connection and problem solving instead of an impenetrable boundary that limits our exchange with the world. And we don’t need to mistake language for truth. The world was talking long before Homo erectus, and when we fail to speak or listen to non human languages, whether due to biology, necessity or mere ignorance, we get a severely limited picture of the world in which we live.

Relying solely on language to communicate with the world is akin to speaking more loudly to a foreign language speaker in order to get them to understand your own. Sometimes it’s simply not the right tool for the moment.

I used to think language could tell me what things were, and as I finish this essay my gaze happens upon a tall green thing outside my window. I speak English so I’ve been taught that it’s a tree. If I’d been raised with Arabic I’d call it a شجرة (shojra), or an arvore if I was born in Portugal. Now I consider that language is not the whole truth, and that perhaps it’s more accurate to say what I see has no objective label at all. And at this moment my job is not to box it with preconceived labels, but simply gaze upon its vibrant colour and movement in the wind, inhale the fragrance from its leaves, and take respite in the shade from its boughs.

---