Lojban In General

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Something weird is going on here:

...
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
New experiments in Sapir Whorf, mentioined in Newsweek --
http://wwwords.org/?SWHE --gejyspa
X-archive-position: 15865
X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0
...

Anyway, gejyspa meant to tell us about http://www.newsweek.com/id/205985

mu'o mi'e florolf

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you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.

OK, this did affect my way of thinking, but what has it to do with Sapir-Whorf?

--- Original Message --
From: Michael Turniansky <mturniansky@gmail.com>
To: lojban-list@lojban.org
Sent: Monday, August 3, 2009 11:58:22 AM
Subject: lojban Experiments in Sapir Whorf

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with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if
you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.

Something weird is going on here:

...
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
New experiments in Sapir Whorf, mentioined in Newsweek --
http://wwwords.org/?SWHE --gejyspa
X-archive-position: 15865
X-ecartis-version: Ecartis v1.0.0
...

Anyway, gejyspa meant to tell us about http://www.newsweek.com/id/205985

mu'o mi'e florolf

To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to lojban-list-request@lojban.org
with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if
you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.

de'i li 03 pi'e 08 pi'e 2009 la'o fy. John E Clifford .fy. cusku zoi skamyxatra.
> OK, this did affect my way of thinking, but what has it to do with
> Sapir-Whorf?
.skamyxatra

For some reason, Michael's e-mails occasionally get mangled by some piece of
e-mail software between him and us. If you look at the raw source of the
message, you'll see that it should have been "New experiments in Sapir Whorf,
mentioined in Newsweek — http://wwwords.org/?SWHE --gejyspa". I have
no idea why this happens, but so far it has happened to him at least eight
times and to ScottL, Jon Top Hat Jones, and lojbab once each.

mu'omi'e .kamymecraijun.

--
mi citka loi cidjrspageti fi'o sanmi lo cersai

To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to lojban-list-request@lojban.org
with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if
you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.

.a'u .u'a .i da mutce cinri tcidu

- Luke Bergen

On Mon, Aug 3, 2009 at 3:13 PM, Minimiscience <minimiscience@gmail.com>wrote:

> de'i li 03 pi'e 08 pi'e 2009 la'o fy. John E Clifford .fy. cusku zoi
> skamyxatra.
> > OK, this did affect my way of thinking, but what has it to do with
> > Sapir-Whorf?
> .skamyxatra
>
> For some reason, Michael's e-mails occasionally get mangled by some piece
> of
> e-mail software between him and us. If you look at the raw source of the
> message, you'll see that it should have been "New experiments in Sapir
> Whorf,
> mentioined in Newsweek — http://wwwords.org/?SWHE --gejyspa". I
> have
> no idea why this happens, but so far it has happened to him at least eight
> times and to ScottL, Jon Top Hat Jones, and lojbab once each.
>
> mu'omi'e .kamymecraijun.
>
> --
> mi citka loi cidjrspageti fi'o sanmi lo cersai
>
>
> To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to lojban-list-request@lojban.org
> with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if
> you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.
>
>

I suppose my question remains. These sorts of coincidences or parallels are always with us and have a variety of explanations, most having little to do with language and thought on any deep level. SWH is about deep level grammatical categories and ontology, not about vocabulary tricks. (It is still a crock, of course, but at least it is an interesting crock).

--- Original Message --
From: Minimiscience <minimiscience@gmail.com>
To: lojban-list@lojban.org
Sent: Monday, August 3, 2009 2:13:52 PM
Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf

de'i li 03 pi'e 08 pi'e 2009 la'o fy. John E Clifford .fy. cusku zoi skamyxatra.
> OK, this did affect my way of thinking, but what has it to do with
> Sapir-Whorf?
.skamyxatra

For some reason, Michael's e-mails occasionally get mangled by some piece of
e-mail software between him and us. If you look at the raw source of the
message, you'll see that it should have been "New experiments in Sapir Whorf,
mentioined in Newsweek — http://wwwords.org/?SWHE --gejyspa". I have
no idea why this happens, but so far it has happened to him at least eight
times and to ScottL, Jon Top Hat Jones, and lojbab once each.

mu'omi'e .kamymecraijun.

--
mi citka loi cidjrspageti fi'o sanmi lo cersai

To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to lojban-list-request@lojban.org
with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if
you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.

To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to lojban-list-request@lojban.org
with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if
you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.

On Mon, Aug 3, 2009 at 3:13 PM, Minimiscience<minimiscience@gmail.com> wrote:
> de'i li 03 pi'e 08 pi'e 2009 la'o fy. John E Clifford .fy. cusku zoi skamyxatra.
>> OK, this did affect my way of thinking, but what has it to do with
>> Sapir-Whorf?
> .skamyxatra
>
> For some reason, Michael's e-mails occasionally get mangled by some piece of
> e-mail software between him and us.

To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to lojban-list-request@lojban.org
with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if
you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.

Apparently it did it again. I'm not sure how to look at the email source in
gmail. Can anyone who can see it forward it back on?

- Luke Bergen

On Mon, Aug 3, 2009 at 4:58 PM, Michael Turniansky <mturniansky@gmail.com>wrote:

>
> On Mon, Aug 3, 2009 at 3:13 PM, Minimiscience<minimiscience@gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > de'i li 03 pi'e 08 pi'e 2009 la'o fy. John E Clifford .fy. cusku zoi
> skamyxatra.
> >> OK, this did affect my way of thinking, but what has it to do with
> >> Sapir-Whorf?
> > .skamyxatra
> >
> > For some reason, Michael's e-mails occasionally get mangled by some piece
> of
> > e-mail software between him and us.
>
>
> To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to lojban-list-request@lojban.org
> with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if
> you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.
>
>

Michael Turniansky wrote:
> On Mon, Aug 3, 2009 at 3:13 PM, Minimiscience<minimiscience@gmail.com> wrote:
>> de'i li 03 pi'e 08 pi'e 2009 la'o fy. John E Clifford .fy. cusku zoi skamyxatra.
>>> OK, this did affect my way of thinking, but what has it to do with
>>> Sapir-Whorf?
>> .skamyxatra
>>
>> For some reason, Michael's e-mails occasionally get mangled by some piece of
>> e-mail software between him and us.
>
>
> To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to lojban-list-request@lojban.org
> with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if
> you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.
>

message was:

Weird. I didn't know that, Minim.... thanks for the head's-up

mu'o mi'e timos

In a message dated 8/3/2009 15:39:24 Eastern Daylight Time,
kali9putra@yahoo.com writes:

> SWH is about deep level grammatical categories and ontology, not about
> vocabulary tricks. (It is still a crock, of course, but at least it is an
> interesting crock).
>

What evidence do you have that it's a crock?

stevo

The negative results of sixty years (more or less, probably more) of trying to formulate a testable hypothesis that is even vaguely related to what Ed and Ben said. The best of these (possibly testable) were either trivially true (the vocab cases) or blatantly false (the strong metaphysical determination cases), and only the latter looked much like what the two actually said. Of the rest, the untestable ones (though it didn't stop people from claiming to try) yielded no significant results (of course) and the testable ones had nought to do with the professor and the claims adjuster (and the results were still generally negative).

From: "MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com" <MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com>
To: lojban-list@lojban.org
Sent: Tuesday, August 4, 2009 9:30:22 PM
Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf

In a message dated 8/3/2009 15:39:24 Eastern Daylight Time, kali9putra@yahoo.com writes:

SWH is about deep level grammatical categories and ontology, not about vocabulary tricks. (It is still a crock, of course, but at least it is an interesting crock).
>
>

What evidence do you have that it's a crock?

stevo

How does failing to come up with a testable hypothesis make something a
crock? It just means we've failed to test it so far. There are a lot of
things in the universe that we don't know how to test yet, that doesn't
make them "a crock" does it?

- Luke Bergen

On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 9:59 AM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com>wrote:

> The negative results of sixty years (more or less, probably more) of trying
> to formulate a testable hypothesis that is even vaguely related to what Ed
> and Ben said. The best of these (possibly testable) were either trivially
> true (the vocab cases) or blatantly false (the strong metaphysical
> determination cases), and only the latter looked much like what the two
> actually said. Of the rest, the untestable ones (though it didn't stop
> people from claiming to try) yielded no significant results (of course) and
> the testable ones had nought to do with the professor and the claims
> adjuster (and the results were still generally negative).
>
> ----------
> *From:* "MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com" <MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com>
> *To:* lojban-list@lojban.org
> *Sent:* Tuesday, August 4, 2009 9:30:22 PM
> *Subject:* lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>
> In a message dated 8/3/2009 15:39:24 Eastern Daylight Time,
> kali9putra@yahoo.com writes:
>
>
> SWH is about deep level grammatical categories and ontology, not about
> vocabulary tricks. (It is still a crock, of course, but at least it is an
> interesting crock).
>
>
>
> What evidence do you have that it's a crock?
>
> stevo
>
>

Yes, it sorta does in this case, since the claimed effects and claimed causes seem to be very familiar and open to examination and tinkering.

From: Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
To: lojban-list@lojban.org
Sent: Wednesday, August 5, 2009 9:14:25 AM
Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf

How does failing to come up with a testable hypothesis make something a crock? It just means we've failed to test it so far. There are a lot of things in the universe that we don't know how to test yet, that doesn't make them "a crock" does it?

- Luke Bergen

On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 9:59 AM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com> wrote:

The negative results of sixty years (more or less, probably more) of trying to formulate a testable hypothesis that is even vaguely related to what Ed and Ben said. The best of these (possibly testable) were either trivially true (the vocab cases) or blatantly false (the strong metaphysical determination cases), and only the latter looked much like what the two actually said. Of the rest, the untestable ones (though it didn't stop people from claiming to try) yielded no significant results (of course) and the testable ones had nought to do with the professor and the claims adjuster (and the results were still generally negative).
>
>
>
>

From: "MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com" <MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com>
>
>To: lojban-list@lojban.org
>Sent: Tuesday, August 4, 2009 9:30:22 PM
>
>Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>
>
>In a message dated 8/3/2009 15:39:24 Eastern Daylight Time, kali9putra@yahoo.com writes:
>
>
>
>
>SWH is about deep level grammatical categories and ontology, not about vocabulary tricks. (It is still a crock, of course, but at least it is an interesting crock).
>>
>>
>
>What evidence do you have that it's a crock?
>
>
>stevo
>

I'm not sure I follow you here. Are you saying that the hypothesis is
defined to vaguely to make realistic/specific tests?

- Luke Bergen

On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 12:28 PM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com>wrote:

> Yes, it sorta does in this case, since the claimed effects and claimed
> causes seem to be very familiar and open to examination and tinkering.
>
> ----------
> *From:* Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
> *To:* lojban-list@lojban.org
> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 5, 2009 9:14:25 AM
> *Subject:* lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>
> How does failing to come up with a testable hypothesis make something a
> crock? It just means we've failed to test it so far. There are a lot of
> things in the universe that we don't know how to test yet, that doesn't
> make them "a crock" does it?
>
> - Luke Bergen
>
>
> On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 9:59 AM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com>wrote:
>
>> The negative results of sixty years (more or less, probably more) of
>> trying to formulate a testable hypothesis that is even vaguely related to
>> what Ed and Ben said. The best of these (possibly testable) were either
>> trivially true (the vocab cases) or blatantly false (the strong metaphysical
>> determination cases), and only the latter looked much like what the two
>> actually said. Of the rest, the untestable ones (though it didn't stop
>> people from claiming to try) yielded no significant results (of course) and
>> the testable ones had nought to do with the professor and the claims
>> adjuster (and the results were still generally negative).
>>
>> ----------
>> *From:* "MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com" <MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com>
>> *To:* lojban-list@lojban.org
>> *Sent:* Tuesday, August 4, 2009 9:30:22 PM
>> *Subject:* lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>>
>> In a message dated 8/3/2009 15:39:24 Eastern Daylight Time,
>> kali9putra@yahoo.com writes:
>>
>>
>> SWH is about deep level grammatical categories and ontology, not about
>> vocabulary tricks. (It is still a crock, of course, but at least it is an
>> interesting crock).
>>
>>
>>
>> What evidence do you have that it's a crock?
>>
>> stevo
>>
>>
>
>

The hypothesis was never formulated in more than casual terms by the "originators." About as clear as it gets (not actually in either of them) is that grammatical categories of a language affect the native ontology of the speakers: if there are nouns, adjectives and verbs, the speakers see the world as composed of isolated things that have properties and do events; if the only major category is verbs, then the speaker sees the world as as a holistic process, with temporary — but constantly changing — eddies. And so on (though it is not clear what is associated with other languages). To make matters somewhat worse, Whorf at least thought he knew how the world really was and therefore implicitly gave added values to those languages (Hopi, Menominee, i.e., the one he had studied) which gave their speakers the right view (the outer edges of Mahayana — which is, of course originally set forth in a language with verbs, nouns and adjectives, whatever the
native grammarians may say).

From: Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
To: lojban-list@lojban.org
Sent: Wednesday, August 5, 2009 11:35:21 AM
Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf

I'm not sure I follow you here. Are you saying that the hypothesis is defined to vaguely to make realistic/specific tests?

- Luke Bergen

On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 12:28 PM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com> wrote:

Yes, it sorta does in this case, since the claimed effects and claimed causes seem to be very familiar and open to examination and tinkering.
>
>
>
>

From: Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
>
>To: lojban-list@lojban.org
>Sent: Wednesday, August 5, 2009 9:14:25 AM
>
>Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>
>
>>How does failing to come up with a testable hypothesis make something a crock? It just means we've failed to test it so far. There are a lot of things in the universe that we don't know how to test yet, that doesn't make them "a crock" does it?
>
>- Luke Bergen
>
>
>
>On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 9:59 AM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>The negative results of sixty years (more or less, probably more) of trying to formulate a testable hypothesis that is even vaguely related to what Ed and Ben said. The best of these (possibly testable) were either trivially true (the vocab cases) or blatantly false (the strong metaphysical determination cases), and only the latter looked much like what the two actually said. Of the rest, the untestable ones (though it didn't stop people from claiming to try) yielded no significant results (of course) and the testable ones had nought to do with the professor and the claims adjuster (and the results were still generally negative).
>>
>>
>>
>>

From: "MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com" <MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com>
>>
>>To: lojban-list@lojban.org
>>Sent: Tuesday, August 4, 2009 9:30:22 PM
>>
>>Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>>
>>
>>In a message dated 8/3/2009 15:39:24 Eastern Daylight Time, kali9putra@yahoo.com writes:
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>SWH is about deep level grammatical categories and ontology, not about vocabulary tricks. (It is still a crock, of course, but at least it is an interesting crock).
>>>
>>>
>>
>>What evidence do you have that it's a crock?
>>
>>
>>stevo
>>
>
>

Wow, I thought SWH was more general than that. Is there a hypothesis that
is more general than "verbs make you think verby and nouns make you think
nouny"? I've read a few different articles that talk about people who speak
languages with certain fundamental differences having fundamentally
different ways of thinking about certain things. I always assumed that they
were SWH like, but evidently they were not. For instance, I was under the
impression that things like:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/080714111940.htm were SWH meets
memory.

Also it's disappointing to hear that Whorf was so.... lingui-centric? But
I'd rather not throw the baby out with the bath-water. It seems like the
root idea is a good one even if you believe that the original author of the
idea had his various problems.

mu'o mi'e pafcribe

On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 1:38 PM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com>wrote:

> The hypothesis was never formulated in more than casual terms by the
> "originators." About as clear as it gets (not actually in either of them)
> is that grammatical categories of a language affect the native ontology of
> the speakers: if there are nouns, adjectives and verbs, the speakers see the
> world as composed of isolated things that have properties and do events; if
> the only major category is verbs, then the speaker sees the world as as a
> holistic process, with temporary — but constantly changing — eddies. And
> so on (though it is not clear what is associated with other languages). To
> make matters somewhat worse, Whorf at least thought he knew how the world
> really was and therefore implicitly gave added values to those languages
> (Hopi, Menominee, i.e., the one he had studied) which gave their speakers
> the right view (the outer edges of Mahayana — which is, of course
> originally set forth in a language with verbs, nouns and adjectives,
> whatever the native grammarians may say).
> ----------
> *From:* Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
> *To:* lojban-list@lojban.org
> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 5, 2009 11:35:21 AM
> *Subject:* lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>
> I'm not sure I follow you here. Are you saying that the hypothesis is
> defined to vaguely to make realistic/specific tests?
>
> - Luke Bergen
>
>
> On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 12:28 PM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com>wrote:
>
>> Yes, it sorta does in this case, since the claimed effects and claimed
>> causes seem to be very familiar and open to examination and tinkering.
>>
>> ----------
>> *From:* Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
>> *To:* lojban-list@lojban.org
>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 5, 2009 9:14:25 AM
>> *Subject:* lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>>
>> How does failing to come up with a testable hypothesis make something a
>> crock? It just means we've failed to test it so far. There are a lot of
>> things in the universe that we don't know how to test yet, that doesn't
>> make them "a crock" does it?
>>
>> - Luke Bergen
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 9:59 AM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com>wrote:
>>
>>> The negative results of sixty years (more or less, probably more) of
>>> trying to formulate a testable hypothesis that is even vaguely related to
>>> what Ed and Ben said. The best of these (possibly testable) were either
>>> trivially true (the vocab cases) or blatantly false (the strong metaphysical
>>> determination cases), and only the latter looked much like what the two
>>> actually said. Of the rest, the untestable ones (though it didn't stop
>>> people from claiming to try) yielded no significant results (of course) and
>>> the testable ones had nought to do with the professor and the claims
>>> adjuster (and the results were still generally negative).
>>>
>>> ----------
>>> *From:* "MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com" <MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com>
>>> *To:* lojban-list@lojban.org
>>> *Sent:* Tuesday, August 4, 2009 9:30:22 PM
>>> *Subject:* lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>>>
>>> In a message dated 8/3/2009 15:39:24 Eastern Daylight Time,
>>> kali9putra@yahoo.com writes:
>>>
>>>
>>> SWH is about deep level grammatical categories and ontology, not about
>>> vocabulary tricks. (It is still a crock, of course, but at least it is an
>>> interesting crock).
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> What evidence do you have that it's a crock?
>>>
>>> stevo
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>
>

There ae more general claims, but they tend to wander off into untestability rather quickly. Almost all of them still remain somewhat concrete, that is they talk about languages different in some particular aspect (not just noun v verb) and some particular aspect of "the way we look at things." Of course, some of the aspects get a little untestable themselves (melodic languages lead to artistic people, to not quite invent a horrible example). The root idea of all this is that language affects culture, which seems likely to be true though hard to prove. Unfortunately, it is also clearly the case that culture affects language, so covariation doesn't show which way the affect goes (or whether there is a tertium that governs both)

From: Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
To: lojban-list@lojban.org
Sent: Wednesday, August 5, 2009 12:51:04 PM
Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf

Wow, I thought SWH was more general than that. Is there a hypothesis that is more general than "verbs make you think verby and nouns make you think nouny"? I've read a few different articles that talk about people who speak languages with certain fundamental differences having fundamentally different ways of thinking about certain things. I always assumed that they were SWH like, but evidently they were not. For instance, I was under the impression that things like: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/080714111940.htm were SWH meets memory.

Also it's disappointing to hear that Whorf was so.... lingui-centric? But I'd rather not throw the baby out with the bath-water. It seems like the root idea is a good one even if you believe that the original author of the idea had his various problems.

mu'o mi'e pafcribe

On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 1:38 PM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com> wrote:

The hypothesis was never formulated in more than casual terms by the "originators." About as clear as it gets (not actually in either of them) is that grammatical categories of a language affect the native ontology of the speakers: if there are nouns, adjectives and verbs, the speakers see the world as composed of isolated things that have properties and do events; if the only major category is verbs, then the speaker sees the world as as a holistic process, with temporary — but constantly changing — eddies. And so on (though it is not clear what is associated with other languages). To make matters somewhat worse, Whorf at least thought he knew how the world really was and therefore implicitly gave
> added values to those languages (Hopi, Menominee, i.e., the one he had studied) which gave their speakers the right view (the outer edges of Mahayana — which is, of course originally set forth in a language with verbs, nouns and adjectives, whatever the native grammarians may say).
>
>

From: Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
>To: lojban-list@lojban.org
>Sent: Wednesday, August 5, 2009 11:35:21 AM
>
>Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>
>
>>I'm not sure I follow you here. Are you saying that the hypothesis is defined to vaguely to make realistic/specific tests?
>
>- Luke Bergen
>
>
>
>On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 12:28 PM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>Yes, it sorta does in this case, since the claimed effects and claimed causes seem to be very familiar and open to examination and tinkering.
>>
>>
>>
>>

From: Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
>>
>>To: lojban-list@lojban.org
>>Sent: Wednesday, August 5, 2009 9:14:25 AM
>>
>>Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>>
>>
>>>>How does failing to come up with a testable hypothesis make something a crock? It just means we've failed to test it so far. There are a lot of things in the universe that we don't know how to test yet, that doesn't make them "a crock" does it?
>>
>>- Luke Bergen
>>
>>
>>
>>On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 9:59 AM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>
>>The negative results of sixty years (more or less, probably more) of trying to formulate a testable hypothesis that is even vaguely related to what Ed and Ben said. The best of these (possibly testable) were either trivially true (the vocab cases) or blatantly false (the strong metaphysical determination cases), and only the latter looked much like what the two actually said. Of the rest, the untestable ones (though it didn't stop people from claiming to try) yielded no significant results (of course) and the testable ones had nought to do with the professor and the claims adjuster (and the results were still generally negative).
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>

From: "MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com" <MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com>
>>>
>>>To: lojban-list@lojban.org
>>>Sent: Tuesday, August 4, 2009 9:30:22 PM
>>>
>>>Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>>>
>>>
>>>In a message dated 8/3/2009 15:39:24 Eastern Daylight Time, kali9putra@yahoo.com writes:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>SWH is about deep level grammatical categories and ontology, not about vocabulary tricks. (It is still a crock, of course, but at least it is an interesting crock).
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>What evidence do you have that it's a crock?
>>>
>>>
>>>stevo
>>>
>>
>>
>
>

heh, kind of reminds me of soc 101 and the "sociological paradox" that
people create/define society but society drives human behavior. Maybe
language is the same. Language evolves according to our perception but then
we see things in terms of language. A cycle of causality?

On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 2:35 PM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com>wrote:

> There ae more general claims, but they tend to wander off into
> untestability rather quickly. Almost all of them still remain somewhat
> concrete, that is they talk about languages different in some particular
> aspect (not just noun v verb) and some particular aspect of "the way we look
> at things." Of course, some of the aspects get a little untestable
> themselves (melodic languages lead to artistic people, to not quite invent a
> horrible example). The root idea of all this is that language affects
> culture, which seems likely to be true though hard to prove. Unfortunately,
> it is also clearly the case that culture affects language, so covariation
> doesn't show which way the affect goes (or whether there is a tertium that
> governs both)
>
> ----------
> *From:* Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
> *To:* lojban-list@lojban.org
> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 5, 2009 12:51:04 PM
>
> *Subject:* lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>
> Wow, I thought SWH was more general than that. Is there a hypothesis that
> is more general than "verbs make you think verby and nouns make you think
> nouny"? I've read a few different articles that talk about people who speak
> languages with certain fundamental differences having fundamentally
> different ways of thinking about certain things. I always assumed that they
> were SWH like, but evidently they were not. For instance, I was under the
> impression that things like:
> http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/080714111940.htm were SWH
> meets memory.
>
> Also it's disappointing to hear that Whorf was so.... lingui-centric? But
> I'd rather not throw the baby out with the bath-water. It seems like the
> root idea is a good one even if you believe that the original author of the
> idea had his various problems.
>
> mu'o mi'e pafcribe
>
>
> On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 1:38 PM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com>wrote:
>
>> The hypothesis was never formulated in more than casual terms by the
>> "originators." About as clear as it gets (not actually in either of them)
>> is that grammatical categories of a language affect the native ontology of
>> the speakers: if there are nouns, adjectives and verbs, the speakers see the
>> world as composed of isolated things that have properties and do events; if
>> the only major category is verbs, then the speaker sees the world as as a
>> holistic process, with temporary — but constantly changing — eddies. And
>> so on (though it is not clear what is associated with other languages). To
>> make matters somewhat worse, Whorf at least thought he knew how the world
>> really was and therefore implicitly gave added values to those languages
>> (Hopi, Menominee, i.e., the one he had studied) which gave their speakers
>> the right view (the outer edges of Mahayana — which is, of course
>> originally set forth in a language with verbs, nouns and adjectives,
>> whatever the native grammarians may say).
>> ----------
>> *From:* Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
>> *To:* lojban-list@lojban.org
>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 5, 2009 11:35:21 AM
>> *Subject:* lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>>
>> I'm not sure I follow you here. Are you saying that the hypothesis is
>> defined to vaguely to make realistic/specific tests?
>>
>> - Luke Bergen
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 12:28 PM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com>wrote:
>>
>>> Yes, it sorta does in this case, since the claimed effects and claimed
>>> causes seem to be very familiar and open to examination and tinkering.
>>>
>>> ----------
>>> *From:* Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
>>> *To:* lojban-list@lojban.org
>>> *Sent:* Wednesday, August 5, 2009 9:14:25 AM
>>> *Subject:* lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>>>
>>> How does failing to come up with a testable hypothesis make something a
>>> crock? It just means we've failed to test it so far. There are a lot of
>>> things in the universe that we don't know how to test yet, that doesn't
>>> make them "a crock" does it?
>>>
>>> - Luke Bergen
>>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 9:59 AM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com>wrote:
>>>
>>>> The negative results of sixty years (more or less, probably more) of
>>>> trying to formulate a testable hypothesis that is even vaguely related to
>>>> what Ed and Ben said. The best of these (possibly testable) were either
>>>> trivially true (the vocab cases) or blatantly false (the strong metaphysical
>>>> determination cases), and only the latter looked much like what the two
>>>> actually said. Of the rest, the untestable ones (though it didn't stop
>>>> people from claiming to try) yielded no significant results (of course) and
>>>> the testable ones had nought to do with the professor and the claims
>>>> adjuster (and the results were still generally negative).
>>>>
>>>> ----------
>>>> *From:* "MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com" <MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com>
>>>> *To:* lojban-list@lojban.org
>>>> *Sent:* Tuesday, August 4, 2009 9:30:22 PM
>>>> *Subject:* lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>>>>
>>>> In a message dated 8/3/2009 15:39:24 Eastern Daylight Time,
>>>> kali9putra@yahoo.com writes:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> SWH is about deep level grammatical categories and ontology, not about
>>>> vocabulary tricks. (It is still a crock, of course, but at least it is an
>>>> interesting crock).
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> What evidence do you have that it's a crock?
>>>>
>>>> stevo
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>
>

Oh, probably not so strong as causality; just that they grow up together. Unfortunately (well, for this issue at least), all the good cases of imposition of a new language or culture are too far in the past to have really good data about either the before or the after. The appeal of the Loglan/Lojban test would be that we could get that data, the flaw is that we can't get the language to dominate the subjects' culture — they'll live their ordinary lives outside the lab (and they may be too old anyhow, etc. etc. ). (I'll pass over the fact that Loglan/Lojban is not well designed for the test, since it is not different from English in almost any possibly relevant way.)

From: Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
To: lojban-list@lojban.org
Sent: Wednesday, August 5, 2009 1:53:39 PM
Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf

heh, kind of reminds me of soc 101 and the "sociological paradox" that people create/define society but society drives human behavior. Maybe language is the same. Language evolves according to our perception but then we see things in terms of language. A cycle of causality?

On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 2:35 PM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com> wrote:

There ae more general claims, but they tend to wander off into untestability rather quickly. Almost all of them still remain somewhat concrete, that is they talk about languages different in some particular aspect (not just noun v verb) and some particular aspect of "the way we look at things." Of course, some of the aspects get a little untestable themselves (melodic languages lead to artistic people, to not quite invent a horrible example). The root idea of all this is that language affects culture, which seems likely to be true though hard to prove. Unfortunately, it is also clearly the case that culture affects language, so covariation doesn't show which way the affect goes (or whether there is a tertium that governs both)
>
>
>
>

From: Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
>To: lojban-list@lojban.org
>Sent: Wednesday, August 5, 2009 12:51:04 PM
>
>Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>
>
>>Wow, I thought SWH was more general than that. Is there a hypothesis that is more general than "verbs make you think verby and nouns make you think nouny"? I've read a few different articles that talk about people who speak languages with certain fundamental differences having fundamentally different ways of thinking about certain things. I always assumed that they were SWH like, but evidently they were not. For instance, I was under the impression that things like: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/080714111940.htm were SWH meets memory.
>
>Also it's disappointing to hear that Whorf was so.... lingui-centric? But I'd rather not throw the baby out with the bath-water. It seems like the root idea is a good one even if you believe that the original author of the idea had his various problems.
>
>mu'o mi'e pafcribe
>
>
>
>On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 1:38 PM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>The hypothesis was never formulated in more than casual terms by the "originators." About as clear as it gets (not actually in either of them) is that grammatical categories of a language affect the native ontology of the speakers: if there are nouns, adjectives and verbs, the speakers see the world as composed of isolated things that have properties and do events; if the only major category is verbs, then the speaker sees the world as as a holistic process, with temporary — but constantly changing — eddies. And so on (though it is not clear what is associated with other languages). To make matters somewhat worse, Whorf at least thought he knew how the world really was and therefore implicitly gave
>> added values to those languages (Hopi, Menominee, i.e., the one he had studied) which gave their speakers the right view (the outer edges of Mahayana — which is, of course originally set forth in a language with verbs, nouns and adjectives, whatever the native grammarians may say).
>>
>>

From: Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
>>To: lojban-list@lojban.org
>>Sent: Wednesday, August 5, 2009 11:35:21 AM
>>
>>Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>>
>>
>>>>I'm not sure I follow you here. Are you saying that the hypothesis is defined to vaguely to make realistic/specific tests?
>>
>>- Luke Bergen
>>
>>
>>
>>On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 12:28 PM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>
>>Yes, it sorta does in this case, since the claimed effects and claimed causes seem to be very familiar and open to examination and tinkering.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>

From: Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com>
>>>
>>>To: lojban-list@lojban.org
>>>Sent: Wednesday, August 5, 2009 9:14:25 AM
>>>
>>>Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>>>
>>>
>>>>>>How does failing to come up with a testable hypothesis make something a crock? It just means we've failed to test it so far. There are a lot of things in the universe that we don't know how to test yet, that doesn't make them "a crock" does it?
>>>
>>>- Luke Bergen
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 9:59 AM, John E Clifford <kali9putra@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>The negative results of sixty years (more or less, probably more) of trying to formulate a testable hypothesis that is even vaguely related to what Ed and Ben said. The best of these (possibly testable) were either trivially true (the vocab cases) or blatantly false (the strong metaphysical determination cases), and only the latter looked much like what the two actually said. Of the rest, the untestable ones (though it didn't stop people from claiming to try) yielded no significant results (of course) and the testable ones had nought to do with the professor and the claims adjuster (and the results were still generally negative).
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>

From: "MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com" <MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com>
>>>>
>>>>To: lojban-list@lojban.org
>>>>Sent: Tuesday, August 4, 2009 9:30:22 PM
>>>>
>>>>Subject: lojban Re: Experiments in Sapir Whorf
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>In a message dated 8/3/2009 15:39:24 Eastern Daylight Time, kali9putra@yahoo.com writes:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>SWH is about deep level grammatical categories and ontology, not about vocabulary tricks. (It is still a crock, of course, but at least it is an interesting crock).
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>What evidence do you have that it's a crock?
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>stevo
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>
>

On Wednesday 05 August 2009 16:32:57 John E Clifford wrote:
> (I'll pass over the fact that Loglan/Lojban is not well designed for the
> test, since it is not different from English in almost any possibly
> relevant way.)

I disagree. It has no distinction between common nouns, adjectives, and verbs;
it has space tenses similar to time tenses; it has neither accusative nor
ergative alignment, but something totally different. One point made on the
Wikipedia page is that Guugu Yimidhirr uses north and south, not front and
back, to state the relative positions of objects. This gives Yimidhirr
speakers an advantage in open terrain. Lojban has both kinds of directions as
tenses.

Lojban has no grammatical number. It does have an individual/mass/set
distinction, which English lacks.

Lojban has a large set of conjunctions, including a one-syllable word for "if
and only if", a word for "the intersection of ... and ...", and words for
joining things in sets and sequences.

Pierre

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with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if
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yeah, but it still uses words, which english does. in order to TRUELY test
SWH we would need to come up with a whole new way of communicating
all-together. ;)

On Wed, Aug 5, 2009 at 10:29 PM, Pierre Abbat <phma@phma.optus.nu> wrote:

> On Wednesday 05 August 2009 16:32:57 John E Clifford wrote:
> > (I'll pass over the fact that Loglan/Lojban is not well designed for the
> > test, since it is not different from English in almost any possibly
> > relevant way.)
>
> I disagree. It has no distinction between common nouns, adjectives, and
> verbs;
> it has space tenses similar to time tenses; it has neither accusative nor
> ergative alignment, but something totally different. One point made on the
> Wikipedia page is that Guugu Yimidhirr uses north and south, not front and
> back, to state the relative positions of objects. This gives Yimidhirr
> speakers an advantage in open terrain. Lojban has both kinds of directions
> as
> tenses.
>
> Lojban has no grammatical number. It does have an individual/mass/set
> distinction, which English lacks.
>
> Lojban has a large set of conjunctions, including a one-syllable word for
> "if
> and only if", a word for "the intersection of ... and ...", and words for
> joining things in sets and sequences.
>
> Pierre
>
>
> To unsubscribe from this list, send mail to lojban-list-request@lojban.org
> with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if
> you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.
>
>

--

- Luke Bergen

In a message dated 8/6/2009 00:59:44 Eastern Daylight Time,
lukeabergen@gmail.com writes:

> yeah, but it still uses words, which english does. in order to TRUELY
> test SWH we would need to come up with a whole new way of communicating
> all-together. ;)
>

It still has to be language, though, since that's what SWH is all about.

stevo

Is there an attitudinal for "playfully facetious"? ;)

Just like all animals eyes have certain similar mechanisms maybe all
languages have certain components out of necessity and these are the
"similarities to english" that John is talking about? I'm not a linguist by
profession so I really wouldn't know authoritatively.

On Thu, Aug 6, 2009 at 2:05 PM, <MorphemeAddict@wmconnect.com> wrote:

> In a message dated 8/6/2009 00:59:44 Eastern Daylight Time,
> lukeabergen@gmail.com writes:
>
>
> yeah, but it still uses words, which english does. in order to TRUELY test
> SWH we would need to come up with a whole new way of communicating
> all-together. ;)
>
>
>
> It still has to be language, though, since that's what SWH is all about.
>
> stevo

On Thu, Aug 6, 2009 at 11:13 AM, Luke Bergen <lukeabergen@gmail.com> wrote:

> Is there an attitudinal for "playfully facetious"? ;)

{.u'i ba'u}?

Though I realize you were just being rhetorical.

In a message dated 8/6/2009 14:14:38 Eastern Daylight Time,
lukeabergen@gmail.com writes:

> Just like all animals eyes have certain similar mechanisms maybe all
> languages have certain components out of necessity and these are the
> "similarities to english" that John is talking about? I'm not a linguist by
> profession so I really wouldn't know authoritatively.
>

Those commonalities among languages are what is known as "universal
grammar".

stevo

kali9putra@yahoo.com writes:

> SWH is about deep level grammatical categories and ontology, not about
> vocabulary tricks. (It is still a crock, of course, but at least it is an
> interesting crock).

stevo said:

> What evidence do you have that it's a crock?

Then John E Clifford wrote:

> The negative results of sixty years (more or less, probably more) of
> trying to formulate a testable hypothesis that is even vaguely related
> to what Ed and Ben said. The best of these (possibly testable) were
> either trivially true (the vocab cases) or blatantly false (the strong
> metaphysical determination cases), and only the latter looked much like
> what the two actually said. Of the rest, the untestable ones (though it
> didn't stop people from claiming to try) yielded no significant results
> (of course) and the testable ones had nought to do with the professor
> and the claims adjuster (and the results were still generally negative).

As with many who have an interest in lojban, this interests me. It especially
interests me via computing, mathematics and juggling. I have experienced
directly what seem to me to be Whorfian effects. In mathematics I've used
language to help find and create mathematical forms that subsequently prove
to be useful. In programming, changing the language I use sometimes helping
to clarify a problem and suggest an algorithm that I subsequently felt would
not have surfaced using the original language. In juggling, the development
of a notation for (a class of) juggling led to the discovery of hundreds of
previously unknown patterns, and the way people describe patterns has
significantly changed. I believe the way people think about juggling changes
when they learn the notation.

Perhaps I'm not using the SWH in its original form, but certainly every time
I've talked about the topic with multipolyglots they've looked at me in
bewilderment, wondering how anyone could believe that choice of language does
not affect/limit/expand thought.

Some time ago I read an unpublished PhD thesis in which the Minnesota
Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) was given to confirmed
English/German bilinguals, once in one language, then later in the other. As
I recall, and it's been some time, the coordinate bilinguals showed a clear
shift in their personalities between the languages, the compound bilinguals
less so. (I think. As I say, it's been some time).

The clear thing that I do remember is that there was a definite shift, which
to me provides evidence that something is definitely happening.

Finally, would you care to comment on how Lera Boroditsky's work is being
received and its implications?

http://www-psych.stanford.edu/~lera/papers/

Thanks for an interesting discussion.

Colin
--
The whole theory of modern education is radically unsound. Fortunately
in England, at any rate, education produces no effect whatsoever.
— Lady Bracknell, The Importance of Being Earnest.

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with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if
you're really stuck, send mail to secretary@lojban.org for help.

Just to add to my previous post:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multilingualism#Comparing_multilingual_speakers

Colin
--
http://www.solipsys.co.uk/new/JugglingTalk.html -
mailto:juggler@solipsys.co.uk

A: Because otherwise it would be confusing
Q: Why are questions and answers always in the same order?

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On Monday 24 August 2009 05:25:35 Colin Wright wrote:
> Some time ago I read an unpublished PhD thesis in which the Minnesota
> Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) was given to confirmed
> English/German bilinguals, once in one language, then later in the other.
> As I recall, and it's been some time, the coordinate bilinguals showed a
> clear shift in their personalities between the languages, the compound
> bilinguals less so. (I think. As I say, it's been some time).

What's the difference between a coordinate bilingual and a compound bilingual?
I read the terms on Wikipedia but don't understand them.

Pierre

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with the subject unsubscribe, or go to http://www.lojban.org/lsg2/, or if
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