Harsha/Digest Number 146, reply to Hans

[Guest guest]

Hi Hans,

 

On Tue, 11 May 1999 19:21:40 Hans Deunhouwer wrote:

>It makes me smile

>when i see that we make such a fuss about some statements. By the way, i am

>curious what you think of this. Can there be thinking without language ?

>I am looking forward to your thoughts about this.

>

>Bi

>Hans

 

Bye-bye love ?

 

Sorry, that was too tempting.

 

Thank you for posting such an interesting

question on the list, especially for a biologist

like me.

 

 

I will share some of my views on this.

I hope I can do honor to your

good and relevant question.

 

First,I feel your question depends on what you mean by

thinking.

 

If you by thinking mean all kinds of

brain activity such as sleep, unconsciosness,

waking state etc, then there certainly can be

thinking without language.

 

Some animals may have forms of abstract thinking

which are a bit similar to us, and a language

with traces of linguistic differentiation.

But most animals

probably do not have the ability to think, in

the will sense of the word. They act very much on

reflexes, spontaneously by action from the outer

world. I'm talking about animals such as insects,

swamps, earthworms, spiders, fish, frogs etc.

But they do have nervous systems with electrical

activity, so in that sense, they "think"

without language.

 

Humans may also exhibit waking

states where they think but

probably without language, in for example reflexes,

certain learned conditions, like performing

acts you have done so many times before it has become

like a reflex, for example a high block if you're

a martial artis and someone tries to punch you in the

nose or bending the knees while landing while

skiing down a hill if you're

a slalom skier. For example.

 

In these cases,

the action is not influenced by

the linguistic

centers and perhaps even conscious centers of the brain

and only gets abstracized in hindsight, after having

been stored in memory.

I guess that can be seen as thinking without language

too.

 

I feel some parts of meditation may at least

partly bypass the centers for conscious control and

give a view of what goes on in the unconscious

part of the brain/mind/body.

But whether that is wholly without language, I

don't know. I'm not proficient enough in

meditation to say and I don't know of any

investigations that have been performed out there

either to find out.

 

I would have loved to find out.

 

I know however,

that all tests regarding cognition and

memory in humans have to take into account the

linguistic aspects of thinking and the possible

interference caused by this.

One reason why in cognitive/emotional tests

ppl are asked to answer as quickly and spontaneously as

possible. Not easy to do when you have twenty pictures

in front of you and you shall decide which ones

give you good feelings and which ones give you bad.

 

Thank you again for your question.

 

Best regards,

 

Amanda.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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