Language and Abstract Thought

Here, language is compared to blood and thoughts, which spring from language, to a living organism. This is a strong statement in that it could invalidate the thoughts of other animals. That said, it is important to note that it can only apply to analytical and abstract thought, which animals are incapable of, e.g., a dog may be able to understand a string of sounds, but only as a single command--rearranging the order or adding new sounds will confuse the animal, since he doesn't know how to break the statement down into its integral parts, nor does he understand how word ordering can affect meaning. With this in mind, the quote can be interpreted to mean language is required for analytical and abtract thought, but not for thought alone. This makes the argument much more applicable, in that only animals with a propensity for language are capable of abstract and analytic thought, both utilizing the act of breaking a thought, idea, or problem into parts. The analytical thought procress breaks these down in context so that the idea or problem can be better understood as a whole, while abstract thought requires looking at each part individually and without context. In this instance, both are broad enough to be used interchangeably, since langauge enables both through the same mechanism although they differ in application and use.

An important aspect of the analytic thought process is the ability to break something, usually a problem, down into parts. It is impossible to understand what each of these parts represent without some sort of classification, which means each of these parts need to be compared to eachother. Ann Berthoff describes the process of composing as making meanings from chaos, which is exactly what analysis is (70). So without langauge, analytic thought would be impossible and without analytic thought, language would be impossible. In this way, the two ideas are isomorphic in that they are similar and inseperable. A parallel can be drawn in that after the invention of the printing press, and even the steam-powered printing press, invention rates skyrocketed in-part due to the much wider dissemination of language and ideas (Timeline)

An article in the Harvard Gazette by William J. Cromie contests the idea that language and thought develop together, and instead favors that infants do not think in regard to language, and therefore do not make distinctions based on it, e.g., describing how objects join. In English, the relationship between the joined objects would be described in relation to the smaller one and whether it is in or on the larger object, but in the Korean, the relationship would be described by how tight the objects fit together. Keeping with these ideas, the study showed that infants took note of the tightness or looseness of containers given to them, but American college students who speak English did not. This finding is supposed to show that since humans are capable of thought without knowing language, that thought is, at least partially, independent from language. In the article, it is said that infants showed interest in tight and loose fitting containers, showing that they could make the distinction. While it does show that thought is possible without language, it does not support the same in regard to analytic thought. If the infant discovered that a jar's lid was tightly joined to the jar, realized that a rubber cloth had mroe grip than his oily fingers, and attempted to use it to remove the lid all without knowing language, then it would support that analytic thought is possible without language, but the described findings do not. The article does mention, however, that language is important in that it allows humans to better "make sense of the world." This relates to the comparison of analytic thought versus general thought: most animals can make the distinction between loose and tight, but can they apply that concept to other areas and understand what it means? The answer is almost always no, with perhaps the exception of dolphins.

So how does language affect analytic thought? The people at Harvard seem to believe that it allows people to ignore certain qualities of objects. An extreme example would be a red soccer ball and a green soccer ball. What if the language didn't describe color? The speaker would ignore the fact that one ball is green and one is red and instead focus on their shape, texture, size, and firmness; however, if the colors were brought to his attention, then he would have no problem recognizing that they're different. Such an obvious contrast would likely cause the speaker to make the conscious distinction between the two at which point he would have created one or two new words. By doing this, he is using analytical thought and and broadening the scope of his language, reinforcing the idea that the two are isomorphic. He can now classify the balls by texture, size, firmness, and color.

Humans set themselves apart from other animals by their ability to think, solve complex problems, and work on the foundation that others have laid. Language helps people do all these things by being tied in with analysis, the foundation of problem solving. Without either one of these, people would lack the ability to classify characteristics and organize their thoughts; the problem would just seem "too big" if lacking the ability to break it down. Research supports that language is a learned skill, and while all humans have a propensity for it, it is not wholly innate. This might explain why common tools didn't start arising until 50,000BC, some time after the first human walked the Earth.

Works cited:

"Timeline of Historic Inventions" Wikipedia. 2008 Wikipedia. 13 Sept. 2008

Cromie, William. "Which comes first, language or thought?" Harvard Gazette 22 Jul. 2004 13 Sept. 2008

Berthoff, Ann. "Learning the Uses of Chaos" Making Meaning. 1979.