Plato’s
Allegory of the Cave addresses our notion of reality. In the
Allegory of the Cave, Plato describes a group of prisoners who live in a cave where their only notion of reality is the shadows they are forced to watch in front
of them. During this time one of the prisoners is released and exposed to world
outside the cave and realizes that what he now sees is more true than what he
had previously thought was reality. When he tries to explain what he has seen
to the others they find it a source of laughter. I imagine it was hard for him
to explain what he had seen outside because he did not know the words for sun
or trees. I imagine he labeled the sun as a circular ball of light.
Essentially, he was experiencing a language barrier. In thinking about this
more I realized that words themselves have a significant impact on understanding
of the world around us.
First
I thought about the fundamentals of labeling things with words. Let me further
explain what I mean with an experiment: Picture a chair in your mind. Now,
think about this: what makes a chair a chair? Well… it has four legs, you sit
on it, it's low to the ground, and it has a back on it. But how does that differ
from a sofa? Well a sofa has these same qualities but it is generally more cushioned
and longer. But where do we draw the line between a notion of a chair and a
notion of a sofa?
It’s a hard question to answer; I don’t have an answer to it
myself. However in trying to answer it I realized that words have a significant
weight on how I experience the world around me in the simplest sense of what goes on in my brain. When I see a chair I process
that reality with the words in my brain “that’s a chair” instead of “that’s a
wooden thing that’s low to the ground.”
Next
I thought about how words affect our understanding of what we are experiencing.
Have you ever been trying to describe a feeling to someone but couldn’t find
the exact word to describe it, but then they say the world you were looking for and you exclaim, “yes! That
is exactly what I am trying to say!” and you feel as though you have a better
understanding of the feeling itself? Or, have you ever been in a foreign language class and realized that that language has a single word to describe something that in
English there is no specific word? For example the Icelandic language Hopelandic
has one word for the experience of jumping into a puddle: Hoppípolla – I
learned this through researching that song by Sigur Rós. In English we have no
concrete word for the mixture action and feeling of jumping into a puddle, and
I would never be able to describe to you that notion. However apparently people who
speak Hopelandic could articulate this perfectly and concisely with one word.
Finally, I did some research on how words affect our notion of reality and my mind was blow by this video from a BBC Horizon Video “Do You See What I See?”
In this video researchers investigate how the words you
learn, being language, structures your visual world, specifically color. In the
first part, researchers observe the brain activity of children processing
color. They observed that babies who have no concept of language process color
with the right side of the brain, whereas toddlers who know their color
categories process color with the left side brain where the notion of language
resides. Next researchers go to the Himba tribe in Africa where their language
categorizes colors in a completely different way. There, through testing their
ability to distinguish colors from one another, they learn that the Himbas
perceive color completely different from how westerners perceive color.
Essentially the Himba must see the world differently from us because of the
language differences. That amazes me! It completely boggles my mind.
Before
reading the Allegory of the Cave, I did not realize how much words are
connected with our notion of reality. It is a simple fact that words are based
off of our reality. As we invent, realize, and discover new things we must
invent new words for them, just as I can imagine the enlightened prisoner had
to do. However it amazes me that our reality may, in part, be based off of words.
I would be curious to imagine what Plato would have to say about this
assertion. Do you guys think our reality is based off of language? What do you
think Plato would have to say about this?
Picture of Sofa and Chair from: http://www.exchange3d.com/3D%20Model%20of%20Wood%20Sofa%20and%20Chair/prod_6181.html
Video of BBC Horizons "Do You See What I See?" from: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4b71rT9fU-I
Picture of Sofa and Chair from: http://www.exchange3d.com/3D%20Model%20of%20Wood%20Sofa%20and%20Chair/prod_6181.html
Video of BBC Horizons "Do You See What I See?" from: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4b71rT9fU-I
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ReplyDeleteI think this is a pretty cool post. From having taken a course in the philosohpy of language, I kind of have some prior experience with the concept that langauge defines our reality. However, I tend to disagree with this assertion. I don't think that language, or even gestures, are necessary to conceptualize the world around us. Although I can't say for certain what would be used to label objects around us in lieu of language, I do think that it is possible for feral children, for example, to understand what certain things are nonetheless. Using the example of the feral child, I think one could argue that instead of calling something a "wolf" or "tiger" to understand danger, all a feral child would need to do is be able to associate these animals with danger. If that is the case, then labeling these animals as "wolf" or "tiger" is not really necessary to understanding the concept of danger; instead, they're merely sub-categories of it. For that reason, I somewhat consider language to be an extraneous feature--it does have its benefits though. In general though, all we need are visual cues and a basic understanding of cause-and-effect. The labels we assign them, otherwise, are irrelevent.
ReplyDeleteI have never thought about language in terms of our perception of reality before, but I do think it is quite an interesting idea. I also think it has a lot of merit in terms of how people perceive others' realities. In the Allegory of the Cave, when the prisoner comes back down from outside, he does not have the words to explain what he saw. Even if he did, the other prisoners would not have understood what he was talking about. However, if they all knew the words to describe what was outside of the cave, although the prisoners might still have not believed him, they would understand what he meant. This would help them to form an idea of what his perception of reality was. In this way, I think language is important in the perception of reality because it helps bond people's realities together. If everyone understands the same words, everyone will be able to understand what others are saying and also be able to picture their realities as well. This helps to make everyone's realities together into one large joint one, and connect everyone in the process.
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, have you ever read de Saussure? This reminds me a lot of his distinction between the signifier and the signified. Second of all, this got me thinking about cognates in languages. Take for instance the Chinese word for sofa, 沙发 or shafa (obviously coming from the English word. I don't actually know the origins of the word sofa, but I'm pretty sure in the Chinese context they use the English). Does this mean that this aspect of Chinese linguistic perception is now socially constructed by how Americans view culture? Does having these sorts of cognates add even another lens, that people who know Chinese know that this word is coming from English? Now, that was tangential; hopefully I can relate it back to Plato. This makes me think about how the Allegory of the Cave is applied in a world that's so internationally connected, perhaps it's impossible to truly perceive things without a dialogue of cultures of sorts. Everyone obviously has their own culture and language that constructs their perceptions, but with so many foreign influences and filters in our modern lives, maybe we're getting even further and further away from (and incapable of returning to) absolute truth and we're even worse than those original prisoners in the cave.
ReplyDeleteI thought your post was absolutely fascinating! I've studied language acquisition and the human symbolic capacity in both psychology and communication classes, so I found your take on language and reality very interesting. Your post helped me to think about Plato's The Allegory of Cave in the context of how crucial symbols and words have become. We really couldn't communicate at all without some form of symbolic language, and I can see how our capacity for language might limit or dictate our perceptions. We so desperately want to define things, to attribute characteristics of some phenomenon that we most definitely will end up differing in how we perceive the world. This comes full circle for me when considering The Allegory of the Cave and Alexandra's point from the previous comment- with all of these perceptions of reality, it is inevitable that the truth is going to be compromised to some degree. So we are now posed with the dilemma to unite a world of a million definitions of reality into one to find the truth, just as Socrates and Plato prompt us to do from Ancient Greece- fascinating.
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ReplyDeleteI really loved this post because everyone can relate to it. I don’t know how many times I have blanked out on a word and when someone says it, I yell “yes!”. This also reminds me of something I learned in my psychology class called the Gleason study. The Gleason study means that language rules are generative. We watched a video in class where a teacher would substitute the word “wub” for objects for a student. Eventually the student caught on and would call what we know as a chair a “wub”. I think this is very interesting because we sometimes even associate this same idea with how we look. We might think it would be odd to have only one eye, but if all humans were born with one eye from the start we wouldn't think it would be weird at all. Similarly, if we all called a chair a “wub” from the beginning, it would be weird to think of calling it anything else.
ReplyDeleteFurthermore, I think you really nailed it with what you inferred about how the man who left the cave didn't know what to call anything. If you didn't know any words to describe anything, it would be extremely hard. Because of this I feel like reality does have some basis of our language, maybe not all but it is involved.