Another Short History of Linguistics (45)

We have said that the Chinese language or culture lack of mathematics expression. Yet it is said that when God closes a door he opens a window. This window is simplification.

With common sense we know the most simple and easy way to study language is separated writing symbol, sound symbol and meaning first and study their number directly. 3

Two different minds of scientific or literary may mention the same scenery indifferent ways. For instance when we see the reflection of cloud of the river. The literary mind may tell us, “It is beautiful.” The scientific mind may ask, “Is it real cloud, how can it shaped like that?” That is to say, the development of science is irrelevant with what language, it is depend on mind.

Further study shown that the relationship of the symbol and meaning is man-made or artificially attached by people. We felt the symbol (characters) of pictogram has the meaning naturally because we have used that symbols more times than the symbols (words) in alphabetic language that we mistake the truth with the reality. Or we may say, by thousand times of practice, we thought the symbol is equal the meaning by mistake of our mind.

Likewise, the alphabetic language speaker always think that the ‘a’ can naturally represent a sound of ‘a’ or similar. But the fact is also with thousand times of practice, the mistake is formed in mind gradually and the truth is that symbol is symbol meaning is meaning without assign a meaning to a symbol arbitrarily or artificially they are irrelevant things. People made them relevant because people needs to communicate by either sound or (writing) symbol. 

The semantic language like Chinese usually required the speaker repeat 3,000 characters during lifetime with so many repeats, people mistake them as real meaning. While an alphabetic language like English, people repeat 26 letters throughout life, it make people believe that the sound of 26 letters is real.

When we want send a message, firstly, we find the first word, (for English speaker normally have 20,000 words in mind) it means we focus of 1/20,000 of our mind. Then find out the second words and our mind focus on 1/20,000x20,000 of it until it focus on 1/several billion, then we find the really necessary meaning hidden there. Or we may say that when we are expressing a sentence, we are looking for a meaning that can be distinguished from the rest several billions of meanings. When we receive a message, it play the same game too.

A common principle called, “A thing is valued in proportion to its rarity.” So between the sound and drawing symbol the number of sound is rarity and it is more important.