I read 1984 when I was a kid. So I understood parts of it. I never understood what the significance of eliminating words was. But it makes so much sense. This connects a lot of pieces for me.
I like and agree with almost all of your observations and conclusions regarding how the well-intentioned empathy for the unfortunate or marginalized becomes codified into social standards that then filter and remove otherwise worthwhile discussion. The "Mrs. Parsons toppled the USSR" idea is new to me, and it resonates strongly — no utopian ideology can survive without getting real stuff done. I loved your story about reading with mittens. Truly evocative.
I believe your argument could be made stronger without the multiple references to being unable to think a thing if we can't say it. From your presentation of the saying, if feels like you support the idea it conveys, but the idea runs counter to everyday experience. When you say "um" searching for a word that matches your thought, the thought is first and the word is an approximation. A painter could have a clear thought and plan for how to fix and improve her painting, and no words are used at all in that thought. I saw a bug this morning and I pictured the mechanics of the muscles that made it move in a funny way, and I remember that thought and I can adjust it with tomorrow's observations, and no words are used.
Newspeak and the like are all about the public perception of a consistency of thought. If everyone says the same, right words, then we can imagine that everyone is thinking the same "right" thing. This "communicated thought" level is where your argument lies, and it certainly gets influenced by Newspeak and its ilk. I suppose my contention is that communication influences thought and how thoughts grow, but does not control it and cannot limit it. If anything, the reason self-censorship feels so ugly to me is because it means that there are worthwhile thoughts out there which are not being shared. The thought comes before the words, but the words let it fly into others' minds.
Thanks for sharing your work, and thoughts, with us. I saw this posted to the Facebook Science Fiction group. I appreciate the commentary you add there.
Thank you so much, Ben, for your thoughtful and informative response. I agree that thought is possible without language, though there is a real debate over it in linguistics and neuroscience, which I did not want to get into. The work of Terence Deacon, for example, argues that language and thought co-evolved, especially if language is understood as any symbolic or representational system
But my refrain “You cannot think what you cannot say” was, in fact, a satire of Newspeak and its main assumptions. I do not believe that it is possible to completely control language and narrative. I should have made it clearer in the body of the essay. I will do so in the follow-up. Thanks again, I really appreciate it.
I read 1984 when I was a kid. So I understood parts of it. I never understood what the significance of eliminating words was. But it makes so much sense. This connects a lot of pieces for me.
Thank you! The problem is not with you; it is with how 1984 is being taught and explained to generations of kids in the West.
I like and agree with almost all of your observations and conclusions regarding how the well-intentioned empathy for the unfortunate or marginalized becomes codified into social standards that then filter and remove otherwise worthwhile discussion. The "Mrs. Parsons toppled the USSR" idea is new to me, and it resonates strongly — no utopian ideology can survive without getting real stuff done. I loved your story about reading with mittens. Truly evocative.
I believe your argument could be made stronger without the multiple references to being unable to think a thing if we can't say it. From your presentation of the saying, if feels like you support the idea it conveys, but the idea runs counter to everyday experience. When you say "um" searching for a word that matches your thought, the thought is first and the word is an approximation. A painter could have a clear thought and plan for how to fix and improve her painting, and no words are used at all in that thought. I saw a bug this morning and I pictured the mechanics of the muscles that made it move in a funny way, and I remember that thought and I can adjust it with tomorrow's observations, and no words are used.
Newspeak and the like are all about the public perception of a consistency of thought. If everyone says the same, right words, then we can imagine that everyone is thinking the same "right" thing. This "communicated thought" level is where your argument lies, and it certainly gets influenced by Newspeak and its ilk. I suppose my contention is that communication influences thought and how thoughts grow, but does not control it and cannot limit it. If anything, the reason self-censorship feels so ugly to me is because it means that there are worthwhile thoughts out there which are not being shared. The thought comes before the words, but the words let it fly into others' minds.
Thanks for sharing your work, and thoughts, with us. I saw this posted to the Facebook Science Fiction group. I appreciate the commentary you add there.
Thank you so much, Ben, for your thoughtful and informative response. I agree that thought is possible without language, though there is a real debate over it in linguistics and neuroscience, which I did not want to get into. The work of Terence Deacon, for example, argues that language and thought co-evolved, especially if language is understood as any symbolic or representational system
https://www.amazon.com/Symbolic-Species-Co-evolution-Language-Brain/dp/0393317544
But my refrain “You cannot think what you cannot say” was, in fact, a satire of Newspeak and its main assumptions. I do not believe that it is possible to completely control language and narrative. I should have made it clearer in the body of the essay. I will do so in the follow-up. Thanks again, I really appreciate it.