UnbornTao

Right?

Also, I'm not exactly sure that its being universal (in the sense of being broadly applied, perhaps) has to be incompatible with its being invented. But in my experience, I keep bumping into assumptions about language. Like: it is objective, it is just an add-on, it is absolute, etc.

I disagree with your point about communication somehow existing on its own. How would that even come about? Is language really limited to defining and labeling reality - as if reality were there as an immutable object, and language merely added commentary on top of it? Or is the relationship far more intertwined? Communication isn't a fact of the universe, but an activity. Bring to mind how much projection and conceptualization is involved in such an assumption. Language actively contributes to our experience in a creative way. It makes possible entire worlds for us to inhabit: science, philosophy, art, religion, belief, communication, comedy, metaphor, symbolism, talking with yourself. These are huge aspects of our shared experience of reality, and yet, without language, they couldn't exist. Think about it. The fact that a sound can represent something beyond or different from itself already points to language being invented. I get that written exchanges may not be especially effective, but at the very least they can leave us with a question or an opening to delve deeper into the topic, rather than simply assuming that all this means we actually comprehend what language is.

@Yimpa Haha, cool.

This is fair, as far as the ideology goes. It's not so much about refusing to use it, but about deliberately choosing an OS. Do people do that? For a large percentage of the user base that doesn't need specialized software like the Adobe suite, Linux or Mac can be better options. There's a case to be made that those are also conformist, of course.

Why that distro? How does it differ from the others?

How many deliberately choose to use it, even though alternatives - sometimes better ones - exist for the average user, especially when the use case involves only basic tasks? What percentage of the user base could do without it, yet install it either way?

This seems to me like a balanced take, in principle. For example, if we were to temporarily eliminate the entire possibility of language, what would we then have, relative to a banana? A perception of something? And then - what is a "thing"? To what extent does language not only influence but also create our experience? It's difficult to separate what is there from what is added. I'd rather not speculate too much, and instead proceed step by step - like a meditation.

But what's true? If it were possible to know what language really is, then that understanding would take a different form than just a notion about it. Isn't that kind of thinking itself dependent on the thing being investigated? When we examine our knowledge of language, how much of it relies on language simply to exist? I haven't done this successfully, but we could ask (as a meditation, perhaps): What is an experience without - or prior to - the existence of language? The goal being creating "language" from the ground up. Not an easy topic.

Same thing, like okey doke.

@Ramasta9 You might be a past user with a different account, and that's OK with me.

Using Windows.

I think 'mathematicians' would fit better there.

John Travolta and Nancy Cartwright (Bart Simpsons' voice actress) are Scientologists. ¡Ay, caramba!

That's the thing, it's a definition. Could you have come up with it if this possibility didn't exist? Ironically, without language, our knowledge about language might never have come to pass in the first place. Without a reference to the content of language, what is language? I ran out of synonyms this morning.

I see no change.

Is it me, or has the main website's width on mobile changed slightly?

Okay, but I also already think I know what language is. (!) That's why we question and remain open, in a way. Do we really understand what language is? It might be that we're standing on artificial ground - intellect, conclusion, belief, opinion, answers. Which is to say, we take our experience of language entirely for granted as if it were the same as realizing its nature. Set aside everything you think you know about language and look into it - in your experience right now.

If that was the case, avoid it in the first place or at least disclose it. To be clear, this refers to content generated by AI. It's not about grammar correction or the like.

Yeah.

Right, I need to eat some food.

Yeah, my best answer is for us to contemplate what languag eis on our own and maybe then share the results here. Because I don't think it's something that can be easily solved.