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You often bring up this heartburn thing. not sure what you mean by that? do you think people disagree with your posts because they are jealous?
let my set it straight. you offer no original thought. most of you posts amount to pretty much nothing meaningful said in some some kind arcane wordy style. you actually do display a mind set in cement. no jealousy just ennui.
This post says more about you than it does about LearnMe.
I have no way of knowing from what base of knowledge you speak, but try Googling the evolution of language - forget the Intelligent Design literature, I'm talking about secular science of the highest caliber. You will discover that the origin of language, particularly from the perspective of evolutionary theory, remains one of the great puzzles. Ditto for the origin of life ("chemical evolution" - uh-huh). Ditto for DNA, which isn't merely "like" a language but is, in fact, a language.
I'm always amused when people - notably Harry D. (he has a college degree!) but certainly others - confidently assert what "science has proved" or "evolution has done." Demonstrating that they actually don't know what they are talking about would be a massive undertaking and not worth the time and effort because they just keep coming back with the same generic nonsense. I simply say: Do your homework, as I have.
You will discover that, within secular science at the highest levels, the origin of life itself, the explanation for DNA and the origin of language - rather fundamental issues, eh? - remain great puzzles and that neo-Darwinism is indeed a theory in crisis insofar as it attempts to explain them and lots of other things. If you think otherwise, I can assure you with the greatest confidence: You really haven't done your homework.
Yes, I have studied vast swaths of the ID literature, which most of you surely haven't because you are under the badly mistaken impression that it's all lightweight pseudo-Creationism. One of the beauties of the ID literature is that it affords a quick entry to the entirely secular, non-ID-affiliated scientific literature. For obvious reasons, those within the ID movement love steering us to the secular science that acknowledges the same things - and there is lots of it, in peer-reviewed work by scientists whose credentials are unimpeachable.
Harry will now assure us, in his little one- and two-line snippets, that the origin of life, DNA and language are all well-understood, that "we have the evidence," and that I have "as usual, provided no evidence." He may even toss in a reference to Bayes' Theorem. Yawn.
When I think of the evolution of language, I am thinking of a word that does not look exactly like its root. Examples would be the doublet "tradition" and "treason". Treason would be the word that has evolved. https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=...tension_submit
Because the first words were not recorded, the origin of language may remain a mystery. But if I wanted to consider the origin of language the first place I would start is how a living creature assigns meaning to something. But this wouldn't involve language because language involves more than one. Instead, the focus would be on how the simplest of creatures can differentiate between two things and why it would. Being able to distinguish between two sounds would be very important to the formation of language I would think.
Quote:
Originally Posted by cb2008
I respect your opinion in the bolded.
However I believe it is a limited view of language itself and I see that in many atheist arguments.
Language - words and meaning - is malleable. Words came first, before it was collected and catalogued into a dictionary. That dictionary has not stopped growing, more words are added to it every year as words are added to the lexicon. Resorting to the dictionary is useful but the usage of words transcends dictionaries. The art of Hip Hop is a good example. As is poetry and metaphors.
The world is full of meaning, and we are not always receptive it or even fully aware of it. How we receive the meaning also is shaped by our own mental health and spirit.
Yes. I acknowledge that language is malleable. While the base of some words may have a concrete meaning, derivatives from that base can be used figuratively.
You often bring up this heartburn thing. not sure what you mean by that? do you think people disagree with your posts because they are jealous?
let my set it straight. you offer no original thought. most of you posts amount to pretty much nothing meaningful said in some some kind arcane wordy style. you actually do display a mind set in cement. no jealousy just ennui.
I wanted to add as well about humans evolving for a higher purpose (but not ultimate). The invention of language is evidence of this because, in order for language (signs, markings, even body language) to work, two people have to agree on its meaning. And when they don't, they infer. And if they get it wrong, hopefully, there is open communication. That is higher thinking for a purpose.
Religion, I think, has a tendency to make meaning out of things that I wouldn't. There is nothing wrong with that because my path to leave religion started with what I took as a sign.
Referring back to this. Advaita, based on the non-dual premise that our true self, Consciousness, is the same as Brhman, the Cosmic Consciousness, considers “names and formsâ€, the origin of language, as the first cause of the delusion that creates duality, the mistaken belief that there is a difference or division between the two.
Thus the first step towards spiritual meditation is the disregard of the “name and forms†in the forms of thoughts, and focus the mind on the stillness of the eternal, ever shining, Existence.
Names and forms are unreal, change constantly. Existence as Consciousness is all there is.
Rather than language being evidence of a higher purpose, it is in fact a hinderance for the ultimate purpose.
But as long as we live in duality, language is an essential utility. Nothing more.
I wanted to add as well about humans evolving for a higher purpose (but not ultimate). The invention of language is evidence of this because, in order for language (signs, markings, even body language) to work, two people have to agree on its meaning. And when they don't, they infer. And if they get it wrong, hopefully, there is open communication. That is higher thinking for a purpose.
Religion, I think, has a tendency to make meaning out of things that I wouldn't. There is nothing wrong with that because my path to leave religion started with what I took as a sign.
I like this line of thinking. Your example of language is about people who have agreed on the meaning, and hence meaning exists. But of course it is not ultimate meaning - language is arbitrary sounds and squiggles at the ultimate level. Some words are incredibly powerful and full of meaning, even without ultimate meaning
Humans can have plenty of meaning without ultimate meaning.
I like this line of thinking. Your example of language is about people who have agreed on the meaning, and hence meaning exists. But of course it is not ultimate meaning - language is arbitrary sounds and squiggles at the ultimate level. Some words are incredibly powerful and full of meaning, even without ultimate meaning
Humans can have plenty of meaning without ultimate meaning.
True enough, but one issue I have with this line of reasoning is that it suggests that living things without language do not have at least as high a purpose and/or meaning. Then again I'm not one to assign purpose or meaning to any of these things other than on a personal level. Hard to glean what purpose or meaning there is to what all has been going on in the observable universe over the course of these 13+ billion years. Or how so given all that seems to have been going on over that period of time. The vast majority of which, over the vast majority of time, has absolutely nothing to do with us humans.
How so indeed without a real cosmic stretch of the imagination?
True enough, but one issue I have with this line of reasoning is that it suggests that living things without language do not have at least as high a purpose and/or meaning. Then again I'm not one to assign purpose or meaning to any of these things other than on a personal level. Hard to glean what purpose or meaning there is to what all has been going on in the observable universe over the course of these 13+ billion years. Or how so given all that seems to have been going on over that period of time. The vast majority of which, over the vast majority of time, has absolutely nothing to do with us humans.
How so indeed without a real cosmic stretch of the imagination?
I wouldn't say language is the only source of higher meaning, just one such source. For example, Humans have evolved emotion and that provides higher meaning as well. Humans are able to think abstractly which provides higher meaning.
But of course none of that is ultimate, universal meaning as you point out. Just human meaning.
I wanted to add as well about humans evolving for a higher purpose (but not ultimate). The invention of language is evidence of this because, in order for language (signs, markings, even body language) to work, two people have to agree on its meaning. And when they don't, they infer. And if they get it wrong, hopefully, there is open communication. That is higher thinking for a purpose.
Religion, I think, has a tendency to make meaning out of things that I wouldn't. There is nothing wrong with that because my path to leave religion started with what I took as a sign.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Peter600
I like this line of thinking. Your example of language is about people who have agreed on the meaning, and hence meaning exists. But of course it is not ultimate meaning - language is arbitrary sounds and squiggles at the ultimate level. Some words are incredibly powerful and full of meaning, even without ultimate meaning
Humans can have plenty of meaning without ultimate meaning.
I wouldn't say language is the only source of higher meaning, just one such source. For example, Humans have evolved emotion and that provides higher meaning as well. Humans are able to think abstractly which provides higher meaning.
But of course none of that is ultimate, universal meaning as you point out. Just human meaning.
I'm not following...
How does language and any other evolved attribute of any living thing, including us, necessarily translate into "higher meaning?" Perhaps if you explain what you mean by meaning. Do all the attributes and talents possessed by an octopus, for example, have less "meaning" far as you are concerned? How so?
If so, what's the meaning?
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