1 00:00:05,040 --> 00:00:10,240 Speaker 1: Are there really dozens of words for snow in northern cultures? 2 00:00:10,800 --> 00:00:13,440 Speaker 1: And what did the movie Arrival have to do with 3 00:00:13,800 --> 00:00:18,919 Speaker 1: how we speak language? Why are Russians better than Americans 4 00:00:19,120 --> 00:00:23,520 Speaker 1: at distinguishing certain shades of blue? And what does any 5 00:00:23,560 --> 00:00:27,040 Speaker 1: of this have to do with space or time or gender? 6 00:00:27,560 --> 00:00:36,240 Speaker 1: And how your language shapes your thinking. Welcome to Inner 7 00:00:36,320 --> 00:00:38,199 Speaker 1: Cosmos with me David Eagleman. 8 00:00:38,400 --> 00:00:42,120 Speaker 2: I'm a neuroscientist and author at Stanford and in these 9 00:00:42,159 --> 00:00:45,720 Speaker 2: episodes we sail deeply into our three pound universe to 10 00:00:45,840 --> 00:00:49,760 Speaker 2: understand why and how our lives look the way they do. 11 00:00:57,960 --> 00:01:03,920 Speaker 1: Today's episode is about language, and specifically a question about 12 00:01:03,960 --> 00:01:08,959 Speaker 1: how your language interacts with your thinking. Now, if you've 13 00:01:09,000 --> 00:01:11,200 Speaker 1: been listening to this podcast for a while, you'll know 14 00:01:11,280 --> 00:01:14,640 Speaker 1: that I often start off talking about how the brain 15 00:01:14,840 --> 00:01:19,920 Speaker 1: is locked in silence and darkness inside our skulls, and 16 00:01:20,000 --> 00:01:23,440 Speaker 1: all we ever get are trillions of spikes coming in 17 00:01:23,480 --> 00:01:27,920 Speaker 1: and running around there, and our perception is constructed from that. 18 00:01:28,680 --> 00:01:32,560 Speaker 1: But it's also true that wherever you grow up, whatever 19 00:01:32,880 --> 00:01:35,360 Speaker 1: spot on the planet you happen to drop in on, 20 00:01:36,040 --> 00:01:40,760 Speaker 1: you are taught a particular language. Now, does the language 21 00:01:40,800 --> 00:01:44,120 Speaker 1: you learn tell you what to pay attention to in 22 00:01:44,160 --> 00:01:48,160 Speaker 1: the world. Does it change your perception of the things 23 00:01:48,200 --> 00:01:50,680 Speaker 1: around you? And if so, does that mean that if 24 00:01:50,720 --> 00:01:54,240 Speaker 1: you grew up with a different language you might see 25 00:01:54,280 --> 00:01:57,920 Speaker 1: the world a little differently. So that's the question we're 26 00:01:57,960 --> 00:02:00,200 Speaker 1: going to look at today. Does the language you speak 27 00:02:00,360 --> 00:02:05,280 Speaker 1: modify the way that you think? So let's start in 28 00:02:05,360 --> 00:02:10,160 Speaker 1: the eighteen eighties with a young man traveling through northern Canada. 29 00:02:10,560 --> 00:02:14,000 Speaker 1: His name was Franz Boaz, and he was an anthropologist, 30 00:02:14,520 --> 00:02:18,399 Speaker 1: and he met and fell in love with the Inuit natives, 31 00:02:18,760 --> 00:02:21,440 Speaker 1: and he worked to take on their diet and to 32 00:02:22,040 --> 00:02:25,080 Speaker 1: learn their language, and he ended up writing a book 33 00:02:25,120 --> 00:02:30,040 Speaker 1: in nineteen eleven called Handbook of American Indian Languages, and 34 00:02:30,160 --> 00:02:33,480 Speaker 1: in it he reported that they have many many words 35 00:02:33,800 --> 00:02:38,120 Speaker 1: for snow. For example, he pointed to the different words 36 00:02:38,160 --> 00:02:43,000 Speaker 1: for snow on the ground versus snow falling, and there 37 00:02:43,040 --> 00:02:49,160 Speaker 1: were subtleties like achille kog for softly falling snow and 38 00:02:49,919 --> 00:02:54,400 Speaker 1: piegnartog for the snow that is good for driving sled. 39 00:02:54,919 --> 00:02:57,400 Speaker 1: His point is that when you look at English, it 40 00:02:57,480 --> 00:03:02,280 Speaker 1: doesn't divide the types of snow as finely. So you've 41 00:03:02,280 --> 00:03:05,440 Speaker 1: probably heard this claim that Inuit natives have lots of 42 00:03:05,480 --> 00:03:10,440 Speaker 1: words for snow. And while the public loved this, among linguists, 43 00:03:10,840 --> 00:03:14,880 Speaker 1: this snowballed into a big debate about whether it was true. 44 00:03:15,400 --> 00:03:18,959 Speaker 1: Many linguists turned a cold shoulder to this as an 45 00:03:19,120 --> 00:03:22,919 Speaker 1: urban legend. They said that it came from neglectful study 46 00:03:23,240 --> 00:03:27,679 Speaker 1: and was then magnified by journalists. Some linguists have gone 47 00:03:27,720 --> 00:03:31,840 Speaker 1: so far as to label it the Great Eskimo Vocabulary hoax. 48 00:03:32,520 --> 00:03:35,400 Speaker 1: But the debate about this isn't over. There was a 49 00:03:35,960 --> 00:03:39,800 Speaker 1: study published a few years ago that suggested Boaz was correct. 50 00:03:40,640 --> 00:03:44,960 Speaker 1: The study showed that the Inuit language in Nuktitute does 51 00:03:45,080 --> 00:03:49,160 Speaker 1: have at least fifty words for snow. These studies authors 52 00:03:49,240 --> 00:03:51,760 Speaker 1: point out as could be guessed that these aren't just 53 00:03:51,960 --> 00:03:56,120 Speaker 1: different ways of saying snow, but instead they referenced different 54 00:03:56,400 --> 00:04:00,520 Speaker 1: types of snow, like wet snow, dry snow, drifting snow, 55 00:04:01,200 --> 00:04:05,600 Speaker 1: and the paper suggests that Boaz's observations were accurate and 56 00:04:05,600 --> 00:04:09,760 Speaker 1: that the Inuit do indeed have a rich vocabulary for 57 00:04:09,920 --> 00:04:12,280 Speaker 1: the stuff that you and I might just call by 58 00:04:12,320 --> 00:04:17,880 Speaker 1: one word now. Obviously, it's easily imaginable and understandable that 59 00:04:17,920 --> 00:04:22,000 Speaker 1: if you're surrounded by snow, you'll develop lots of distinctions 60 00:04:22,040 --> 00:04:25,000 Speaker 1: for it. All snow is the same to me, or 61 00:04:25,240 --> 00:04:27,680 Speaker 1: maybe I have snow that's good for skiing or not 62 00:04:27,760 --> 00:04:30,440 Speaker 1: good for skiing. But if you're surrounded by it all 63 00:04:30,480 --> 00:04:34,680 Speaker 1: the time, and your hunts depend on subtle differences in it, 64 00:04:34,720 --> 00:04:37,760 Speaker 1: and your livelihood depends on subtle differences in it, then 65 00:04:37,800 --> 00:04:41,520 Speaker 1: you'll get good at making those distinctions. And by the way, 66 00:04:41,560 --> 00:04:45,599 Speaker 1: cultures who live in warmer climates, like the Aztec speaking 67 00:04:45,640 --> 00:04:50,560 Speaker 1: their language Nahwattle, use only a single broad term that 68 00:04:50,720 --> 00:04:54,119 Speaker 1: means snow, and it includes other cold things like ice. 69 00:04:54,920 --> 00:04:58,320 Speaker 1: So the idea is that our language is shaped by 70 00:04:58,360 --> 00:05:02,760 Speaker 1: the need for efficient communication. Brains want to come up 71 00:05:02,800 --> 00:05:06,960 Speaker 1: with words that are exact and informative to other brains 72 00:05:06,960 --> 00:05:09,839 Speaker 1: in the community, and they want to be able to 73 00:05:09,880 --> 00:05:14,200 Speaker 1: produce these with minimal effort. In other words, you don't 74 00:05:14,240 --> 00:05:18,000 Speaker 1: want to have to use a six syllable word for 75 00:05:18,360 --> 00:05:20,880 Speaker 1: a word that you use a lot, like dog or cow, 76 00:05:21,240 --> 00:05:25,560 Speaker 1: but you might use longer, less efficient words for concepts 77 00:05:25,640 --> 00:05:28,360 Speaker 1: that you don't need to refer too much, like anti 78 00:05:28,400 --> 00:05:35,600 Speaker 1: disestablishmentarianism or anachronistic or sesquipedalian. So, using snow as an example, 79 00:05:35,920 --> 00:05:40,200 Speaker 1: if your community subdivides this into lots of words. That 80 00:05:40,400 --> 00:05:44,200 Speaker 1: requires more effort to store all these words, but it's 81 00:05:44,320 --> 00:05:49,360 Speaker 1: worth it if you get a big gain in informativeness. 82 00:05:49,440 --> 00:05:53,760 Speaker 1: So wherever you find things frequently referenced in language, then 83 00:05:53,800 --> 00:05:59,200 Speaker 1: you find finer grained categories appearing. And this is how 84 00:05:59,240 --> 00:06:04,279 Speaker 1: you get communication. So the way that we talk about 85 00:06:04,320 --> 00:06:09,000 Speaker 1: the world is shaped by our environment and our experiences 86 00:06:09,120 --> 00:06:12,599 Speaker 1: in the world. For the Inuit, snow is an important 87 00:06:12,640 --> 00:06:16,159 Speaker 1: part of their environment and their language reflects this. So 88 00:06:16,240 --> 00:06:19,520 Speaker 1: this is how language gets shaped. But there's a debate 89 00:06:19,880 --> 00:06:23,320 Speaker 1: that's been raging in the linguistics community for a century, 90 00:06:23,360 --> 00:06:27,640 Speaker 1: and that is, if you grow up speaking a particular language, 91 00:06:28,279 --> 00:06:31,160 Speaker 1: does it make you think differently? In other words, if 92 00:06:31,200 --> 00:06:34,080 Speaker 1: you grow up in a language with lots of distinctions 93 00:06:34,120 --> 00:06:38,839 Speaker 1: for snow in the vocabulary, do you actually see snow differently? 94 00:06:38,880 --> 00:06:41,120 Speaker 1: When you look out the window. You don't just see 95 00:06:41,240 --> 00:06:46,280 Speaker 1: falling white stuff, but do you perceive distinctions that would 96 00:06:46,279 --> 00:06:50,080 Speaker 1: be invisible to me? And does your language shape your thought? 97 00:06:50,160 --> 00:06:53,839 Speaker 1: Does it restrict or expand what you are able to see? 98 00:06:54,839 --> 00:06:58,720 Speaker 1: So let's start with the twenty sixteen movie Arrival, which 99 00:06:58,760 --> 00:07:01,240 Speaker 1: was based on the novella story of Your Life by 100 00:07:01,279 --> 00:07:04,479 Speaker 1: Ted Chang, and for reasons of not spoiling it if 101 00:07:04,520 --> 00:07:06,760 Speaker 1: you haven't seen it, I'll leave out the details. But 102 00:07:07,240 --> 00:07:10,559 Speaker 1: this movie is about alien ships coming to the Earth 103 00:07:10,600 --> 00:07:14,240 Speaker 1: and they just hover there and we meet the protagonist 104 00:07:14,360 --> 00:07:18,520 Speaker 1: played by Amy Adams, because the military can't figure out 105 00:07:18,880 --> 00:07:21,920 Speaker 1: how to communicate with the aliens, and so she's called 106 00:07:21,960 --> 00:07:25,880 Speaker 1: in as a linguist. Can she figure out how to 107 00:07:25,960 --> 00:07:30,080 Speaker 1: communicate with these aliens? And in this story she ends 108 00:07:30,160 --> 00:07:34,640 Speaker 1: up learning the alien's language, and at the end, once 109 00:07:34,800 --> 00:07:38,720 Speaker 1: she speaks this new language, she's able to perceive the 110 00:07:38,760 --> 00:07:41,960 Speaker 1: world differently. And in fact, some of you may have 111 00:07:42,000 --> 00:07:44,520 Speaker 1: seen this movie but didn't catch this part of it. 112 00:07:44,600 --> 00:07:49,360 Speaker 1: The aliens have a different relationship with time, and once 113 00:07:49,480 --> 00:07:53,040 Speaker 1: Amy Adams learns to speak like they do, she can 114 00:07:53,160 --> 00:07:58,320 Speaker 1: see time like they do. Now. Although Arrival is a 115 00:07:58,360 --> 00:08:00,960 Speaker 1: work of fiction, I talked with Head Chang about this, 116 00:08:01,120 --> 00:08:05,200 Speaker 1: and indeed he based this on this longstanding debate about 117 00:08:05,240 --> 00:08:10,000 Speaker 1: whether and how your language shapes your thinking, And really 118 00:08:10,040 --> 00:08:13,280 Speaker 1: the debate began in Earnest a century ago. There were 119 00:08:13,280 --> 00:08:17,520 Speaker 1: two linguists who thought about this idea, and they proposed 120 00:08:17,600 --> 00:08:21,200 Speaker 1: that maybe language isn't just the output of how we think. 121 00:08:21,720 --> 00:08:25,000 Speaker 1: But instead, when you teach a child language, you're actually 122 00:08:25,120 --> 00:08:29,000 Speaker 1: shaping how they can think, or how they can see 123 00:08:29,040 --> 00:08:33,280 Speaker 1: the world, or how their mind can cogitate. These two 124 00:08:33,840 --> 00:08:37,960 Speaker 1: linguists were named Edward Sapier and Benjamin Wharf, and the 125 00:08:38,040 --> 00:08:42,280 Speaker 1: idea that language shapes thought became known as the Sapier 126 00:08:42,320 --> 00:08:46,480 Speaker 1: Wharf hypothesis. Now we can divide this into the strong 127 00:08:46,679 --> 00:08:49,800 Speaker 1: version and the weak version of the hypothesis. The strong 128 00:08:50,040 --> 00:08:55,479 Speaker 1: version states that language determines thought, meaning that the structure 129 00:08:55,520 --> 00:09:00,240 Speaker 1: of a language actually limits what its speakers can and 130 00:09:00,320 --> 00:09:02,600 Speaker 1: think about. So if you don't have a word for 131 00:09:02,679 --> 00:09:05,760 Speaker 1: something in your language, you can't even conceive of it. 132 00:09:06,720 --> 00:09:12,440 Speaker 1: The weak hypothesis states that language influences thought, meaning that 133 00:09:12,480 --> 00:09:16,400 Speaker 1: the structure of your language can affect how you think 134 00:09:16,440 --> 00:09:18,720 Speaker 1: about the world. I'll cut to the chase here and 135 00:09:18,760 --> 00:09:23,640 Speaker 1: say that the strong hypothesis that language determines thought has 136 00:09:23,720 --> 00:09:27,360 Speaker 1: not held up against testing, but there is evidence supporting 137 00:09:27,480 --> 00:09:31,240 Speaker 1: the weak hypothesis. As an example that we'll get into 138 00:09:31,360 --> 00:09:35,320 Speaker 1: in a moment, some languages have different ways of dividing 139 00:09:35,400 --> 00:09:39,559 Speaker 1: up the color spectrums, so they might verbally distinguish two 140 00:09:39,640 --> 00:09:44,240 Speaker 1: neighboring colors whereas your language might just use a single 141 00:09:44,280 --> 00:09:48,440 Speaker 1: word that encompasses both colors, and the evidence suggests that 142 00:09:48,480 --> 00:09:52,200 Speaker 1: speakers of that other language are better at seeing, better 143 00:09:52,200 --> 00:09:57,120 Speaker 1: at distinguishing between those different colors, between different shades than 144 00:09:57,160 --> 00:10:00,400 Speaker 1: you are because they have words for them. Is this 145 00:10:00,480 --> 00:10:04,880 Speaker 1: because the language itself is influencing their perception or is 146 00:10:04,880 --> 00:10:07,440 Speaker 1: it simply because they're more familiar with these colors because 147 00:10:07,480 --> 00:10:09,840 Speaker 1: they have separate words for them. We'll get back to 148 00:10:09,880 --> 00:10:13,440 Speaker 1: that momentarily, but either way, they get the difference between 149 00:10:13,520 --> 00:10:16,800 Speaker 1: these colors better than you do, just as a function 150 00:10:16,960 --> 00:10:21,000 Speaker 1: of the language that they speak. Now, the extent of 151 00:10:21,480 --> 00:10:25,680 Speaker 1: language's influence on your thinking is debated, and in part 152 00:10:25,760 --> 00:10:29,839 Speaker 1: this is because it's really hard to design good experiments 153 00:10:29,880 --> 00:10:33,760 Speaker 1: that can isolate the effects of language on your cognition 154 00:10:34,160 --> 00:10:38,160 Speaker 1: from other factors about your culture and your environment. And 155 00:10:38,240 --> 00:10:42,200 Speaker 1: also a lot of people are bilingual or multilingual, so 156 00:10:42,720 --> 00:10:46,160 Speaker 1: their cognitive processes might be shaped by the interplay of 157 00:10:46,240 --> 00:10:50,640 Speaker 1: multiple languages, so it's not always straightforward to test this. 158 00:10:51,160 --> 00:10:54,160 Speaker 1: But that said, our language does seem to play a 159 00:10:54,400 --> 00:10:58,120 Speaker 1: role in shaping how we think and perceive the world, 160 00:10:58,679 --> 00:11:03,040 Speaker 1: and that's not so surprising. After all, language provides a 161 00:11:03,280 --> 00:11:09,360 Speaker 1: framework for organizing and categorizing thoughts and experiences. The words 162 00:11:09,400 --> 00:11:13,640 Speaker 1: and labels we use to describe things can influence how 163 00:11:13,960 --> 00:11:18,600 Speaker 1: we mentally organize the world around us, and our language 164 00:11:18,600 --> 00:11:23,080 Speaker 1: is what we use to express complex and abstract ideas, 165 00:11:23,720 --> 00:11:29,079 Speaker 1: and the availability of specific words or phrases can affect 166 00:11:29,120 --> 00:11:34,280 Speaker 1: how effectively and precisely we can communicate these ideas, or 167 00:11:34,320 --> 00:11:38,679 Speaker 1: take something subtle, like gendered nouns. A lot of languages 168 00:11:38,800 --> 00:11:42,640 Speaker 1: use gendered nouns, meaning each object is either a male 169 00:11:42,840 --> 00:11:45,760 Speaker 1: or a female. English doesn't have this, but lots of 170 00:11:45,840 --> 00:11:48,840 Speaker 1: languages do, and there's a lot of study on how 171 00:11:48,880 --> 00:11:53,200 Speaker 1: that leads speakers to notice different things. Like the word 172 00:11:53,320 --> 00:11:57,080 Speaker 1: bridge in one language might be male and female in another, 173 00:11:57,480 --> 00:12:01,359 Speaker 1: and so people who speak those languages will often describe 174 00:12:01,679 --> 00:12:05,920 Speaker 1: different things about the same bridge, whether it's strong or 175 00:12:05,960 --> 00:12:10,840 Speaker 1: it's sleek, depending on their native language. And of course, 176 00:12:10,840 --> 00:12:14,119 Speaker 1: as I mentioned, the words and concepts that are prominent 177 00:12:14,200 --> 00:12:17,800 Speaker 1: in your language influence what you pay attention to, like 178 00:12:17,920 --> 00:12:22,880 Speaker 1: the differences in snow or colors. Now, I recently made 179 00:12:22,880 --> 00:12:27,120 Speaker 1: an episode on the idea of translating animal language, where 180 00:12:27,160 --> 00:12:33,120 Speaker 1: we talked about using AI to decode communication between say, dolphins, 181 00:12:33,160 --> 00:12:37,600 Speaker 1: or between whales, or between songbirds. And the idea behind 182 00:12:37,640 --> 00:12:41,880 Speaker 1: that comes out of research showing that all human languages 183 00:12:42,520 --> 00:12:46,800 Speaker 1: share a similar structure, where the words each sit in 184 00:12:46,880 --> 00:12:50,720 Speaker 1: a network of meaning related to each other. And you 185 00:12:50,800 --> 00:12:53,600 Speaker 1: can plot this out and see that languages have a 186 00:12:53,679 --> 00:12:57,680 Speaker 1: particular shape to them, and so researchers are interested in 187 00:12:57,720 --> 00:13:01,280 Speaker 1: whether that same shape could be success fully applied to 188 00:13:01,640 --> 00:13:05,640 Speaker 1: decoding animal languages. But one of the possibilities I brought 189 00:13:05,720 --> 00:13:09,920 Speaker 1: up is that an animal language might contain concepts that 190 00:13:09,960 --> 00:13:13,160 Speaker 1: we don't have any way to understand, and so those 191 00:13:13,320 --> 00:13:17,440 Speaker 1: parts of the space would be totally uninterpretable to us. 192 00:13:17,880 --> 00:13:21,760 Speaker 1: And that's because the sensorium of an animal, the kind 193 00:13:21,800 --> 00:13:24,240 Speaker 1: of signals that can pick up from the world, might 194 00:13:24,480 --> 00:13:29,280 Speaker 1: influence their concepts what they can think about. And so 195 00:13:29,320 --> 00:13:31,959 Speaker 1: if we just keep that idea in mind, that's really 196 00:13:31,960 --> 00:13:52,040 Speaker 1: the heart of the question that we're asking today. There's 197 00:13:52,040 --> 00:13:55,200 Speaker 1: been so much excitement in machine learning about the similar 198 00:13:55,320 --> 00:13:59,120 Speaker 1: structures of human language, but what we're asking today is 199 00:13:59,120 --> 00:14:01,720 Speaker 1: in what ways are are they different, even if only 200 00:14:01,800 --> 00:14:06,640 Speaker 1: subtly different, and how might that map onto differences in 201 00:14:07,080 --> 00:14:11,600 Speaker 1: human thought or experience. Even though we all emerged from 202 00:14:11,640 --> 00:14:15,679 Speaker 1: the same origins recently, and all have the same brain structure. 203 00:14:16,400 --> 00:14:22,280 Speaker 1: Culture and history modify the details of languages. So to 204 00:14:22,400 --> 00:14:25,840 Speaker 1: understand this better, I called up my colleague, the cognitive 205 00:14:25,880 --> 00:14:30,240 Speaker 1: scientist Lira Boroditsky, and I asked her, does the language 206 00:14:30,280 --> 00:14:32,640 Speaker 1: you speak change how you think? 207 00:14:36,600 --> 00:14:40,400 Speaker 3: What a great question. Certainly, research in my lab and 208 00:14:40,480 --> 00:14:44,360 Speaker 3: many other labs over the last thirty years is shown 209 00:14:44,440 --> 00:14:47,440 Speaker 3: that the structure of the language that you speak changes 210 00:14:47,520 --> 00:14:50,320 Speaker 3: the way you think, changes the way you see the world, 211 00:14:50,440 --> 00:14:55,080 Speaker 3: the way you feel, what you pay attention to. And 212 00:14:56,440 --> 00:14:59,360 Speaker 3: what's emerging from all of that research is this idea 213 00:14:59,440 --> 00:15:04,440 Speaker 3: that human minds construct not just one cognitive universe, but 214 00:15:04,520 --> 00:15:08,720 Speaker 3: actually many thousands of cognitive universes. Right, every language is 215 00:15:08,760 --> 00:15:14,600 Speaker 3: its own little inner cosmos, and every language gives you 216 00:15:14,960 --> 00:15:18,920 Speaker 3: a different perspective not just on the physical world, but 217 00:15:18,960 --> 00:15:23,280 Speaker 3: also on the incredible complex invented worlds that we humans 218 00:15:23,360 --> 00:15:27,880 Speaker 3: create that allow us to think about complex things like 219 00:15:28,440 --> 00:15:32,440 Speaker 3: our inner universes or the cosmos, or the kinds of 220 00:15:32,480 --> 00:15:35,680 Speaker 3: things that allow us to play chess, or compose symphonies 221 00:15:36,040 --> 00:15:39,960 Speaker 3: or do really high level mathematics. Every language is its 222 00:15:40,000 --> 00:15:45,880 Speaker 3: own little set of tools for creating those very complex 223 00:15:45,960 --> 00:15:48,720 Speaker 3: ideas and ends up with very different complex ideas as 224 00:15:48,760 --> 00:15:49,160 Speaker 3: a result. 225 00:15:49,920 --> 00:15:53,440 Speaker 1: So you grew up speaking Russian, Yeah, so give us 226 00:15:53,440 --> 00:15:57,160 Speaker 1: a sense of the differences between English and Russian and 227 00:15:57,280 --> 00:15:59,440 Speaker 1: what that might lead to in terms of thinking about 228 00:15:59,440 --> 00:15:59,960 Speaker 1: something different. 229 00:16:01,160 --> 00:16:03,920 Speaker 3: Sure, I can give you a couple of basic differences. 230 00:16:04,520 --> 00:16:07,400 Speaker 3: Russian is a language that has grammatical gender, so every 231 00:16:07,400 --> 00:16:12,360 Speaker 3: now and is masculine or feminine, and so people who 232 00:16:12,440 --> 00:16:16,880 Speaker 3: speak languages like that end up actually assigning some gender 233 00:16:16,960 --> 00:16:21,200 Speaker 3: stereotypically gendered properties to things that don't have gender, like 234 00:16:21,280 --> 00:16:27,040 Speaker 3: toasters or gloves or plants, things like that. Russian, in 235 00:16:27,680 --> 00:16:32,080 Speaker 3: the perceptual realm makes an obligatory distinction between light blue 236 00:16:32,080 --> 00:16:36,240 Speaker 3: and dark blue. So things that English calls blue for 237 00:16:36,360 --> 00:16:40,200 Speaker 3: Russian speakers, the light part of the blue spectrum is 238 00:16:40,280 --> 00:16:43,440 Speaker 3: gulaboy and the dark part is seeny, and you have 239 00:16:43,520 --> 00:16:45,240 Speaker 3: to call them by different names. They are just two 240 00:16:45,240 --> 00:16:49,440 Speaker 3: different color words like blue and green and English. And 241 00:16:49,760 --> 00:16:52,160 Speaker 3: what we find is that people who speak languages like 242 00:16:52,200 --> 00:16:55,880 Speaker 3: this actually do make a sharper distinction perceptually between those 243 00:16:55,920 --> 00:17:00,560 Speaker 3: two colors, and very early on their brain and starts 244 00:17:00,640 --> 00:17:04,680 Speaker 3: treating those two colors as categorically different. So if you're 245 00:17:04,720 --> 00:17:08,000 Speaker 3: looking at the brain of say a Greek speaker Russian speaker, 246 00:17:08,359 --> 00:17:11,280 Speaker 3: looking at a stream of colors, when it changes from 247 00:17:11,320 --> 00:17:14,280 Speaker 3: the light blue category to the dark blue category, the 248 00:17:14,320 --> 00:17:17,840 Speaker 3: brain gives us very fast surprise response like Ooh, something 249 00:17:17,880 --> 00:17:21,040 Speaker 3: categorically has shifted. But if you're looking at the brain 250 00:17:21,119 --> 00:17:24,359 Speaker 3: of an English speaker where they're all just blue, then 251 00:17:24,720 --> 00:17:27,680 Speaker 3: you just get this nice, smooth function. The brain isn't 252 00:17:27,720 --> 00:17:31,399 Speaker 3: alarming at saying, oh, you've changed something. So that tells 253 00:17:31,480 --> 00:17:36,040 Speaker 3: us that language sneaks into even the very finest, little 254 00:17:36,119 --> 00:17:40,960 Speaker 3: tiny decisions that your brain is making about the perceptual world. 255 00:17:41,440 --> 00:17:44,560 Speaker 3: Just looking at colors is not such a hard conceptual task, 256 00:17:45,320 --> 00:17:48,240 Speaker 3: but even there, language is interfering. 257 00:17:49,119 --> 00:17:53,159 Speaker 1: And what about examples across cultures with for example, time 258 00:17:53,280 --> 00:17:53,920 Speaker 1: and space. 259 00:17:56,280 --> 00:17:58,959 Speaker 3: Yeah, so both of us are very interested in how 260 00:17:59,000 --> 00:18:03,080 Speaker 3: people think about and across lots and lots of cultures. 261 00:18:03,119 --> 00:18:07,719 Speaker 3: What we see is people think about time using ideas 262 00:18:07,720 --> 00:18:12,200 Speaker 3: from space, so they're using metaphors, they borrow spatial representations 263 00:18:12,200 --> 00:18:15,639 Speaker 3: to think about time. But the way that space is 264 00:18:15,720 --> 00:18:18,120 Speaker 3: used to talk about time and to think about time 265 00:18:18,200 --> 00:18:21,159 Speaker 3: differs from culture to culture. Let me give you some examples. 266 00:18:21,400 --> 00:18:24,320 Speaker 3: So in English we talk about the best being ahead 267 00:18:24,320 --> 00:18:26,000 Speaker 3: of us and the worst being behind us. So the 268 00:18:26,040 --> 00:18:28,320 Speaker 3: future is in front of us and the past is behind. 269 00:18:28,840 --> 00:18:32,000 Speaker 3: And we used to think maybe this is a biological necessity, right, 270 00:18:32,080 --> 00:18:34,760 Speaker 3: because of course we walk forwards, not backwards. We have 271 00:18:35,080 --> 00:18:36,840 Speaker 3: eyes on the front of our heads, not on the 272 00:18:36,880 --> 00:18:39,600 Speaker 3: backs of our heads. But then it turns out there 273 00:18:39,600 --> 00:18:41,680 Speaker 3: are lots of cultures that put the past in front 274 00:18:41,880 --> 00:18:45,840 Speaker 3: and the future behind, and for them that's the more 275 00:18:45,960 --> 00:18:48,960 Speaker 3: natural way, they say, because of course you know what 276 00:18:49,040 --> 00:18:52,040 Speaker 3: has already happened. The past is no and it's manifest, 277 00:18:52,119 --> 00:18:54,399 Speaker 3: that's why it's in front of your eyes, whereas the 278 00:18:54,440 --> 00:18:58,439 Speaker 3: future is unknown. So what humor is for us to 279 00:18:58,520 --> 00:19:00,439 Speaker 3: think that the future is in front of ours, to 280 00:19:00,480 --> 00:19:03,199 Speaker 3: think that we can see it. To them, that seems absurd. 281 00:19:03,480 --> 00:19:06,280 Speaker 3: There are differences in how people think about time, even 282 00:19:06,320 --> 00:19:09,360 Speaker 3: based on how their language is written. So, for example, 283 00:19:09,720 --> 00:19:12,360 Speaker 3: if your language is written from left to right, events 284 00:19:12,440 --> 00:19:14,719 Speaker 3: unfold in your mind from left to right. If your 285 00:19:14,760 --> 00:19:17,480 Speaker 3: language is written from right to left, like Arabic or Hebrew, 286 00:19:17,760 --> 00:19:22,920 Speaker 3: that events will unfold from right to left. Some languages 287 00:19:22,960 --> 00:19:25,720 Speaker 3: have a strong vertical dimension for time, so for example, 288 00:19:25,760 --> 00:19:28,960 Speaker 3: in Mandarin, the past is up in the future is down, 289 00:19:29,240 --> 00:19:32,879 Speaker 3: and so Mandarin speakers have this strong vertical orientation for time. 290 00:19:33,680 --> 00:19:36,040 Speaker 3: My favorite example comes from some work that I got 291 00:19:36,080 --> 00:19:39,680 Speaker 3: to do in Aboriginal Australia, and so there's this group 292 00:19:39,800 --> 00:19:41,720 Speaker 3: called the kook Tire that I had a chance to 293 00:19:41,760 --> 00:19:46,280 Speaker 3: work with with my colleague Alice Gabee. And in kook 294 00:19:46,359 --> 00:19:49,240 Speaker 3: Tire you don't use words like left and right to 295 00:19:49,280 --> 00:19:52,480 Speaker 3: talk about space. Instead everything is in north south east 296 00:19:52,560 --> 00:19:56,480 Speaker 3: west space and really everything. There are a lot of 297 00:19:56,600 --> 00:20:00,240 Speaker 3: languages like kuk Tire where you would even say, oh, 298 00:20:00,240 --> 00:20:04,399 Speaker 3: there's an ant on your north northwest leg and of course, well, 299 00:20:04,400 --> 00:20:07,160 Speaker 3: if your body that's no longer than north northwest leg, 300 00:20:07,240 --> 00:20:10,480 Speaker 3: you have to recalculate. The way you say hello and 301 00:20:10,560 --> 00:20:13,680 Speaker 3: coop Tire is to say which way are you going? 302 00:20:14,200 --> 00:20:17,119 Speaker 3: And the answer should be something like north northwest in 303 00:20:17,160 --> 00:20:20,280 Speaker 3: the far distance, how about you? So even to get 304 00:20:20,359 --> 00:20:23,040 Speaker 3: past hello, you have to be oriented, and this is 305 00:20:23,119 --> 00:20:27,960 Speaker 3: very different from the way most Western folks orient themselves. 306 00:20:28,200 --> 00:20:30,680 Speaker 3: Most of the time we're thinking about space with respect 307 00:20:30,680 --> 00:20:33,879 Speaker 3: to our bodies, not with respect to the landscape. So 308 00:20:34,359 --> 00:20:36,960 Speaker 3: for me, the question was how do folks like this 309 00:20:36,960 --> 00:20:40,280 Speaker 3: think about time. If it's true that we use ideas 310 00:20:40,280 --> 00:20:43,200 Speaker 3: from space to think about time, but these folks think 311 00:20:43,240 --> 00:20:46,639 Speaker 3: about space with respect to the landscape, how do they 312 00:20:46,640 --> 00:20:51,160 Speaker 3: think about time? So I made up a very simple task. 313 00:20:51,320 --> 00:20:53,360 Speaker 3: I have a set of picture cards. I give them 314 00:20:53,359 --> 00:20:56,399 Speaker 3: to you, and they might be, say, pictures of my 315 00:20:56,440 --> 00:21:00,440 Speaker 3: grandfather at different ages, and I just say, put these 316 00:21:00,480 --> 00:21:03,200 Speaker 3: in the correct order, and so you lay them out 317 00:21:03,320 --> 00:21:06,040 Speaker 3: on the ground in some order that you think is correct. 318 00:21:06,080 --> 00:21:08,879 Speaker 3: But what I'm interested in is what is the orientation 319 00:21:09,000 --> 00:21:12,080 Speaker 3: with respect to your body or the respect to the landscape. 320 00:21:13,119 --> 00:21:17,679 Speaker 3: And what we find is if a cook tire speaker 321 00:21:17,720 --> 00:21:21,600 Speaker 3: is sitting facing south, they'll put the cards out from 322 00:21:21,680 --> 00:21:24,800 Speaker 3: left to right. If they're sitting facing north, they'll put 323 00:21:24,800 --> 00:21:28,040 Speaker 3: the cards out from right to left. If they're sitting 324 00:21:28,040 --> 00:21:31,119 Speaker 3: facing east, they'll put the cards out coming towards their body. 325 00:21:32,080 --> 00:21:34,399 Speaker 3: So if you do a little mental rotation in your mind, 326 00:21:34,520 --> 00:21:38,600 Speaker 3: think about what the pattern there is. Well, it's from 327 00:21:38,640 --> 00:21:41,119 Speaker 3: east to west right, It's always in the same direction 328 00:21:41,240 --> 00:21:43,760 Speaker 3: in the landscape, it just goes in different directions of 329 00:21:43,840 --> 00:21:47,240 Speaker 3: the respect to the body. And as an English speaker, 330 00:21:47,280 --> 00:21:49,119 Speaker 3: I look at that and they think, oh, how strange 331 00:21:49,400 --> 00:21:52,040 Speaker 3: time is flowing in different directions for them, depending on 332 00:21:52,040 --> 00:21:54,840 Speaker 3: which way they're facing. But another way to think about 333 00:21:54,880 --> 00:21:57,320 Speaker 3: that is no, actually time is always flowing in the 334 00:21:57,320 --> 00:22:01,399 Speaker 3: same direction for them east to west landscape. And it's 335 00:22:01,480 --> 00:22:04,560 Speaker 3: so strange that for me, time shifts every time I 336 00:22:04,760 --> 00:22:07,040 Speaker 3: move my body right. So if I'm facing this way, 337 00:22:07,119 --> 00:22:09,440 Speaker 3: then time goes this way. If I'm facing this way, 338 00:22:09,480 --> 00:22:11,560 Speaker 3: then time goes this way. If I'm facing this way, 339 00:22:11,600 --> 00:22:15,000 Speaker 3: then time goes so ego centric of me to make 340 00:22:15,119 --> 00:22:20,080 Speaker 3: the dimension of time change anytime I turn so to me, 341 00:22:20,200 --> 00:22:25,240 Speaker 3: that's a really wonderful example about the potential also of 342 00:22:25,280 --> 00:22:28,359 Speaker 3: the human mind, because in order to be able to 343 00:22:28,600 --> 00:22:31,280 Speaker 3: organize time that way, you have to be oriented in 344 00:22:31,320 --> 00:22:34,119 Speaker 3: a way that we used to think humans couldn't be oriented. 345 00:22:34,320 --> 00:22:37,240 Speaker 3: We used to think it was beyond human capability to 346 00:22:37,480 --> 00:22:40,480 Speaker 3: be able to keep track of your orientation at all times. 347 00:22:41,320 --> 00:22:46,040 Speaker 3: And it turns out not only was it not impossible, 348 00:22:46,200 --> 00:22:48,280 Speaker 3: it's not even that hard. You just have to try. 349 00:22:48,320 --> 00:22:52,199 Speaker 3: It's just a mental practice that you start, and in 350 00:22:52,240 --> 00:22:55,040 Speaker 3: these cultures and cultures like the kouk Tire, it's constantly 351 00:22:55,080 --> 00:22:58,720 Speaker 3: reinforced socially because you have to use the language. The 352 00:22:58,760 --> 00:23:03,320 Speaker 3: language requires you to be oriented, and so to me, 353 00:23:03,520 --> 00:23:06,040 Speaker 3: this is always a really putent reminder of how much 354 00:23:06,080 --> 00:23:09,399 Speaker 3: more is available for our brain to do that is 355 00:23:10,040 --> 00:23:12,840 Speaker 3: not just what we're used to, but what we could 356 00:23:12,840 --> 00:23:29,480 Speaker 3: do if we just try out a couple things. 357 00:23:30,640 --> 00:23:32,760 Speaker 1: How do you suppose it got started in the Koukti. 358 00:23:32,920 --> 00:23:36,439 Speaker 1: One possibility is that it just gets passed along from 359 00:23:36,520 --> 00:23:40,120 Speaker 1: generation to generations, so people have to become very aware 360 00:23:40,160 --> 00:23:45,320 Speaker 1: of the landscape. Another possibility is that there's some genetic things, 361 00:23:45,359 --> 00:23:48,240 Speaker 1: such as they have slightly more magnetite in their inner 362 00:23:48,280 --> 00:23:51,480 Speaker 1: ear and they're more sensitive to the orientation of the planet. 363 00:23:51,920 --> 00:23:55,440 Speaker 1: I'm just curious how you think about why that happens 364 00:23:55,480 --> 00:23:57,800 Speaker 1: in some cultures and why it doesn't happen in others. 365 00:23:58,640 --> 00:24:01,080 Speaker 3: Yeah, so it happens in culture all over the world, 366 00:24:01,160 --> 00:24:06,080 Speaker 3: and it happens this property of using absolute space instead 367 00:24:06,080 --> 00:24:09,560 Speaker 3: of terms like left or right happens in all kinds 368 00:24:09,560 --> 00:24:12,919 Speaker 3: of different environments. So sometimes it's people who live in 369 00:24:12,960 --> 00:24:16,160 Speaker 3: dense forests, and sometimes it's people who live in barren deserts, 370 00:24:16,240 --> 00:24:19,600 Speaker 3: and sometimes it's people who live in mountains, and sometimes 371 00:24:19,640 --> 00:24:23,320 Speaker 3: it's seafaring people, and sometimes it's landlocked people. So you 372 00:24:23,359 --> 00:24:26,439 Speaker 3: can kind of find it in every geographical environment. So 373 00:24:26,560 --> 00:24:29,840 Speaker 3: I don't think the geographical environment is the best predictor 374 00:24:30,359 --> 00:24:34,159 Speaker 3: of this. I don't think we have any evidence that 375 00:24:34,200 --> 00:24:36,960 Speaker 3: there's a genetic component, and I can give you a 376 00:24:36,960 --> 00:24:40,840 Speaker 3: couple of anecdotal reasons for it. One is, if you 377 00:24:40,880 --> 00:24:44,240 Speaker 3: look at people living in the same community, let's say, 378 00:24:44,240 --> 00:24:48,200 Speaker 3: in the same village where they're bilingual or some people 379 00:24:48,240 --> 00:24:52,280 Speaker 3: are stronger, and one language that's an absolute orientation language, 380 00:24:52,280 --> 00:24:56,240 Speaker 3: in another language that's a relative left right orientation language. 381 00:24:56,720 --> 00:24:59,800 Speaker 3: The way people stay oriented in the way they gestured 382 00:24:59,840 --> 00:25:02,879 Speaker 3: to depends on the language that they're dominant in, not 383 00:25:03,160 --> 00:25:05,960 Speaker 3: on you know, anything else. They're all related, they're all 384 00:25:05,960 --> 00:25:07,680 Speaker 3: part of the same village, as part of the same 385 00:25:07,720 --> 00:25:12,080 Speaker 3: genetic pool, right, And so you can find even within 386 00:25:12,119 --> 00:25:16,120 Speaker 3: a very very small genetic community, variation based on language 387 00:25:16,119 --> 00:25:20,679 Speaker 3: exposure rather than on geography or other things. And in 388 00:25:20,680 --> 00:25:24,560 Speaker 3: my own experience, you know, I spend a lot of 389 00:25:24,560 --> 00:25:28,040 Speaker 3: time outside. I love to go hiking, and i go 390 00:25:28,200 --> 00:25:32,159 Speaker 3: mushroom hunting, and I'm constantly traveling and finding myself in 391 00:25:32,200 --> 00:25:34,919 Speaker 3: new places. It would have been extremely useful for me 392 00:25:35,040 --> 00:25:38,679 Speaker 3: to develop an ability to stay oriented as well as 393 00:25:38,720 --> 00:25:41,119 Speaker 3: the kuktai or stay oriented. There have been lots of 394 00:25:41,119 --> 00:25:43,560 Speaker 3: times in my life where it would have been really useful, 395 00:25:44,400 --> 00:25:47,080 Speaker 3: And the first time that I really felt it was 396 00:25:47,160 --> 00:25:50,600 Speaker 3: when I was spending time in this community. Because when 397 00:25:50,640 --> 00:25:53,080 Speaker 3: you don't know which ways which they're people treat you 398 00:25:53,119 --> 00:25:55,960 Speaker 3: like you're stupid, but because you kind of are by 399 00:25:56,000 --> 00:25:59,880 Speaker 3: local standards, right. And I remember after about a week, 400 00:26:00,040 --> 00:26:03,679 Speaker 3: I was walking along and suddenly I saw this window 401 00:26:03,720 --> 00:26:06,159 Speaker 3: open up in my mind and it was a bird's 402 00:26:06,160 --> 00:26:08,560 Speaker 3: eye view of the landscape, and I was a little 403 00:26:08,600 --> 00:26:12,520 Speaker 3: red dot that was just traversing the landscape. And as 404 00:26:12,560 --> 00:26:17,879 Speaker 3: I turned the thing, this window, this map stayed locked 405 00:26:17,880 --> 00:26:20,040 Speaker 3: on the landscape and it just turned in my mind 406 00:26:20,359 --> 00:26:24,200 Speaker 3: and it seemed to happen automatically. And as soon as 407 00:26:24,240 --> 00:26:26,800 Speaker 3: I saw it, I thought, oh, well, this makes it 408 00:26:26,960 --> 00:26:30,040 Speaker 3: so easy, Like if this thing keeps working, if this 409 00:26:30,080 --> 00:26:33,160 Speaker 3: automatic little widget that my brain just grew keeps working, 410 00:26:33,600 --> 00:26:36,440 Speaker 3: it'll be trigger to be oriented. And then I kind 411 00:26:36,480 --> 00:26:38,600 Speaker 3: of sheepishly told someone there, I said, you know, this 412 00:26:38,640 --> 00:26:40,960 Speaker 3: weird thing happened. I said, saw it from a bird's 413 00:26:40,960 --> 00:26:45,120 Speaker 3: eye view and it rotated in my mind. And they said, well, 414 00:26:45,160 --> 00:26:51,760 Speaker 3: of course, how else would you do it. So I 415 00:26:51,880 --> 00:26:55,600 Speaker 3: noticed it developing within my brain within the course of 416 00:26:55,640 --> 00:27:00,600 Speaker 3: a week because of the intense social pressure to try 417 00:27:00,640 --> 00:27:04,000 Speaker 3: to appear not so useless and not so not so 418 00:27:04,080 --> 00:27:06,760 Speaker 3: stupid to the people around me, even though it would 419 00:27:06,760 --> 00:27:09,080 Speaker 3: have been useful lots of other times in my life. 420 00:27:09,359 --> 00:27:13,959 Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, So getting back to language, the language that 421 00:27:14,000 --> 00:27:17,560 Speaker 1: you speak, there seems to be some structuring of how 422 00:27:17,600 --> 00:27:20,119 Speaker 1: you think or what you're able to think. How do 423 00:27:20,160 --> 00:27:23,679 Speaker 1: we know that language is a causal factor there, that 424 00:27:23,840 --> 00:27:26,920 Speaker 1: the language actually structures how you think. 425 00:27:27,680 --> 00:27:30,280 Speaker 3: That's a great question because whenever you compare to groups 426 00:27:30,280 --> 00:27:32,560 Speaker 3: of people who speak different languages and you say, well, 427 00:27:32,560 --> 00:27:35,280 Speaker 3: look they think differently, what you're showing is a correlation 428 00:27:35,480 --> 00:27:37,960 Speaker 3: because there could, of course be lots of other things 429 00:27:38,000 --> 00:27:41,600 Speaker 3: that are underlying causes that are not the language. And 430 00:27:41,680 --> 00:27:44,320 Speaker 3: so the way we try to attack that very directly 431 00:27:44,600 --> 00:27:46,720 Speaker 3: is in the lab. We bring people in and we 432 00:27:46,840 --> 00:27:49,199 Speaker 3: teach them new ways to talk about time. So we 433 00:27:49,240 --> 00:27:52,399 Speaker 3: teach them new ways to talk, new metaphors, and then 434 00:27:52,440 --> 00:27:55,760 Speaker 3: we see if we have shifted the way that they think. So, 435 00:27:55,880 --> 00:27:58,560 Speaker 3: if you come in and let's say you're an English speaker, 436 00:27:59,000 --> 00:28:02,359 Speaker 3: I try to teach you vertical ways to talk about time. 437 00:28:02,480 --> 00:28:04,800 Speaker 3: So now in this version of English, you're going to 438 00:28:04,840 --> 00:28:08,639 Speaker 3: say Monday is above Tuesday, and Tuesday is above Wednesday, 439 00:28:08,800 --> 00:28:14,359 Speaker 3: or the reverse mondays below Tuesday, Tuesday's below Wednesday. After 440 00:28:14,400 --> 00:28:16,760 Speaker 3: doing that for a little while, even just a few 441 00:28:16,800 --> 00:28:19,359 Speaker 3: minutes of just getting it down, making sure that you 442 00:28:19,400 --> 00:28:22,760 Speaker 3: really understand the metaphor, what we see is people start 443 00:28:22,760 --> 00:28:26,239 Speaker 3: to develop an implicit mental timeline that's vertical and in 444 00:28:26,280 --> 00:28:29,560 Speaker 3: the direction that the metaphors go. And we can measure 445 00:28:29,600 --> 00:28:34,280 Speaker 3: that implicit timeline with clever little experiments that and tasks 446 00:28:34,280 --> 00:28:36,560 Speaker 3: that we set up in the lab. So that's a 447 00:28:36,680 --> 00:28:41,560 Speaker 3: very clear sign that changing the way that people talk, 448 00:28:41,760 --> 00:28:45,080 Speaker 3: changing language very quickly changes the way people think. You 449 00:28:45,120 --> 00:28:49,320 Speaker 3: can teach people new ideas by introducing a new metaphor, 450 00:28:49,400 --> 00:28:50,000 Speaker 3: for example. 451 00:28:50,120 --> 00:28:52,240 Speaker 1: And at what age do you see these kind of 452 00:28:52,240 --> 00:28:53,600 Speaker 1: effects in children? 453 00:28:55,200 --> 00:29:00,840 Speaker 3: Oh? Well, with the grammatical gender example that I showed 454 00:29:00,880 --> 00:29:04,920 Speaker 3: you that I told you early on, you see even 455 00:29:05,080 --> 00:29:09,280 Speaker 3: quite young kids, like five year old kids starting to 456 00:29:09,760 --> 00:29:12,880 Speaker 3: think that if you're going to make a movie about toasters, 457 00:29:12,920 --> 00:29:15,880 Speaker 3: for example, the toasters should have boy voices or girl voices, 458 00:29:15,920 --> 00:29:19,480 Speaker 3: depending on the grammatical gender in the language. But with 459 00:29:19,600 --> 00:29:25,120 Speaker 3: more basic perceptional things like differentiating different sounds. That starts 460 00:29:25,120 --> 00:29:29,440 Speaker 3: to happen in infancy. So different languages make use of 461 00:29:30,080 --> 00:29:35,520 Speaker 3: different sound contrasts, and human infants are born ready to 462 00:29:35,600 --> 00:29:40,200 Speaker 3: be able to discriminate all the possible sounds in human languages, 463 00:29:40,680 --> 00:29:42,480 Speaker 3: but some of those turn out not to be useful 464 00:29:42,480 --> 00:29:45,480 Speaker 3: because their language doesn't actually make use of those contrasts. 465 00:29:45,600 --> 00:29:47,880 Speaker 3: And you see those abilities start to fall away in 466 00:29:47,920 --> 00:29:51,080 Speaker 3: the very first year of life. So if you compare 467 00:29:51,480 --> 00:29:54,160 Speaker 3: relatively newborn infants that are growing up, say in a 468 00:29:54,240 --> 00:29:58,040 Speaker 3: Japanese speaking environment in an English speaking environment, they're equally 469 00:29:58,080 --> 00:30:02,560 Speaker 3: sensitive across the contrast range. But if you compare them 470 00:30:02,600 --> 00:30:04,960 Speaker 3: at one year of age, you start to see that 471 00:30:05,000 --> 00:30:07,680 Speaker 3: some contrasts have fallen away, and they're different ones for 472 00:30:07,800 --> 00:30:09,400 Speaker 3: different language environments. 473 00:30:09,960 --> 00:30:14,880 Speaker 1: God, and are people swayed by the framing of language 474 00:30:15,320 --> 00:30:18,560 Speaker 1: that they receive, for example, in the context of the 475 00:30:18,640 --> 00:30:19,720 Speaker 1: legal system. 476 00:30:20,520 --> 00:30:24,960 Speaker 3: Oh well, obviously our lawyers would hope so because they 477 00:30:25,000 --> 00:30:27,920 Speaker 3: want you to They want you to give them lots 478 00:30:27,960 --> 00:30:32,160 Speaker 3: of money so that they can continue to sway them. Yeah, 479 00:30:32,240 --> 00:30:36,000 Speaker 3: language is very powerful in shaping how we construe situation, 480 00:30:37,240 --> 00:30:41,480 Speaker 3: even a very simple situation let's say there's an accident 481 00:30:41,600 --> 00:30:44,160 Speaker 3: someone breaks a oz. There are lots and lots of 482 00:30:44,200 --> 00:30:47,320 Speaker 3: ways to describe that situation in language, and depending on 483 00:30:47,400 --> 00:30:49,720 Speaker 3: how I frame it, if I say he broke the vaz, 484 00:30:49,840 --> 00:30:52,960 Speaker 3: or I say the vaz broke, or to him it 485 00:30:53,000 --> 00:30:56,840 Speaker 3: so happened that the vaz broke. All of those lead 486 00:30:56,880 --> 00:30:59,960 Speaker 3: people to think to construe the situation in different ways, 487 00:31:00,160 --> 00:31:04,200 Speaker 3: to focus more on who's to blame. In our experiments, 488 00:31:04,240 --> 00:31:07,760 Speaker 3: people both blame people more and require more money if 489 00:31:07,840 --> 00:31:11,400 Speaker 3: you describe as a situation a situation as he did it, 490 00:31:11,520 --> 00:31:15,160 Speaker 3: as opposed to it happened. And this is true even 491 00:31:15,200 --> 00:31:16,920 Speaker 3: if they can see the video themselves. 492 00:31:16,960 --> 00:31:17,160 Speaker 1: Right. 493 00:31:17,240 --> 00:31:22,360 Speaker 3: So if we show them an example of a crime 494 00:31:22,400 --> 00:31:25,280 Speaker 3: against a balloon, for example, someone popping a balloon or 495 00:31:25,280 --> 00:31:29,280 Speaker 3: breaking of oz, people will both blame the person more 496 00:31:29,320 --> 00:31:32,680 Speaker 3: and want more money if we describe the situation as 497 00:31:32,840 --> 00:31:33,320 Speaker 3: he did it. 498 00:31:38,040 --> 00:31:41,560 Speaker 1: So that was Lera Boroditsky, and she studies how our 499 00:31:41,840 --> 00:31:44,840 Speaker 1: language and our brains are in a feedback loop with 500 00:31:44,880 --> 00:31:48,640 Speaker 1: one another, such that the language you speak can modify 501 00:31:48,680 --> 00:31:51,280 Speaker 1: what you are sensitive to, like if you have different 502 00:31:51,320 --> 00:31:54,680 Speaker 1: words are blue, or how you think about space and time. 503 00:31:55,880 --> 00:31:58,920 Speaker 1: So fundamentally, there are still many open questions about this. 504 00:31:59,240 --> 00:32:03,520 Speaker 1: The long version of the Sapier war hypothesis has been 505 00:32:03,600 --> 00:32:06,400 Speaker 1: largely dismissed, but there are a lot of excellent questions 506 00:32:06,400 --> 00:32:11,360 Speaker 1: and possibilities about the weak hypothesis. As you know if 507 00:32:11,360 --> 00:32:14,160 Speaker 1: you've been listening to this podcast for a while, my 508 00:32:14,320 --> 00:32:18,200 Speaker 1: obsession is about the way that we have different internal 509 00:32:18,320 --> 00:32:21,720 Speaker 1: worlds on the inside, with each of us living on 510 00:32:21,760 --> 00:32:26,080 Speaker 1: our own planet. Whether that's the way that we see colors, 511 00:32:26,160 --> 00:32:30,440 Speaker 1: or whether we have synesthesia or word a version or 512 00:32:30,480 --> 00:32:35,800 Speaker 1: a fantasia, or one hundred other measurable differences about our 513 00:32:36,040 --> 00:32:40,920 Speaker 1: internal reality, we all end up having a slightly different 514 00:32:41,080 --> 00:32:44,920 Speaker 1: experience of reality. And so while there are plenty of 515 00:32:45,040 --> 00:32:48,200 Speaker 1: remaining questions about language and the extent to which it 516 00:32:48,320 --> 00:32:52,640 Speaker 1: modifies your thinking, the work of Lira and other linguists 517 00:32:52,640 --> 00:32:56,920 Speaker 1: and cognitive scientists gives us yet another way to zoom 518 00:32:56,960 --> 00:32:59,720 Speaker 1: in on some of these questions and get a better 519 00:33:01,040 --> 00:33:06,440 Speaker 1: of the differences between how each of us sees the world. 520 00:33:12,320 --> 00:33:15,400 Speaker 1: Go to Eagleman dot com slash podcast for more information 521 00:33:15,680 --> 00:33:19,240 Speaker 1: and to find further reading. Send me an email at 522 00:33:19,360 --> 00:33:23,320 Speaker 1: podcast at eagleman dot com with questions or discussions, and 523 00:33:23,360 --> 00:33:27,200 Speaker 1: I'll be making episodes sporadically in which I address those. 524 00:33:29,560 --> 00:33:34,160 Speaker 1: Until next time, I'm David Eagleman, and this is Inner Cosmos.