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] wwwSite > SamHarris.org Reader Forum Index ->  /  17 April 07  /
] Forum > Politics, Religion, Philosophy, and Science >  Philosophy
] Thread > Sophiology & History / Topic > how written-language emerged
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] on 16Apr homunculus say: Fascinating essay, textman.
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textman say: thx, homunculus.
I never get tired of hearing those three most-beautiful words! 
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] h: It's sort of surprising how little attention ends up being paid to the vast
] cultural revisions Akhenaten managed to attain, even if many of them were
] only temporary.
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tx: I agree. the scholars have yet to fully appreciate the black-pharaoh's
rightful place in history. he started something that is still being played-out.
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] h: You touch on the transition between oral-tradition and early writing.
] Would you say that very early writings were almost by necessity
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tx: 'necessity is the mother of invention', yes.
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] h: (since they lacked human personality and other subtlety as well as formal
] complexity) clumsy and unwieldy,
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tx: yes. again, necessarily so, since simple-signs and symbols are very basic
compared to a flexible, yet useful, written-language.
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] h: introducing much error into myths of various cultures?
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tx: no, not really. the early-writings merely expressed the thinking that was
done by those who used the larger spoken-language. writing itself is simply a
tool. it can help us to clarify our thinking, if we approach things rationally, or
it can be used to express imaginative flights of fancy. Today we call this kind
of literature 'science-fiction', but in the age-of-myth mindset such literature
is taken very seriously, and called sacred-scriptures and holy-texts. Of course,
some languages are better suited to rational thinking than others.
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] h: In other words, does it seem to you that spoken subtlety, when it was
] translated into words, suddenly (comparatively speaking) needed precision
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tx: well, precision is always helpful, but that was a relatively late development.
I'd say that real precision did not emerge until the rise of classical greece
and the greek-alphabet. this is why philosophy and science first appeared among
the ancient greeks. language has an awful lot to do with *how* people think,
as well as with the *way* people think. thus the bronze-age languages were
far more supportive of priestly and mythic ways of thinking, than of more
rational ways of thought. and this only makes all of Akhenaten's achievements
that much more remarkable.
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] h: akin to mathematics
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tx: If I recall correctly, i think that the first systematic use of signs (ie.
a row of "dots" or tiny holes carved into bones and antlers) was as an aid to
counting and remembering. thus written language may well have gotten its initial
impetus from mathematics. hence the lists-of-kings and tallies-of-booty are a
natural extension of the stone-age row-of-dots. all this would suggest that
written-language was born a child of rational-pragmatism, and only later was side-
tracked for the exclusive priestly-usage. in ancient-egypt, to be a scribe meant
that you were part of the religious-elite. The ancient-egyptian god Thoth was
the special deity for this small, yet wise, class of citizen. yes, you just know
you're special when you have your own exclusive god looking out for you, eh?
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] h: -- and that the precision itself tended to remove the subtlety?
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tx: in a sense, that's true. symbols and myths seem to carry more "weight"
than a 'how-to build a table' pamphlet. being ambiguous allows you to import
and hold more meaning than purely technical how-to instructions. everything
depends on what you want to do with the language. this is why english is the
number-one language in the world: there is none other that is so flexible.
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btw: I sure would like to know what waltercat thinks of S&H ... as much of
what is to follow depends rather heavily upon one particular quality whose
presence or absence can make or break sophiology even before it is fully
birthed. And that quality or characteristic is its ... ummm ... [insert much head-
scratching here] ... its solidity? okay, let's try that. so, dude, would you say
that S&H is a solid foundation from which to launch an inquiry? or not?
speak now or forever hold your piece ...
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Sorry, i mean: 'your peace', of course. 
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