6 ms·

I don't know if I would call it a "language" (which to me implies grammar and some level of composability), but I suspect most people have these hidden subconsc

I don't know if I would call it a "language" (which to me implies grammar and some level of composability), but I suspect most people have these hidden subconscious languages too. Think about the "bouba"/"kiki" effect [1], or how the spells in Harry Potter sound recognizably "spell-like" even though spells aren't a real thing. (In the latter case, it's because they're phonetically Latin-adjacent.) For example, here are some nonsense terms: * Swith'eil Aerveid * Karflon B43 * Hooboo skramp If I were to ask you all which is a dangerous gas, a sex act, and an Elven city, I suspect there would be fairly wide agreement. Inventing words that are evocative this way is a fundamental part of fiction writing, especially in fantasy, horror, and sci-fi. There's nothing profound going on here, it's just that language recognition is fuzzy and highly associative even at the level of individual phonemes. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bouba/kiki_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bouba/kiki_effect

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
fgdelcueto 4y ago
Also, there is evidence that there might be some hidden meta-language on humans as well from studies on how bilingual people/polyglots speak, code-switch, translate, etc.
- Teever 4y ago
  This is fascinating, can you tell me more about it?
- z3ugma 4y ago
  This is a major plot point of the novel "Snow Crash" by Neal Stephenson, in case the idea strikes anyone's fancy
  - casselc 4y ago
    “Lexicon” by Max Barry is another good novel that plays with this premise.
  - 0des 4y ago
    You talking about the namshub of enki? Cryptonomicon is also great.
- nabla9 4y ago
  My native language don't have gender-neutral personal pronouns. If I want to use pronouns correctly in English, I have to make mental pause before writing he or she to figure it out. Woman/man distinction does not come automatically. When I use or think in English, my brain has weird rules of its own. Some person can have his/her pronoun constantly wrong. For some it's random. Context and rhythm can also can create pattern.
  - icoder 4y ago
    Philipines?
beepbooptheory 4y ago
Slightly tangential, but along these lines, I was always very moved by this piece. https://www.bartleby.com/284/1.html https://www.bartleby.com/284/1.html
alx__ 4y ago
Seems perfectly cromulent too me.
oneoff786 4y ago
Avada kedavra Abra kedabra
- wccrawford 4y ago
  Yeah, that Harry Potter spells often sound like something else. Leviosa is very close to levitate, for instance. So it's not surprising that many of them seem correct.
- nwatson 4y ago
  Always has sounded to me like "abra cadáver" i.e. "open up corpse [and reveal your magical secrets]" (Portuguese).
- colordrops 4y ago
  Palabra Cadabra
- tedd4u 4y ago
  Yep! I’m sure Rowling did that intentionally. By the way, Haaretz says: “Abracadabra belongs to Aramaic, a Semitic language that shares many of the same grammar rules as Hebrew, says Cohen in Win the Crowd. ‘Abra' is the Aramaic equivalent of the Hebrew 'avra,' meaning, 'I will create. ' While 'cadabra' is the Aramaic equivalent of the Hebrew 'kedoobar,' meaning 'as was spoken.” https://www.haaretz.com/2013-05-08/ty-article/word-of-the-day-abracadabra/0000017f-e08b-d38f-a57f-e6db9da50000 https://www.haaretz.com/2013-05-08/ty-article/word-of-the-da...
  - KennyBlanken 4y ago
    Must've been a trip for the Haaretz staff writing that puff piece given the antisemitic stuff in the Potter movies: https://www.google.com/search?q=harry+potter+bankers https://www.google.com/search?q=harry+potter+bankers From the book: "about a head shorter than Harry [...] swarthy, clever face, a pointed beard [...] very long fingers and feet”, indeed. I lol'd at the "Jewish culture" tag.
    - 4y ago
Sophistifunk 4y ago
It seems obvious to me that there exists something like this shared across all homo sapiens. What we see now as complex language allowing for the broadcast of abstract thoughts and memes, as well as human culture, must both have evolved alongside each other a period of time that would appear long to us, but is meaningless in terms of genetic drift and "meat evolution". But in order for that process to begin, there must have been an extremely basic structure on which to begin it, which by definition must be in our DNA.
- BbzzbB 4y ago
  Hard disagree. Seems obvious to me those associations are cultural and extrapolations of previous experiences and stories. Ask these 3 prompts to isolated North Koreans or Papuans (probably after explaining elves are supernatural humanoids from Germanic folklore associated with woods and pointy ears) and I'd bet the house it's gonna be a random distribution. Involving genetics and evolution in etymology makes no sense.
  - KennyBlanken 4y ago
    Yeah, this is pretty silly. Following and recognizing phonetic patterns from science / fantasy fiction naming tropes isn't a "secret language." Ask a person off the street to come up with an "alien planet in a science fiction TV series" or "deadly gas/virus from a comic book" and you'll get similar answers. Your average person on the street could probably successfully come up with trope-fitting "evil alien species" and "peaceful alien species" names, too.
    - notahacker 4y ago
      And if you asked the average person off a street somewhere with minimal exposure to English and Anglo-American culture to come up with names, and they'd probably come up with something completely different derived from their own cultural tropes and neighbouring foreign languages.
  - Sophistifunk 4y ago
    The fact that the baabaa/keekee effect is not cultural is very well documented.
mod 4y ago
Your examples are well done, kudos. Swith'eil Aerveid, which I took to be the Elven city, immediately made me think of Morrowind. I think it's a perfectly fitting name for a Dunmer or Dunmer city. Maybe a dwarven ruin.
- munificent 4y ago
  'Tis an excellent place to toss a coin at a wench in return for a hooboo skramp behind the inn.
  - labster 4y ago
    But the ancients released Karflon B43 into the the woods beyond, mutating the monsters therein. Plenty of coin to be made in clearing the elven lands of these fell beasts, to those brave or foolish enough to try.
saghm 4y ago
Immediately after realizing which term is which, I can't help but try to use them all in a sentence together, like "Those damn kids in Swith'eil Aerveid just sit around all day hooboo skramping and smoking their Karflon B43", which I think makes it even more clear how different the words "feel" from each other.
- morsch 4y ago
  Sounds like the beginning of a pulp fantasy scifi novel. You could submit that sentence to the Little Lytton contest: http://adamcadre.ac/lyttle.html http://adamcadre.ac/lyttle.html
  - lqet 4y ago
    > There was me. That is, Alex, and my three droogs. That is, Pete, Georgie and Dim. And we sat in the Korova Milk Bar trying to make up our rassoodocks what to do with the evening. The Korova Milk Bar sold milk plus. Milk plus vellocet or synthemesc or drencrom which is what we were drinking. This would sharpen you up and make you ready for a bit of the old ultra-violence. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HI-mDTdeKR8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HI-mDTdeKR8
    - unhammer 4y ago
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nadsat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nadsat ("droog" from друг 'friend')
aaron695 4y ago
LudwigNagasena 4y ago
Yeah, that reminded me of Rorschach test and other projective tests. That thread was an example that shows that people benefit from general education and erudition… and that people need a bit more humility to not put forward grandiose claims.
aliswe 4y ago
You might not agree as to the effects of them, but the existence of spells in themselves is a historical, undisputable fact.
qwerty456127 4y ago
Everybody even has a non-verbal language they mostly are unaware of. It uses feelings of specific meanings, not words. You'll see the next time you know exactly what you wan to say but can't recall a proper word in any of the languages you speak.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

fgdelcueto 4y ago

Also, there is evidence that there might be some hidden meta-language on humans as well from studies on how bilingual people/polyglots speak, code-switch, translate, etc.

Teever 4y ago
This is fascinating, can you tell me more about it?
z3ugma 4y ago
This is a major plot point of the novel "Snow Crash" by Neal Stephenson, in case the idea strikes anyone's fancy
- casselc 4y ago
  “Lexicon” by Max Barry is another good novel that plays with this premise.
- 0des 4y ago
  You talking about the namshub of enki? Cryptonomicon is also great.
nabla9 4y ago
My native language don't have gender-neutral personal pronouns. If I want to use pronouns correctly in English, I have to make mental pause before writing he or she to figure it out. Woman/man distinction does not come automatically. When I use or think in English, my brain has weird rules of its own. Some person can have his/her pronoun constantly wrong. For some it's random. Context and rhythm can also can create pattern.
- icoder 4y ago
  Philipines?

beepbooptheory 4y ago

Slightly tangential, but along these lines, I was always very moved by this piece. https://www.bartleby.com/284/1.html https://www.bartleby.com/284/1.html

alx__ 4y ago

Seems perfectly cromulent too me.

oneoff786 4y ago

Avada kedavra Abra kedabra

wccrawford 4y ago
Yeah, that Harry Potter spells often sound like something else. Leviosa is very close to levitate, for instance. So it's not surprising that many of them seem correct.
nwatson 4y ago
Always has sounded to me like "abra cadáver" i.e. "open up corpse [and reveal your magical secrets]" (Portuguese).
colordrops 4y ago
Palabra Cadabra
tedd4u 4y ago
Yep! I’m sure Rowling did that intentionally. By the way, Haaretz says: “Abracadabra belongs to Aramaic, a Semitic language that shares many of the same grammar rules as Hebrew, says Cohen in Win the Crowd. ‘Abra' is the Aramaic equivalent of the Hebrew 'avra,' meaning, 'I will create. ' While 'cadabra' is the Aramaic equivalent of the Hebrew 'kedoobar,' meaning 'as was spoken.” https://www.haaretz.com/2013-05-08/ty-article/word-of-the-day-abracadabra/0000017f-e08b-d38f-a57f-e6db9da50000 https://www.haaretz.com/2013-05-08/ty-article/word-of-the-da...
- KennyBlanken 4y ago
  Must've been a trip for the Haaretz staff writing that puff piece given the antisemitic stuff in the Potter movies: https://www.google.com/search?q=harry+potter+bankers https://www.google.com/search?q=harry+potter+bankers From the book: "about a head shorter than Harry [...] swarthy, clever face, a pointed beard [...] very long fingers and feet”, indeed. I lol'd at the "Jewish culture" tag.
  - 4y ago

Sophistifunk 4y ago

It seems obvious to me that there exists something like this shared across all homo sapiens. What we see now as complex language allowing for the broadcast of abstract thoughts and memes, as well as human culture, must both have evolved alongside each other a period of time that would appear long to us, but is meaningless in terms of genetic drift and "meat evolution". But in order for that process to begin, there must have been an extremely basic structure on which to begin it, which by definition must be in our DNA.

BbzzbB 4y ago
Hard disagree. Seems obvious to me those associations are cultural and extrapolations of previous experiences and stories. Ask these 3 prompts to isolated North Koreans or Papuans (probably after explaining elves are supernatural humanoids from Germanic folklore associated with woods and pointy ears) and I'd bet the house it's gonna be a random distribution. Involving genetics and evolution in etymology makes no sense.
- KennyBlanken 4y ago
  Yeah, this is pretty silly. Following and recognizing phonetic patterns from science / fantasy fiction naming tropes isn't a "secret language." Ask a person off the street to come up with an "alien planet in a science fiction TV series" or "deadly gas/virus from a comic book" and you'll get similar answers. Your average person on the street could probably successfully come up with trope-fitting "evil alien species" and "peaceful alien species" names, too.
  - notahacker 4y ago
    And if you asked the average person off a street somewhere with minimal exposure to English and Anglo-American culture to come up with names, and they'd probably come up with something completely different derived from their own cultural tropes and neighbouring foreign languages.
- Sophistifunk 4y ago
  The fact that the baabaa/keekee effect is not cultural is very well documented.

mod 4y ago

Your examples are well done, kudos. Swith'eil Aerveid, which I took to be the Elven city, immediately made me think of Morrowind. I think it's a perfectly fitting name for a Dunmer or Dunmer city. Maybe a dwarven ruin.

munificent 4y ago
'Tis an excellent place to toss a coin at a wench in return for a hooboo skramp behind the inn.
- labster 4y ago
  But the ancients released Karflon B43 into the the woods beyond, mutating the monsters therein. Plenty of coin to be made in clearing the elven lands of these fell beasts, to those brave or foolish enough to try.

saghm 4y ago

Immediately after realizing which term is which, I can't help but try to use them all in a sentence together, like "Those damn kids in Swith'eil Aerveid just sit around all day hooboo skramping and smoking their Karflon B43", which I think makes it even more clear how different the words "feel" from each other.

morsch 4y ago
Sounds like the beginning of a pulp fantasy scifi novel. You could submit that sentence to the Little Lytton contest: http://adamcadre.ac/lyttle.html http://adamcadre.ac/lyttle.html
- lqet 4y ago
  > There was me. That is, Alex, and my three droogs. That is, Pete, Georgie and Dim. And we sat in the Korova Milk Bar trying to make up our rassoodocks what to do with the evening. The Korova Milk Bar sold milk plus. Milk plus vellocet or synthemesc or drencrom which is what we were drinking. This would sharpen you up and make you ready for a bit of the old ultra-violence. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HI-mDTdeKR8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HI-mDTdeKR8
  - unhammer 4y ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nadsat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nadsat ("droog" from друг 'friend')

aaron695 4y ago

LudwigNagasena 4y ago

Yeah, that reminded me of Rorschach test and other projective tests. That thread was an example that shows that people benefit from general education and erudition… and that people need a bit more humility to not put forward grandiose claims.

aliswe 4y ago

You might not agree as to the effects of them, but the existence of spells in themselves is a historical, undisputable fact.

qwerty456127 4y ago

Everybody even has a non-verbal language they mostly are unaware of. It uses feelings of specific meanings, not words. You'll see the next time you know exactly what you wan to say but can't recall a proper word in any of the languages you speak.