Monday, April 09, 2007

Subtitles, learning English, and global communication

I think global communication could be forwarded tremendously if countries around the world would get English into schools early, and stop dubbing English-language movies, but instead subtitle them. The latter also helps the young ones learning to read. (I used to teach reading, and a milestone was always: "I can manage to read the whole of the subtitles now before they change!." Big smile.)

[The below was clipped from comments on "on Writing".]

Eolake:
"Scandinavians learn it easier than other Europeans because in Scandinavia TV shows and movies are not dubbed, but subtitled."

Pascal:
Same in Lebanon. It really helped me perfect my English.
Or my American, to be precise. :-)
That was before local TV became so decadent, it is now practically unwatchable. During ad breaks, you forget what you were actually watching! ):-P
Subtitles are a mixed annoyance : at first you're bothered by having to focus on reading instead of the images, and later on you really appreciate being able to follow it in original version, and often grasp all the nuances.

The French dub all their foreign movies and TV shows. As a result, many people there almost take pride in not knowing other languages! Or they behave as if such were the case. :-P
Fortunately, today the youngest generation is more eager to learn. Thanks to Europe. :-)))
Marriages between young Europeans of different countries seem to be increasing exponentially. Bravo.

Eolake:
"And I just feel like English is the best option for global communication"

Pascal:
As much as I care for the preservation of cultural diversity, I fully agree here: we Earthlings should set a single global communication standard, and English has everything vouching for it in this particular case. It's hugely widespread, dominant in the computers field, and globally simple, unless you want to get litterary. Which you can, while it's not mandatory.
For comparison, Japanese is also uncomplicated in structure), but it's nightmarish to learn to write, with thousands and thousands of Kanji to memorize. Chinese is even "worse", so to speak, because added to the even more complex writing, it requires much oral skill to master. Undoubtedly poetic and pleasant-sounding, but not very practical for a world standard, especially one using a keyboard. Lazies and dyslexics, search elsewhere!

TTL put forth:
Eolake proclaimed: "I think global communication could be forwarded tremendously if countries around the world would get English into schools early, and stop dubbing English-languish movies, but instead subtitle them."

Well, I am certainly relieved that in my country TV programs have always been subtitled and never dubbed. But not just because of the learning opportunity. I think dubbing is a terrible form of distortion. I want to hear the actor's natural voice no matter what the language. And even if they forgot the subtitles!

For example, if in KieÊlowski's Trois Couleurs: Rouge when Irène Jacob first opens her mouth out would come some union actor's English, I would probably puke. :-)

But I think you are forgetting two things:

1) Countries like French aren't doing it (dubbing instead of subtitling, and not pushing English early on) out of lazyness, but in a deliberate attempt to save the language. And you could say that they have been succesful at this.

2) Natural languages do not exist just as a method of communication here and now. Their other function is to carry information from generation to generation. The languages of, say, northern Europe are thousands of years old (much older than English). There are reasons why in these languages things have the names they have. The very rhythm and use of phonemes and the resulting associations carry information. We do not normally pay attention to this, but its role is huge.

If all of a sudden all languages of the world disapeared, with the exception of English in which everyone would be fluent, the world would be an infinitely dumber place. And I am not saying this to mock English. I love English. It's just that all our languages serve a purpose as a carrier of humankind's collective wisdom.

Eolake concluded: "And I just feel like English is the best option for global communication"

I agree. Provided you don't have to communicate anything of importance. ;-)

Shakespeare did not say anything of importance? :)

It is not necessary for the French to be protectionistic of their language. Most Danes speak English well, but I don't know a single Dane who has trouble speaking Danish for that reason.

Update: thanks to Mary for pointing out that the first paragraph had the expression "
English-languish"... now that is funny! Especially considering the context.

DreamingWolf exclaimed:
It is funny for me (weeell, not THAT funny) to read these opinions on English as a major language for all of us here on Earth. Though I speak English and I like it, the idea of it becoming the main language for the world sounds great on one side, on the other I think it just contributes to self-importance of Brits and Anglo-Americans (to exclude Spanish, Italian, Chinese, Polish and other American minorities). The fact that English is so widespread is due to the British imperial expansivity and expansionism in the past. They conquered a lot of other countries and cultures. OK. But this doesn't mean those of English origin are super-human, and superior to other nations and cultures...

Eolake said:
You have a good point.
I just think that regardless of the dubious means of how the English-language domination was established, global communication is so important that it supersedes any lingering resentment due to past wrongs. It would be shooting yourself in the foot to refuse this grand a communication opportunity just because you were invaded by the English at some point. Heck, I am Danish, and I don't use a moment's thought on Lord Nelson bombarding Copenhagen some time in the nineteenth century.

It also seems to me that the less reason people have for an inflated ego, the more inflated it is. So no harm can come, at least compared to the benefits.

Update April 10:
Wonko scribes:
One of the reasons for the "success" of English as a de facto international language is because of its origins. English has Scandanavia, Germanic, French and Latin and even Ancient Greek roots, together with a generous sprinkling of terms from other languages - Urdu and Hindi in particular (for example words such as; Pyjamas, Khaki and Shampoo). As a result English has a lot of synonyms - words expressing subtle variations of the same concept - which makes it wonderfully good for describing things. It's also a good technical language for the same reason, hence the take up on the internet/computing circles. Unfortunately this is a double-edged sword and lends towards our problems with spelling. For example think of the words: Slough (a town to the West of London), slow, plough, Brough (another town in Yorkshire), brow, and dough. Some are pronounced the same, some are subtly different, and the spelling doesn't always have a lot to do with it. It's because they're all from different roots.

Learn some 'Old English' from the Anglo-Saxon period of English History, it's not that different from what we speak today. Even more intriguingly if you then go to certain parts of North Holland and Scandanavia you can make yourself understood speaking it. Eddie Izzard did so in his television programme "Mongrel Nation". He asked a farmer if he could see a "brune coo" (brown cow), and the guy understood him. In fact, if you're familiar with the North-East accent in England, at lot of the terms and way people speak are almost pure Norse, even today! Am awee gan ham (I'm away going home, or just: I'm going home).

Post Norman Conquest - the Normans themselves being Scandanavians who settled in France and took on French ways, just look at the ships on the Bayeux Tapistry - a lot of French was introduced into "English". Interestingly, a lot of words to do with violence, war and law came from Norman French.

The key has always been that English constantly changes and adapts, incorporating new words all the time. As a result it has been able to grow and change. Melvyn Bragg's excellent series "The History of English" is a fascinating study of my mother tongue.

I would agree that British schoolchildren (can't speak for USA) would greatly benefit from learning foreign languages, earlier. I learned French at secondary school, and although I studied it for seven years, being honest I was never that good at it. I'm constantly surprised at how well many foreigners speak English, far, far better than I could communicate in their language. It shames me a little, but whenever I travel abroad I do at least try to learn a few key phrases - Please, Thank You, etc. - and I usually find that the person I'm speaking to wants to practice their English with me!

One last point: English is already the standard International language of Radio Communication, and is used by shipping, aircraft and Amateur Radio enthusiasts the World over.

Update April 11:
Wonko expanded:

Thanks TTL for posting that link, it made very interesting reading. Just to pick up on one comment to your list, about the use of "gate" for "street". In Leeds (in South Yorkshire) there are streets called Briggate, Eastgate and Westgate. These are all Norse/Viking in origin. I understand that the word "gata" is used in Norwegian and Icelandic for many streets. Even today Briggate is the road to a bridge that crosses the river. You'll find Norse names throughout North-Eastern and Eastern England, dating back to the period known as 'Danelaw' in the late Saxon period. In this time England was split in two along a line roughly from The Wash to the Severn, with predominently Danes ruling in the North and East, and Saxons in the South and West. Any town names ending in "thorpe" or "by" are Norse in origin.

Interestingly on the subject of seemingly unrelated languages, I have a story involving my Grandfather that you may like. he is now living in a Nursing Home having reached the age of 90. He was taken prisoner by the Japanese at Singapore and survived building the Burma Railroad, being torpedoed in the Sea of Japan and the A-bomb at Hiroshima. He spoke with the other male resident of his home who it turned out used to work for the Foreign Office. Furthermore this man left Singapore on the ship my Grandfather arrived on! This man's background was in studying ancient languages, he spoke and read several easily. One of the carers he'd had over the years was Hungarian and didn't speak much English. He discovered that speaking Ancient Greek to her and she replying in Hungarian allowed them to communicate better than in English! He also claimed to have found some links between Greek and Chinese through earlier Indo-European Languages. It just goes to show that we're all much more closely linked than it would otherwise appear!

In Danish a street is "gade". Due to the peculiar Danish soft D (similar the th in "the"), I never spotted the link the "gate" in English.

22 comments:

Anonymous said...

Eolake:
"And I just feel like English is the best option for global communication"

Agreed. But here in the States our government won't even make english our official language. It would bother the spanish people too much!
Politicians would lose votes too, boo hoo.
So every new item you buy here is labled in english and spanish. I say if you live here SPEAK OUR LANGUAGE! If not, leave.
Official or not, it's still the language WE Americans use. Deal with it Mexicans and Chinese.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

"But here in the States our government won't even make english our official language."

The thing is, if they did, it would create resentment and resistance.

Anonymous said...

Eolake proclaimed: "I think global communication could be forwarded tremendously if countries around the world would get English into schools early, and stop dubbing English-languish movies, but instead subtitle them."

Well, I am certainly relieved that in my country TV programs have always been subtitled and never dubbed. But not just because of the learning opportunity. I think dubbing is a terrible form of distortion. I want to hear the actor's natural voice no matter what the language. And even if they forgot the subtitles!

For example, if in Kieślowski's Trois Couleurs: Rouge when Irène Jacob first opens her mouth out would come some union actor's English, I would probably puke. :-)

But I think you are forgetting two things:

1) Countries like French aren't doing it (dubbing instead of subtitling, and not pushing English early on) out of lazyness, but in a deliberate attempt to save the language. And you could say that they have been succesful at this.

2) Natural languages do not exist just as a method of communication here and now. Their other function is to carry information from generation to generation. The languages of, say, northern Europe are thousands of years old (much older than English). There are reasons why in these languages things have the names they have. The very rhythm and use of phonemes and the resulting associations carry information. We do not normally pay attention to this, but its role is huge.

If all of a sudden all languages of the world disapeared, with the exception of English in which everyone would be fluent, the world would be an infinitely dumber place. And I am not saying this to mock English. I love English. It's just that all our languages serve a purpose as a carrier of humankind's collective wisdom.

Eolake concluded: "And I just feel like English is the best option for global communication"

I agree. Provided you don't have to communicate anything of importance. ;-)

Hannah said...

Actually... I'm an American and moved to Holland when I was 13. I picked up basic Dutch in a bunch of different ways:
- I knew all the messages in Windows 98 in English - so it was just guesswork to learn them in Dutch, too. Taught me some good words.
- The Dutch subtitle everything, so if I watched a TV show, I learned to read along with the Dutch subtitles and learn like that
- I had a little radio that I used when biking... but the music is inevitably cut into pieces by the news - in Dutch. It became so that I learned all the names of the Dutch highways and such because of the traffic reports. Ditto for the weather. Let's not get into my language problems with United Nations, though... :)
- I ended up working at a supermarket when I turned 15, so learned as I went
- Then I was crazy enough to go to Dutch university. Turned out that my Dutch wasn't anywhere near as good as I thought it was... though my classmates found great amusement in teaching me. Plus the fact that I was the shortest, the only woman, the youngest and the only foreigner. Go Hannah! :-P

It's tough, learning a new language. I still watch my mom struggle. I'm just so glad that the Dutch subtitle things, so you don't miss as many nuances as if it was dubbed.

I wonder, though.. considering the political side - is English the best language? Are any existing languages the best? Or would we be better off by looking at something like Spanglish?

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

English is just a necessary evil. It is damn hard to spell, for one thing. But it's what we have.

Anonymous said...

Eolake defended: "It is not necessary for the French to be protectionistic of their language. Most Danes speak English well, but I don't know a single Dane who has trouble speaking Danish for that reason."

You will in a couple of generations.

As a more contemporary example, ask how many people in Hawaii speak the Hawaiian language; or why there's a revival of Hawaiian going now. (Reason: They woke up.)

Languages don't easily die entirely. But the balance of power changes surprisingly fast.

Anonymous said...

We Belgians thankfully didn't jump on the dubbing bandwagon. It's a truly distasteful practice that should really be abolished. There's nothing worse than a low-budget dub with 3 voice actors doing 20 odd voices. Nevermind the lip sync..

There is something seriously wrong with English speakers, though. No, what's wrong isn't the language, but the retardedness of people whose only language it is. If you don't speak at least two languages, you're either retarded, or you were raised in a puny village somewhere in Africa where there isn't enough food to go 'round. Either that, or you're an American who's so sure of his (or her) superiority that you just flat out refused to pick up another language. You should try it sometimes though, it'll be good for you.

Also, why is it that young (teens, tweens and whatnot) Brits and Americans have such a hard time spelling in their own language? Especially when it's the only one they know.. I'd like to think that the aforementioned retardedness has something to do with it, but even reasonably intelligent people can't seem to spell. Yes, we know that your public schools suck big donkey cock, but anyone who picks up a book every once in a while knows how to spell. Or are you trying to tell me that b00kz r wr1tt3n l1k3 dis?

Belgium doesn't have many uses I admit, but when it comes to education you anglo-american/saxon lot should probably follow our lead. Here's a quick outline for success:
1) Remove religious views from education. The Earth isn't flat, there is no such thing as intelligent design, the Earth is a few billion years old.
2) Introduce different languages and make them compulsory. The younger the better, too.
3) Make sure the teachers you hire actually know how said language works.
4) Reintroduce science. See point 1.
5) Make education compulsory from age 6-18. None of this bullshit with trying to teach toddlers how to read.. it obviously doesn't work, ample examples of that, and kids really should be kids for a while. Let them eat crayons and stuff for a while before teaching them how to write.
6) Make education affordable. Seriously.. my 3 years in uni in Belgium cost me about 1500USD in total (including books, excluding accomodation). That would buy an American what, 5 seconds of study time?

Try it sometimes.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Anonymous (name?), you have some good points, but I think you're being overly harsh on Americans. People in small European countries have other languages forced upon them because the neighbors are so close. Learning a second language is a lot of work, you need a strong reason to go through that. I can't be sure whether I would have learned a second language if I had been born in an English-speaking country.

Anonymous said...

1) Remove religious views from education. The Earth isn't flat, there is no such thing as intelligent design, the Earth is a few billion years old.

The fool has said in his heart there is no God.
The earth is 6000 years of age. We didn't come from monkies.
Man, you got some serious issues to deal with dude. Very ill thinking.

Anonymous said...

Belgium doesn't have many uses I admit, but when it comes to education you anglo-american/saxon lot should probably follow our lead. Here's a quick outline for success:

No wonder you're jealous of Americans. Belgium? Oh brother. You poor soul. You couldn't escape huh?

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Michael, be nice.

DreamingWolf said...

It is funny for me (weeell, not THAT funny) to read these opinions on English as a major language for all of us here on Earth. Though I speak English and I like it, the idea of it becoming the main language for the world sounds great on one side, on the other I think it just contributes to self-importance of Brits and Anglo-Americans (to exclude Spanish, Italian, Chinese, Polish and other American minorities). The fact that English is so widespread is due to the British imperial expansivity and expansionism in the past. They conquered a lot of other countries and cultures. OK. But this doesn't mean those of English origin are super-human, and superior to other nations and cultures...

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

You have a good point.
I just think that regardless of the dubious means of how the English-language domination was established, global communication is so important that it supersedes any lingering resentment to past wrongs. It would be shooting yourself in the foot to refuse this grand a communication opportunity just because you were invaded by the English at some point.

Heck, I am Danish, and I don't waste a moment's thought on Lord Nelson bombarding Copenhagen some time in the nineteenth century.

It also seems to me that the less reason people have for an inflated ego, the more inflated it is. So no harm can come, at least compared to the benefits.

Anonymous said...

Wonko outside the asylum said: "One of the reasons for the "success" of English as a de facto international language is because of its origins. English has Scandanavia, Germanic, French and Latin and even Ancient Greek roots ..."

A very interesting post, Wonko! Thanks.

I once entertained myself listing all the common words between Finnish and English I could come up with. I was surprised by how easy that was and by how much shared vocabulary these "unrelated" languages have.

I stopped after an hour or so, and after about 120 words, but people (mostly from Britain) have been emailing me new words to include, and the list is slowly growing.

Now, I could easily list a much longer list of common words between Swedish and English. But for linguistical and other reasons that wouldn't be nearly as interesting an exersize.

Anonymous said...

Terry said...
"So every new item you buy here is labled in english and spanish."


Is it about official language, or simply winning market parts with a wide, non-English-speaking clientele?
There's only one truly universal language in Economics: CHC. Cold, Hard Cash. :-P

TTL said...
"Countries like French aren't doing it (dubbing instead of subtitling, and not pushing English early on) out of lazyness, but in a deliberate attempt to save the language."


I don't know whether the French are overly chilly about their language, or simply the authorities are painfully aware of the wave of pathetic snobbery that has many people indulging into "Franglais". Not that English is any improved by the phenomenon!
For instance, I cringe every time 90% of the French mis-pronounce words like "Manchester Uniteed", "Wanteed criminal", "reloadeed", "animateed"... They learned that "E in English is pronounced ee", and they follow the dumb rule like a herd of ovines. Sacré nom de bonsoir, apprenez la langue si vous voulez l'utiliser, merde!
It won't even keep my fellow countrymen from snickering at an American's attempts to speak "localese".

Numérique has become "digital", which in French only refers to the fingers. Facing a problem, it's no more about résoudre but "solutionner". Commercialiser? Marketing! Gestion? Managing! Today they speak worse than Mumble the penguin sings. AAARGH! Pitié, mon Dieu, faites que cela cesse! Make it stop, please.

I can really understand why the French-speaking Canadian minority, in Québec, puts so much effort in preserving their normal vocabulary.

Hannah said...
"Then I was crazy enough to go to Dutch university. Turned out that my Dutch wasn't anywhere near as good as I thought it was... though my classmates found great amusement in teaching me."


I'll bet. :-)

About dubbing...
Thanks to satellite, I've discovered what can only be called "Polish dubbing". It's quite creative... in a twisted sort of way! Basically, the movies, series, cartoons... are broadcasted with their original sound, but at low volume, and a guy dubs the dialogues in Polish, live, over it. It seems the SAME guy does all the voices, including women and children!
Late at night, you'll feel the poor guy getting tired. Sometimes, he'll let several sentences slip by, then suddenly (wake up?) and keep going.

Anonymous said...
"Or are you trying to tell me that b00kz r wr1tt3n l1k3 dis?"


ROTFWL! gr8 1 N-on :)
Actually, I've seen a book deliberately written like this once. Real weird stuff, I tel U.

"Belgium doesn't have many uses I admit"

Who're you kidding? Begium comic books are a world treasure!
It took me years to find out that some of my fave french series were made by Belgians. They don't have big mouths, only big talent. Better that way than the opposite! :-)

"and kids really should be kids for a while. Let them eat crayons and stuff for a while"

Cute. And so true. (^_^)
Besides, crayons are designed to be absolutely non-toxic! :o)
Your advice on education is, well... spot-on.
The problem is not that Englishmen and Americans often speak one language, as much as that they are frequently confident it is the best and only one they should ever need. Otherwise put, chauvinism.
Without that kind of arrogant attitude, we'd probably already have a global communication standard. It's not so much the language, than those who try to spread it in a very clumsy manner. Like Bush's vision of world Democracy...
(I'm beginning to see a pattern here...)

DreamingWolf,
As I said in the previous discussion, English has advantages and arguments to become the global communication standard. But it certainly shouldn't become the one and only Earth language, as TTL points out.
The fact that Brits and Anglo-Americans are (correction: tend to be) appallingly narcissic isn't the problem of the language, but of the people.
Having said that, clearly today's anti-americanism is hurting the best chance we've had since Ancient Rome to all be able to understand each other. English is by no means superior in some way. Just adequate, and the most convenient today.
Because let's be honest, I don't expect the planetary triumph of Esperanto, do you?

Eolake said...
"global communication is so important that it supersedes any lingering resentment to past wrongs."


Wisely spoken. I myself have a problem with the countries today that speak English. But I'd feel like a bloody fool to reject a good tool because I don't like those who use it and project my frustrations on it. The abovementioned example of the Romans applies again: they were eventually ousted from all their empire, but the social, scientific, architectural and technical achievements they had brought were kept. Up to this day, the names of bones and muscles in anatomy are in latin. France recently started following this Anglo-American standard, precisely for the sake of knowledge uniformity. (And, I wager, because Latin doesn't feel like another cultural invasion! :-)

"It also seems to me that the less reason people have for an inflated ego, the more inflated it is."

I KNEW IT! You've visited Lebanon, haven't you? :o)
Why didn't you come by my home, then? It was almost safe. :-(

Wonko,
Thanks for the enriching contribution. Very well thought. I knew a bit of this, but loved to learn all the rest.
I found in school that not being utterly lousy in French (unlike most of my mates!!!), I learned English with great ease, relatively. Arabic is not the best base for this. (Come to think of it, my schoolmates weren't always that great in Arabic, either...)

TTL said...
"I once entertained myself listing all the common words between Finnish and English I could come up with. I was surprised by how easy that was and by how much shared vocabulary these "unrelated" languages have."


Heh... I did the same with several languages I know a wee bit of. But if you want it to be more than a moment of gratuitous fun, you should study linguistics. It would seem that everything spoken today proceeds more or less from a mother tongue dating to the African origns of Man, some 50-100.000 years ago. In fact, the comparison between languages allows a partial cross-reference of the findings of archaeology and history. And genetics, studying the phenotype variations between populations (such as blood groups, Rhesus and HLA). Hugely interesting stuff, but enough knowledge for a good dozen well-filled lifetimes!

Fallen Darkness,
Please enlighten us: what rational scientific proof do you have to back your own assertions about such "facts"? I'm very curious, and always willing to learn.
Incidentally, the name of the human blood factor Rhesus comes from the fact that it was initially discovered in rhesus monkeys, a species close to the macaques. Not that I'm claiming they're our ancestors, but... interesting coincidence, that we both happen to have it.
The skeleton of whale fins has a structure identical to human arms, did you know that? You can check it out in the museums. Humerus, radius and ulna, 8-boned wrist, and full fingers inside. Only the shapes differ. Charles Darwin exclusively studied the evidence present in God's creations to draw logical conclusions which no serious scientist will dispute today.
Just like the radio-active period of Uranium undoubtedly proves, by a very simple mathematical calculation, that the Earth WAS formed four and a half billion years ago. The proof is of forensic nature, so any neutral court of law would rule in it favor. The exact same principle is used daily, not only in Carbon14 dating, but in all applications of nuclear medicine. Which is very reliable, like Positron emission tomography for instance.

Wonko outside the asylum said...
"my Grandfather [...] was taken prisoner by the Japanese at Singapore and survived building the Burma Railroad, being torpedoed in the Sea of Japan and the A-bomb at Hiroshima."


Gee, that's one tuff feller! You must have good genes, and can expect to live long. :-)

Anonymous said...

Pascal adviced: "There's only one truly universal language in Economics: CHC. Cold, Hard Cash."

One of my mottos: In God we trust, all others pay cash.

Still, I disagree with your universality axiom. Try exchanging cash with the fine people living in Borneo jungle.

"But if you want it to be more than a moment of gratuitous fun, you should study linguistics."

Study? I am researching it. As you can see from my first research report. I don't trust other people's linguistics.

"It would seem that everything spoken today proceeds more or less from a mother tongue dating to the African origns of Man, some 50-100.000 years ago."

I am familiar with this hypothesis but I doubt it. Isolated colonies could easily have developed spoken language independent of each other.

"The skeleton of whale fins has a structure identical to human arms, did you know that? You can check it out in the museums."

I have never heard of a critic of neo-darwinism who would deny the similarities, 'common themes', or the observable distances between the manfestation of species. That is not the point. Assuming an alternative mechanism for the origin of species, one could easily come up with other explanations for the similarities.

Anonymous said...

Wonko outside the asylum said...
I was fascinated by the "Polish dubbing" you mentioned. There has been a similar case here in the UK. I refer to the famous "children's" television programme "The Magic Roundabout".


I've seen many episodes of it on satellite TV. The English "duh-bbed" version, precisely.
It so happens that I have many of those in original (French) comic-book version, from when I was "this tall". Allowed me to compare. Very amusing how it turns out the simplistic storylines actually match rather well.
This Eric Thomson should've been in international politics, considering his ability to render things simply and effectively. :-)

"the snake died!"

I had an old lady for a neighbor once, a world-class gossiper. Same thing happened when a viper bit her.
God rest her soul. She passed away after accidentally biting her own tongue. It turns out she had never done that before in all her life, go figure... It WAS a lethal weapon after all.

She believed she'd be the only survivor of the Y2K bug (according to her astrologist), and planned to then go live into Mrs F*****'s nice house.
As my brother said: "I pity the monkey that survives with her to repopulate the planet!" :-D
Fear not, PETA friends, today the monkey's safe.

TTL said...
"One of my mottos: In God we trust, all others pay cash."


"In Dei confidem, sed omnis altruis reachem pocketam." I think it it the motto of the US National Bank, no?

"Try exchanging cash with the fine people living in Borneo jungle."

Hold on a second, I remember those people. They live stark naked, hate all visitors, and when helicopters flew over their islands to check on them after the Tsunami, they were greeted with a flurry of furious spears. THOSE fine people?
Un-unh, no way. I'm NOT going there to exchange cash. I'd rather try to sell anti-wrinkle cream at the door of Wonko's Grandpa!
Come to think of it... he probably knows these folks!

"I don't trust other people's linguistics."

A piece of friendly advice: don't ever tell my aunt Rosalina you don't trust her linguini, if you know what's good for you. And better be ready to swear under oath that your research is purely gastronomic!

"Isolated colonies could easily have developed spoken language independent of each other."

The thing is, language apparently developed very early, before human colonies started to spread.
Of course, stemming from that initial proto-language, separated groups started evolving independently, also quite early on. It's a relatively fast process, on the human scale. But there's still much to discover in that vast field. Theories are still likely at best, nothing's certain yet.

"I have never heard of a critic of neo-darwinism who would deny the similarities"...

Well, just a bit above is somebody who clearly rejects all the rather overwhelming evidence of astronomy, geology and evolution proven by fossils.
Starting with this very relevant discrepancy in the Genesis symbolic parable: if plants, animals and Man were created just like that, "each according to their species", with no evolutionnary process, where did all those now-extinct "drafts" come from?

Just to correct a common misconception, no serious scientist would claim that "we descend from monkeys", or apes for that matter. We and the apes have a common ancestry, confirmed as much by the convergence of fossils toward the Past, and by all genetic studies. the foot/lower limb of the Australopithecus is the exact intermediate between the human foot and the ape's "rear hand", it's quite striking when you see it.
Further back in the past, we have a common ancestry with other mammals, vertebrates, pluricellular animal life, all animal life and fungi (which ARE NOT plants), and eventually all life, including bacteriae.

"one could easily come up with other explanations for the similarities."

Of course. You can always build theories. But remember the principle of Ockham's Razor: evolution via the neo-darwinist model is by far the simplest and most sensible explanation. We can't make up an infinite tower of elephants standing on one another in space... I do not believe in evolution because "I was raised in it", but because it is so scientifically solid.
Here's but a simple example: in mammals, the hormone prolactin is vital for the survival of the species, because it causes milk production in the mother, without which the young wouldn't live. But would you expect to find such a mechanism outside mammals? Probably not.
However, it appears that this very same hormone is present IN FISH. And in a very different role, too. It regulates the metabolic adaptation when passing from soft to salty water and back. A vital mechanism for the life cycle of many fish, but no other relation whatsoever with lactation. There's no sensible reason why we would have this hormone in common.
Hormones are chemical signals. By essence, they are arbitrary, it's just that once they appear they'll remain. We and the fish share it because it is a common inheritage.

The VERY SAME genes are involved in the early development of humans, birds, or radically different anatomies like insects. If I wanted to create an intelligent species called Man and make it clear to them that they are fundamentally different from all the rest, I'd give their predictably growing scientific curiosity and knowledge some clear proof. If for no other reason, to better silence the many predictable skeptics and convince the simple minds that I am the Truth.
How do we know that the caterpillar and the radically different butterfly are the same species? By scientific methodology.
The argument "I want to believe this way and not that way", against all intelligent evidence, is, well... childish! Emotional immaturity blinding the use of one's presumed superior intelligence.

I recall another common misconception, from the not-so-ancient times of racist society, where it was claimed that dark-skinned African humans "had no soul, were animals, and similar to apes". All alleged "scientific proof" of those claims were, notoriously, thoroughly falsified under the bias of Westerners blinded by their delusion of God-given superiority. The Bible was heavily put to contribution too. Today we know better, but it took much time, effort, and righteous debate before the rather obvious was finally accepted.

Galileo Galilei was burned because he dared discover and scientifically prove that our planet and cosmos were not like the ancient texts presented it. I ask you this : how many times must one attitude be blatantly mistaken before we cease relying on it as a rule of thumb and sole reference?

"Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame... uh... er... you won't fool me again!" -- (George Walker Bush)

Anonymous said...

P.S.: When I say that Galileo Galilei was burned, I meant his books, of course. The man himself was luckier.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

"She believed she'd be the only survivor of the Y2K bug (according to her astrologist), and planned to then go live into Mrs F*****'s nice house."

ROTFL!
First you think she is the most blunted and naive person in the world, and then she tops it herself!

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Darwinism and Christian fundamentalism are the two most common theories, but that does not mean they are the two only possibilities.

Anonymous said...

Eolake: "Darwinism and Christian fundamentalism are the two most common theories, but that does not mean they are the two only possibilities."

Exactly! And of those two "Christian fundamentalism" isn't really even a theory, since it doesn't explain the mechanism. (It basically just says that species came to be.)

So we have only one theory so far, Darwinism, also known as the holiest of holy cows in science.

Until it becomes possible to apply objective reasoning to Darwinism, which so far has not been possible, and until it becomes possible for scientists to debate Darwinism without losing their careers, I'm afraid our understanding of the origin of species is stuck in the 1800s.

Ockham's Razor has nothing to cut.

Anonymous said...

Eolake said...
"Darwinism and Christian fundamentalism are the two most common theories, but that does not mean they are the two only possibilities."


Quite true. I could come up with a new one from the back of my head (and there's a lot of available space there)!
I might correct: "the two most common theories in the Western world". Any "exotic" religion has its own version about the origin of life. Not to mention several very imaginative fiction writers, and a few dozen cult gurus.

Though I must say, the idea of angels being extraterrestrials divinized by human folklore is rather interesting. It has only one major flaw : where the heck are these superiorly advanced beings, now that we are ready to welcome them for what they are? Are they worried after watching too many of our B-movies, that they might no longer be welcome on Earth?
Hey, E.T., phone call from home! Come right in! ;-P

TTL, I could enter a very lengthy discussion with you over Darwinism, but I'd rather let you study it if and when you like. I'll just point out a few details:
-Darwinism was the original theory, it was later perfected into more fact-relying "neo-darwinism" after more knowledge was gathered.
-An essential distinction should be made between the theories of evolution and Darwin's scientific legacy. There are several theories, more or less conflicting or unconfirmed, about the mechanisms and details of evolution. But Evolution in itself is now a perfectly established fact (along with natural selection), just as much as continental drift or heliocentric cosmology (a familiar controversy, that one...).
One of the biggest "unknowns" is the importance of natural selection's role in evolution. It is still much debated whether the species adapt to the environment by selecting the changes, or adapt to the changes by seeking the fittest environment, for example.
You DO understand that this issue is highly complex, and that probably several different explanations may be true depending on the case studied.

I'll give just a couple major examples of how evolution is self-evident:
-Adaptation to chemical poisons. Today's mosquitoes have become 40 (or is it 400?) times more resilient to DDT than when the substance was first used. Study Bacterial resistance to antibiotics (it has a great variety of mechanisms) to find out just how fast evolution can happen when a species has a short reproduction cycle.
-Also, the notorious germ Streptococcus pneumoniae is well known for gaining virulence when successively transmitted through contagion, while on the contrary losing it when cultivated in petri dish. It took time to realize there was not two but one changing species there.
Evolution and genetic/phenotypic adaptation can be observed practically with the naked eye, if you know where to look.
I've seen starfish species so adapted to sea pollution where they lived, that if you place them in clean water, they die within minutes. (And it looks painful, too.)
Now, you may feel that in scientific circles any discussion about this topic is locked, and you may very well be right. The same has been said about the very interesting but slightly dogmatic and rigid ideas of Sigmund Freud. This is not a valid ad hominem argument against the idea itself. I'm painfully aware of all the nonsense and, frequently, criminal hypocrisy that religious types may indulge into, and yet I'm still a believer. A good idea poorly defended isn't enough for me to shift to atheism. I just "don't believe" in atheism. :-)

«If Scripture cannot err, some of its interpreters may, and they can in several ways.» -- (Galileo Galilei, sincere believer, in a letter to Benedetto Castelli.)
Wisdom to ponder...