a little more McLuhan (& maybe Pynchon)

[alice wellintown]

You might try chapter six of Pinker's _The Language Instinct_ or "The
Sound of Silence"
& Chapter 13 or "Mind Design"

On Tue, Aug 30, 2011 at 4:26 PM, Mark Kohut <markekohut at yahoo.com> wrote:
> This has been a fascinating, because more puzzling than usual, thread.
>
> I do not know what I may be "mistaking" my word-thinking for, since I am
> just offering it as a phenomenon.
> I do not know if it comes from some learned or innate 'grammar".........
> Yes, I KNOW it slows me down --in reading anyway. (Although I have various
> speeds--as we all do?)
> How word-thinking is connected to my auditory sense, I do not know either,
> except that, as I wrote, it happens
> when I listen to TV, say, so that sense is involved. Happens (mostly) when I
> read in quiet. happens when I write.
> Sometimes when I 'think", I think.
>
> And, I am sure I 'think', experience much mentally, in other ways than in
> words as well. Not to even mention the Unconscious.
>
> I just wondered who else is like me in this regard. What they think it might
> mean for our orientation in the world.
> And, for whom this may NOT be true.............and what that might mean for
> them...
>
> And how societies might handle the dirfferences.
> From: David Morris <fqmorris at gmail.com>
> To: alice wellintown <alicewellintown at gmail.com>
> Cc: pynchon -l <pynchon-l at waste.org>
> Sent: Tuesday, August 30, 2011 2:57 PM
> Subject: Re: a little more McLuhan (& maybe Pynchon)
>
> On Tue, Aug 30, 2011 at 10:34 AM, alice wellintown
> <alicewellintown at gmail.com> wrote:
>>  I think McLuhan would say that, even on a gray scale, black & white are
>> qualitatively different......like literate vs. pre-literate even on a gray
>> scale
>>
>> He would say this.
>
> And who wouldn't say this?  Without qualitative differences in a gray
> scale, no images could be seen.  But the point of a scale is minute
> differences.
>
>>> And young 'uns learn most languages as abstract marks on a page. English
>>> say.....
>>
>> This is false. First, humans don't learn language but are born with
>> language.
>
> Language versus literacy?  I think we've jumped a step here.
>
>>> The literate vs. pre-literate distinction is in anthropologists' work and
>>> is still used to the present....
>>
>> Like all technologies, printing brought positives and negatives. Surely
>> there are things that pre-literate cultures have kept or developed that
>> literate cultures have lost or neglected. We would all be better runners if
>> we hadn't abandoned the cave and invented the wheel. But the health that
>> would come with our endurance would not give us longer or better lives. We
>> would die quite young.
>
> AMEN!
>
> But would our shorter lives have been more rich inside?  (joke)
>
>>> No one has (yet) answered whether they think mostly in words....for
>>> example, I watch TV....I SEE the words they are speaking...mostly...not
>>> every, I'm sure....
>
>> We think in grammar not words.
>
> I'd like to see more of this "We think in grammar not words" theory.
> If by this grammar you mean simple equations of logic revolving around
> desire, fear, etc, then I think I understand your statement.  These
> binaries are not our enemies (as GR might imply).  They are natural
> first perceptions that we need to see more finely with practiced
> observation.
>
> On another level, individual humans are often predisposed toward
> certain sensory inputs: visual and/or auditory primarily.  I am
> personally very visually oriented.  Maybe Mark mistakes his
> word-thinking from being primarily auditory.
>
> David Morris
>
>
>