Languages and Thought

Synapse is, indeed, related. Especially because the previously held notions were that only there did the changes occur. Now some believe that neurons are also in play. I suspect a bit of both but with more synapse action.

Ah, this is exciting, lots of ramifications.

And I am in my 40's and learning to pilot small planes (though they tell me that kids learn to fly faster than adults). Also I didn't start playing tennis until was in my 20's and now I'm an accomplished player, so those of us over two years old are not washed up by any means

I agree with this. My guess is that synapse junctions become smaller, or that the dendrites retain more of the chemicals which precipitate connection, but that the neurons also become more robust in some way (though I can't say *what* way).

Hmm, how about in that more of them are produced? The Princeton studies suggest that the neurons are produced and then migrate to different areas of the brain and proceed to establish synapses with exisuting cells.

Hmmm, I'm not familiar with the Princeton studies (did I miss a link in a previous post?).

I know that some cells "migrate", but I had only heard of this occuring in early embryonic states (frogs zygotes which are just starting to show differentiation can be prodded such that cells from the dorsal side can "migrate" back to their source if moved).

In any case, I've never heard of new neurons being produced in an adult organism and then migrating to a new destination in the brain. Why would new neurons grow in one place and then move to another? If they could grow at all, why not just grow where they are needed? It seems like an unecessarily complex process.

I can't answer the why, but I can give the links.

I do note that blood cells grow in certain places and migrate elsewhere.

http://www.brainlightning.com/regen.html

http://www.princeton.edu/pr/pwb/99/0405/brain.htm

Hmm - that is interesting - neurones do lots of migating in infancy...

Walter Mitigating?

This looks interesting, haven't read it through yet. I remember reading it, though it's not the article I have in mind. Hopefully it will remind me of some things.

http://www.michaelspecter.com/ny/2001/2001_07_23_brain.html

Migrating, dammit! Blush....

I'm definately not going to migrate anywhere!

Re: Languages and Thought
I was pointed to this thread because of the interesting group dynamics that are going on in it. But now that I read some of it, it strikes me as extremely interesting -- and I'd like to add an observation of my own in response to the original question:



Absolutely! Mathematics, considered as a language, makes many phenomena a child's play to understand which are almost impenetrable in plain English. I hope I make myself clear in English when I answer questions about natural sciences or make economic arguments. But when it comes to these fields, I speak German and English as second and third languages. Whenever I can, I think my answer through in terms of a mathematical model, then translate in to something that might be reasonably comprehensible to people who don't speak mathematics.

Oh, good point, Thomas. I've tried to say that re: physics terminology -- that "strings" and "doughnuts" and such are just clumsy English approximations of complex concepts -- that's a very clear and succinct way of saying it.

I thought the thread was about human languages. I would be interested to see you guys hold a conversation in Math, though.

Thomas is human BTW.

My husband regularly holds conversations in physics. I don't understand probably 25% or so of the words, or if I think I do, I'm wrong, since they have their own physics meaning. And that's not counting the conversations in equations... writing stuff on the chalkboard et al.

You couldn't use Math or Physics in the same way that you would use a human language though. I challenge someone to translate sozo's post into either.

0100110101111001001000000110100001110101011100110110001001100

0010110111001100100001000000111001001100101011001110111010101

1011000110000101110010011011000111100100100000011010000110111

1011011000110010001110011001000000110001101101111011011100111

0110011001010111001001110011011000010111010001101001011011110

1101110011100110010000001101001011011100010000001110000011010

0001111001011100110110100101100011011100110010111000100000010

0100100100000011001000110111101101110001001110111010000100000

0111010101101110011001000110010101110010011100110111010001100

0010110111001100100001000000111000001110010011011110110001001

1000010110001001101100011110010010000000110010001101010010010

1001000000110111101110010001000000111001101101111001000000110

1111011001100010000001110100011010000110010100100000011101110

1101111011100100110010001110011001011000010000001101111011100

1000100000011010010110011000100000010010010010000001110100011

0100001101001011011100110101100100000010010010010000001100100

0110111100101100001000000100100100100111011011010010000001110

1110111001001101111011011100110011100101100001000000111001101

1010010110111001100011011001010010000001110100011010000110010

1011110010010000001101000011000010111011001100101001000000111

0100011010000110010101101001011100100010000001101111011101110

1101110001000000111000001101000011110010111001101101001011000

1101110011001000000110110101100101011000010110111001101001011

0111001100111001011100010000001000001011011100110010000100000

0111010001101000011000010111010000100111011100110010000001101

1100110111101110100001000000110001101101111011101010110111001

1101000110100101101110011001110010000001110100011010000110010

1001000000110001101101111011011100111011001100101011100100111

0011011000010111010001101001011011110110111001110011001000000

1101001011011100010000001100101011100010111010101100001011101

0001101001011011110110111001110011001011100010111000101110001

0000001110111011100100110100101110100011010010110111001100111

0010000001110011011101000111010101100110011001100010000001101

1110110111000100000011101000110100001100101001000000110001101

1010000110000101101100011010110110001001101111011000010111001

0011001000010000001100101011101000010000001100001011011000010
1110

Edit'(broke up the text so it won't stretch the page.

Math is a human language. Some humans speak it when they discuss physical, biological, and economic phenomena, et cetera. Other humans don't. These other humans are severely constrained in their thinking about these phenomena, which is one answer to the thread's original question.


Two answers. 1) Sozobe's computer translated her post into a dialect of mathematics when she pressed the 'Submit' button. A chain of computers than transported the translation -- in mathematics -- to your computer, which translated it back to written English before you read it. So it can be done -- it's just difficult. (UPDATE: I see Craven bet me to it)

2) The point of my example was to illustrate how the choice of language affects the way people think. Even if nobody could meet your 'challenge', this would be evidence not against my claim, but for it: Things you can think in one language would be unthinkable in the other language.