We Don't Know if We See the Same Colors

the colours that we finally think we see are labels used for convenience by the brain. I used to be disappointed when I saw 'false colour' images, say, satellite photographs of earth, or computer-constructed images of deep space. The caption tells us that the colours are arbitrary codes, say, for different types of vegetation, in a satellite picture of Africa. I used to think false colour images were a kind of cheat. I wanted to know what the scene 'really' looked like. I now realize that eve...

 Lojban for Experimental Linquistics

Lojban is a predicate language, with no distinct nouns, verbs, or adjectives. What are the linguistic (communicative) properties of such a system? The answer has been partially explored through symbolic logic. But do people, when thinking linguistically, mimic in any way the processes of formal logic? What effects would a formal-logic– based language have on those linguistic thinking processes? Is the resulting language susceptible to the same analysis as natural language, in terms of the v...

 How do We Fix Spelling?

...it can be argued, perhaps, if they wish, that it's a question of style and beauty in the language, and that to make new words and new parts of speech might destroy that. But they cannot argue that respelling the words would have anything to do with the style. There's no form of art form or literary form, with the sole exception of crossword puzzles, in which the spelling makes a bit of difference to the style. And even crossword puzzles can be made with a different spelling. And if it's no...