Beyond Us: Language with Jennifer Hornsby | Bernardo Kastrup & Fred Matser

[Soul_of_Shu]

The latest conversation with Bernardo in the IAI series ...

[Pantalaimon]

It's always a pleasure viewing a new episode of "Beyond Us".

However, I am a bit disappointed by the restrictive view of language and subjective experience espoused by the interviewee. Especially the part in the interview where Hornsby talks about an individual's struggle of not being able to express a feeling (which would be subjectively experienced) and eventually "giving up" contradicts Hornsby's view that there is no world beyond language.

Hornsby defends the view that everything in principle can be expressed as language. But wouldn't the experience of struggling to express a feeling forcibly entail having a subjective experience of that feeling and not having the words to describe it? As I understood it, Hornsby grants the existence of this experience, which would imply a "world beyond language" and thus weaken Hornsby's position.

[Soul_of_Shu]

Pantalaimon ... Well said. I posted this video before actually watching it, as it seemed a promising and fertile topic, but now feel disappointed. Of all the interesting, insightful and eloquent conversations BK could be having, this one has to rank very low on the list. It was a struggle watching BK struggle to find some meaningful connection amidst such cognitive dissonance. Whoever set this up surely missed the target. Oh well, bring on the next guest please.

[AshvinP]

Knowing nothing about Hornsby, I actually felt more connection to her position than BK's formulation that we are living in "linguistic reality-tunnels". When pressed, I am sure BK would clarify that he does not assume language is fundamentally disconnected from an objective reality in principle, but that was the way it came off to me. I think the critical realization is that percepts do not exist separately from concepts (language) and vice versa. So BK is right to say that there is no purely 'objective' language about the world that is not also 'subjective'. However, there does seem to be a shared 'pool' of concepts from which humans draw and attach to percepts. While language-concepts may influence perceptions of color, for ex., we cannot imagine and describe a color which never objectively existed. Even the most abstract language-concept like "God" could mean a lot of different things to many different people, but it does not seem to be infinitely malleable to the point where no shared understanding of the word is possible.

[SanteriSatama]

It's always a pleasure viewing a new episode of "Beyond Us".

However, I am a bit disappointed by the restrictive view of language and subjective experience espoused by the interviewee. Especially the part in the interview where Hornsby talks about an individual's struggle of not being able to express a feeling (which would be subjectively experienced) and eventually "giving up" contradicts Hornsby's view that there is no world beyond language.

Hornsby defends the view that everything in principle can be expressed as language. But wouldn't the experience of struggling to express a feeling forcibly entail having a subjective experience of that feeling and not having the words to describe it? As I understood it, Hornsby grants the existence of this experience, which would imply a "world beyond language" and thus weaken Hornsby's position.

Arguments making "in principle" claims are often weak and uninteresting, as proving impossibilities tends to be darn hard.

The middle ground is often where the interesting and meaningful stuff resides.

Language is not restricted to inter-personal in the subjective sense. Languages can speak also in asubjective level, where subject-object division is absent. It can be and and has been argued that asubjective language ("language of the forest") can be poetically and emotionally more rich and expressive than language ordered by subject-object structure ("language of the house"). It seems that at least some indigenous languages have richer means to express emotions and moods and feels than highly subjectified European languages.

For example, Sami joik does not have a descriptive 'aboutness' relation. It directly does what/as it sings. For example, here when asked what he is going to do, the singer responds: "I shall joik my best friend".

[Lou Gold]

Santeri,

It seems that at least some indigenous languages have richer means to express emotions and moods and feels than highly subjectified European languages.

Do you think, as David Abram does, that it has something to with the alphabet?

[SanteriSatama]

Do you think, as David Abram does, that is has something to with the alphabet?

No, I don't think so. Not familiar with Abram and his argument. Worth checking?

[Lou Gold]

I find the post-modern 'jojk' in the music of the young polymath Jacob Collier who the arranger/composer at the MIT media center described as convincing that "divinity exists."

https://www.vulture.com/2021/03/grammys ... 2A0tc4bnc4

[Lou Gold]

Do you think, as David Abram does, that is has something to with the alphabet?

No, I don't think so. Not familiar with Abram and his argument. Worth checking?

Look at his two books.

The Spell of the Sensuous

Becoming Animal

Animal tracks, word magic, the speech of stones, the power of letters, and the taste of the wind all figure prominently in this intellectual tour de force that returns us to our senses and to the sensuous terrain that sustains us. This major work of ecological philosophy startles the senses out of habitual ways of perception.

For a thousand generations, human beings viewed themselves as part of the wider community of nature, and they carried on active relationships not only with other people with other animals, plants, and natural objects (including mountains, rivers, winds, and weather patters) that we have only lately come to think of as inanimate. How, then, did humans come to sever their ancient reciprocity with the natural world? What will it take for us to recover a sustaining relation with the breathing earth?

In The Spell of the Sensuous David Abram draws on sources as diverse as the philosophy of Merleau-Ponty, Balinese shamanism, Apache storytelling, and his own experience as an accomplished sleight-of-hand of magician to reveal the subtle dependence of human cognition on the natural environment. He explores the character of perception and excavates the sensual foundations of language, which--even at its most abstract--echoes the calls and cries of the earth. On every page of this lyrical work, Abram weaves his arguments with a passion, a precision, and an intellectual daring that recall such writers as Loren Eisleley, Annie Dillard, and Barry Lopez.

[SanteriSatama]

Do you think, as David Abram does, that is has something to with the alphabet?

No, I don't think so. Not familiar with Abram and his argument. Worth checking?

Look at his two books.

The Spell of the Sensuous

Becoming Animal

local library has only the Spell of the Sensuous. I made reservation. Haven't read a book in ages.