I read somewhere years ago, and I believe it's true, that the English language suffers from a paucity of words to describe flavor and taste when compared with other languages.
If you don't have the words, how can you say it? Maybe this is why we are suffering more than others the insults of pre-prepared and over processed foods.
Colors - you can't explain, define or describe them without referencing itself or another color. What does red look like? Does it look the same to you as it does to me? No one knows. And there's no way to explain it - red is just red. It just is.
Cephyn: In at least some cases, we can fairly conclusively say that two people don't see the same colors, because color-blindness can be objectively measured. This is a classic case where the consensual understanding of a word is based on common experience.
This also applies to concepts like "love" -- many people experience it in very different ways, but almost everyone agrees there is such a thing. More importantly, there are enough points of commonality that we mostly agree on various examples chosen by "pointing around".
Having English as a first language seems to make it difficult to appreciate the nuances of other languages. For example, we'd simply say "coarse", but the Germans would make a distinction between "poebelhaft" and "grob".
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I read somewhere years ago, and I believe it's true, that the English language suffers from a paucity of words to describe flavor and taste when compared with other languages.
If you don't have the words, how can you say it? Maybe this is why we are suffering more than others the insults of pre-prepared and over processed foods.
Very hard to describe odor, maybe moreso than taste. Uses oldest part of brain, loosely speaking.
Hard to describe synaesthesia to those without it.
Hard to describe degrees of, and texture of, pain and pleasure. Also related to oldest parts of brain.
Hard to describe what Alan Ginsberg called "magical emotions" in dreams.
Lots of things are hard to describe. That's why there are Scientists and Artists!
Colors - you can't explain, define or describe them without referencing itself or another color. What does red look like? Does it look the same to you as it does to me? No one knows. And there's no way to explain it - red is just red. It just is.
Cephyn: In at least some cases, we can fairly conclusively say that two people don't see the same colors, because color-blindness can be objectively measured. This is a classic case where the consensual understanding of a word is based on common experience.
This also applies to concepts like "love" -- many people experience it in very different ways, but almost everyone agrees there is such a thing. More importantly, there are enough points of commonality that we mostly agree on various examples chosen by "pointing around".
To bastarise some half remembered quote:
You are trying to analyse complex abstract concepts using a language designed by monkeys to tell other monkeys where the ripe fruit is.
Bastardise that is.
Having English as a first language seems to make it difficult to appreciate the nuances of other languages. For example, we'd simply say "coarse", but the Germans would make a distinction between "poebelhaft" and "grob".