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Comments:
lynne - 2004-08-20 23:04:49 Wasn't it? I thought he devised ingenious tests to get the data. He hid a piece of candy, as you remember, in a box with a picture of four fish and then scrambled that box amid other boxes with pictures of three and of five fish...the Brazilians were not successful at picking the right box since they didn't have a mental category for "four" and couldn't recognize that. Quite interesting. I was amused by one caller to the show who doubted the finding that that group of people did not have linguistic/semantic categories for numbers beyond 2. She said, "but we all learn to count in kindergarten..." Yeah. Show me the kindergarten in the Amazonian bush, dipwad. It struck me as the typical comment from an American who never lived/visited overseas and who fails to realize that there are other worlds of thought and culture out there--some that don't conform to the American model (gasp!) At any rate, it was a very thought-provoking NPR story. * * * * * * * * * * * * lynne - 2004-08-21 08:29:39 My impression of that caller was that she just couldnt wrap her mind around the concept of someone not knowing how to count because, in her experience, everyone knows how to count. In a way, she cant conceptualize NOT counting in the same way the Brazilians cant count. It all reminded me of one time when I was on a huge rant in high school about learning algebra and how I didnt understand why we needed to learn it when we were never going to use it again. My father said that I *would* use it (and he was right, darn it!) but that even if I didnt, one of the reasons to teach it was to teach people to think in a certain way. Maybe there is something to that? [shrug]* * * * * * * * * * * * Laura - 2004-08-21 13:59:25 It takes a lot of effort to learn to think in a different way. Learning a different language, and learning how the terms shape one's thought--is one way. You're right, the caller couldn't wrap her brain around that, since it wasn't in her experience. I was just protesting such limited experience without the awareness that there's more out there than what is defined by one's experience.* * * * * * * * * * * * add your comment: |