Indigenous Ability

There is some very good evidence that language not only allows us to communicate our thoughts from one brain to another but that our native language [or adopted language] shapes, limits, or expands the very thoughts we can even think. To put this in perspective let’s look to a scientific paper in an altogether different field. The paper in question? Physiological Consequences for the Cat’s Visual Cortex of Effectively Restricting Early Visual Experience With Oriented Contours. This was published in the JOURNALOF NEUROPHYSIOLOGY Vol. 41, No. 4, July 1978. The authors were Michael Stryker, Helen Sherk, Audie Levanthal, and Helmut Hirsch. Allow me to summarize. Kittens were split into two groups. Group A were raised in environments with Vertical Stripes and no Horizontal Stripes [accomplished via wallpaper, and physical environments that limited or camouflaged the horizontal.] Group B were raised in the reverse environment, that is, all Horizontal and no Vertical stripes....

Dr. Huth is Donner Professor of Science in the Physics Department at Harvard University. He is also an historian and resurrector of primitive navigation skills. The below is part two of a lengthy and fascinating discussion on not just primitive navigational skills, but the consequences of allowing human skills or abilities to lie fallow. This conversation goes deep and is all the better for it.  You provide one fascinating example after another of navigating abilities that would border on the supernatural if one were not aware of the method. Once the method is revealed, and the skill set begins to be developed one feels almost as if they are engaged in a Benedict Cumberbatch-Sherlockian observational game of immense proportions. Is that how you see the world to some degree? Where the “ Oh, look at that pretty cloud ” becomes “ That cloud type and movement contrasted with the wind at ground level tells me to enjoy the picnic while you can because it’s about to turn cold in 3-4...

“ Let another's wounds be your warning .” ( Njal's Saga , c.37) How wise is it to quest for or resurrect lost abilities/skills while allowing present skills to atrophy? In the pursuit of excellence, we often overweight positive or how-to advice, i.e., via positiva , as opposed to looking just as hard for negative lessons, or how-not-to advice, i.e., via negativa. Both roads, the Positive and Negative, have much to offer, but we are usually biased towards the “How to” road while failing to realize, often you can move faster down the positive road, and with fewer set-backs if we remove as many speed-bumps and hurdles as possible. It is for this very reason the Viking wisdom from Njal’s Saga should be held at the fore:   “ Let another's wounds be your warning .” With that out of the way, if you have a mind to, stick with me for an anecdote [a true one, but a single example does not a fact make], more than a little science from a learned man, and a specul...