The Benefits of Generations of Liars

My last post (Besieged by Lies) was inspired byDaniel Dor’s interesting paper, “The Role of the Lie in the Evolution of Language. ” That paper concludes, “Language would be much simpler had it evolved just for honest communication and we would be much less imaginative, suspicious and inquisitive and emotionally controlled. We would probably have very little symbolic culture, no myths, no propaganda, and we would also proba bly insult each other much more often.” The latter may be the most surprising claim as we live in an age with a leader who exults in both lies and insults.Dor ’s reasoning emerges from his unusual definition of language: “a collectively-designed communication technology specifically constructed for the instruction of imagination.” For example, a hunter may return to his band and report, “There are impala beyond the second creek over there.” He f inishes his remark with a gesture indicating the location of “over there.” This truthful communication is understood by evoking thoughts of impala in the listeners’ imaginations. If they are familiar with the general area they may be able to picture the creek and impala beside it. According to Dor, language works by directing attention to things evoked in the listener’s imagination.Suppose this hunter ’s report is true. Then, all the hunter has to do to give his report is remember what he saw.Suppose, however, for some reason he is lying. Then he must imagine what he reports rather than...
Source: Babel's Dawn - Category: Speech Therapy Authors: Source Type: blogs