Language with Chu

What types of knowledge do you need in order to use language? You know A LOT more than you think! From abstract rules, to how to remove ambiguity in funny sentences, an ocean of knowledge is available to you every second of your day. Learn more about the ease with which you do amazing computations when you speak, and be proud of yourself!

If you are a language nerd, you will like this one! How many parts of our bodies do we need to produce speech? Which is the only floating bone in our body, and how is it useful for speech? How do we use statistics all day long when producing language, and not even realizing it? What is Theory of Mind? What abilities do we need to put to use every time we speak, ranging from motor skills, to cognitive abilities and social aptitudes? All this and much more, to explain how everything in language is complex, and how its basic dictionary definition doesn’t even begin to explain it.

Have you ever heard of the “ta-ta” or the “yo-he-ho” theories of language evolution? These and several others started off as jokes, yet, you can find them mentioned in serious textbooks nowadays. It is as if most of the mystery of language’s origins had been relegated to speculation, and as if jokes had become the new “science”. But we can do a bit better than that! References: - (book) Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man, 1871 - (book) Allan Keith et al., The Oxford Handbook of the History of Linguistics, chapter 1 (by Salikoko S. Mufwene), pp.1-41.

In this short video, you get to hear about what Michael Denton, author of “Evolution: Still a Theory in Crisis”, has to say about the problems of language evolution as it is commonly understood. Questions such as these should inspire us to let go of the dogmas and beliefs that have taken hold of the Academia for decades. How likely are random mutations applied to language? How come all humans share the same capacity in spite of living in completely different environments? Sure, you can dismiss all the arguments in this video and say that Language started earlier, and THEN spread out, but then you are only pushing the same problem to an earlier date, and you haven’t explained a thing… References: - (book) Michael Denton, Evolution: Still a Theory in Crisis, Discovery Institute, 2016. - (article) Joseph Warren Poushock, "Language-Wonder: Theory, Pedagogy, and Research", 1998. - (Book) J. C. Sandford, Genetic Entropy and the Mystery of the Genome, FMS Publications, 2015.

And now we connect biology and Michael Behe’s work tothe complexity of language, and the theories of its emergence. From physical apparatuses that serve multiple intricate purposes, to the connection between language and mind, we explore some of the questions that remain unanswered. And at the end, you get to hear a fairy tale… about how, according to Darwin, language emerged. It’s up to you to decide which theory seems the most plausible. References: - (book) Michael Behe, Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution, Free Press, 2001. - (article) W. Fitch, David Reby, “The descended larynx is not uniquely human”, 2001: https://royalsocietypublishing.org/do... - (book) Michael Denton, “Evolution: Still a Theory in Crisis”, Discovery Institute, 2016. - (book) Stephen Mithen, “The Prehistory of the Mind”, Thames & Hudson, 1999. - (article) T. Fitch, “Musical protolanguage: Darwin's theory of language evolution revisited”, 2009. (On the occasion of Charles Darwin’s 200th Birthday) - (video) What does Language Teach Us about Intelligent Design? - Dr. Paul Nelson https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_DvCc...

Can Language be the product of random mutations and gradual evolution? I don’t think so. And in order to help you see it from another perspective, in this video we talk about Michael Behe’s work on Intelligent Design and Irreducible Complexity. Some observable principles are completely ignored by official science. But without them, we cannot explain Life as a whole, much less the emergence of language. So, let’s go on a little excursion into biology to find out more! References: - (video) Amazing Flagellum : Michael Behe and the Revolution of Intelligent Design : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNR48... - (video) Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xht_b... - (book) Michael Behe, Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution, Free Press, 2001. - (book) Douglas Axe, Undeniable: How Biology Confirms Our Intuition That Life Is Designed, HarperOne, 2016. - (book) J. C. Sandford, Genetic Entropy and the Mystery of the Genome, Feed My Sheep Foundation, Inc., 2008. - (book) Ruchard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene: 40th Anniversary edition, OUP Oxford, 2016

In this video, I summarize Darwin's Theory of Evolution, and most particularly, Darwin's writings about how the language capacity evolved. We begin questioning some aspects of this theory, and seeing how complex this subject is. And we end with several of the questions that need to be asked if we wish to understand how language emerged. Some references used: - Allan Keith et al., The Oxford Handbook of the History of Linguistics, chapter 1 (by Salikoko S. Mufwene), pp.1-41. - Tom Wolfe, The Kingdom of Speech, Vintage, 2017. - W. Tecumseh Fitch, "Musical Protolanguage: Darwin's Theory of language evolution revisited", (2005?) - W. Tecumseh Fitch, "Descent of the larynx": https://blogs.ntu.edu.sg/hg3040-2014-1/?page_id=105 - David Stove, "Darwinian Fairytales: Selfish Genes, Errors of Heredity and Other Fables of Evolution", Encounter Books, 2006. - Leading Evolutionary Scientists Admit We Have No Evolutionary Explanation of Human Language: https://evolutionnews.org/2014/12/leading_evoluti/

In this video I do a short recap of the previous parts of this series, I explain the reasons for why I started sharing this line of research with the study of sounds, and what my general plan is for future videos. Let’s be like Sherlock Holmes, and find secrets in the tiniest molecules of language! Interviews mentioned: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4AiGYmLvH8&list=PL4Qj8FQLyAorJAtW9SBJMf0sjZy88Tcyj&t=0s The full Sounds and Meaning series: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bkbw3jZDTPc&list=PL4Qj8FQLyAooT4Joe-fcUw5iU1ycuQIa5&t=0s

Language. We use it to speak, obtain information and enrich our minds. We’re immersed in it every day and would find it nearly impossible to communicate and exist in the ways that we’re used to without it. And yet the use of language - and all its varied and nuanced components - are very largely taken for granted by us until we take a step or two back to think about how language works, how incredibly complex it is, what many languages have in common, what makes language successful (or not), and what some research into the origins of language suggest about how little we truly know about them. This week on MindMatters we are joined by Juliana Barembuem of Language with Chu, a polyglot and long-time student of language, who presents a number of ‘outside of the box’ perspectives on language; what do languages have in common with discoveries in biology? Is language a feature of intelligent design? How is the use of language abused and in service of ideas that actually confuse and misinform - to name just a few. One thing to realize is that the deeper we get into this discussion the more we see that these lines of inquiry are really just the beginning of this conversation. Language with Chu: https://www.youtube.com/user/chuailen MindMatters on odysee: https://odysee.com/@MindMatters:4 Audio on BuzzSprout: https://mindmatters.buzzsprout.com/

So far, we have seen that phonemes and sounds can carry meaning. In this part, you will learn about other possible clues: Do frequencies have shapes? Does the shape of a letter relate to its sound? And what do the shapes of our letters convey about our remote past and legacy? We'll connect these pieces of "trivia" with the rest of the series. And hopefully after watching, you will see your letters and the sounds of your language in a whole new light. References: - Cymatics: https://www.cymascope.com/cyma_research/phonology.html - Nora Turoman, Suzy J Styles, "Glyph guessing for 'oo' and 'ee': spatial frequency information in sound symbolic matching for ancient and unfamiliar scripts" https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28989784/ - TED Talk, Genevieve von Petzinger, "Why are these 32 symbols found in caves all over Europe" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJnEQCMA5Sg

Have you ever noticed similarities between languages that are said to belong to different “families”? Why do the pairs “wick-wicked” (English) and “mèche - méchant” (French) have four different historical roots, yet they all share an underlying meaning, “twisted”? Why do “mère” (French) and “mare” (English) sound similarly, and “ma” (Chinese) can mean both “mother” and “horse”? Is it all just pure coincidence? There may be an explanation for these and many other oddities! Reference: Abraham A. Abehsera, "Babel, the Language of the 21st Century", 1991.

In this second part, you will get to learn the difference between a phone and a phoneme, and to interpret the basics of the International Phonetic Alphabet. This, and some comparisons between languages, will help you understand WHY learning certain sounds can be crucial for understanding and speaking better, as well as for being understood. Don’t just imitate sounds, but rather, understand the reason why this can make your life much easier in the long run! And if you study Linguistics, this can be a simple introduction for you to get acquainted with the API, and the basics of Phonology, a fascinating sub-discipline in this field!

In this third part, I finish giving you an introduction to phonemes, this time focusing more on consonants. And then, the good news! Learn why you always had a huge talent for sounds when you were a small child, and why that gift is just dormant, not gone forever! Your brain is like a sponge, or rather, like a colander. Anybody can add sounds to their repertoire!

Welcome to the wonderful world of language sounds, which often gets neglected! In this video I give my take on the reasons why sounds and pronunciation are often (and sadly) not taken seriously, and why they can be super interesting, fun, important and even healthy when learning a language. Do not believe that it’s too late, or too hard to work on your pronunciation. The earlier you do it, the better!

In this video I explain in simple words a chapter from one of my favorite books: “Political Ponerology”, by Andrej Lobaczewski, with examples taken from the current global situation, so as to give you an idea of how to immunize yourself against many lies. These “five ponerogenic processes” (poneros= evil, genic= origin) are at play in today’s society and color your actions, your beliefs, and your thoughts. Evil spreads like a virus, in almost invisible ways (including language), and in the most unsuspecting hosts, because we lack basic knowledge about these processes and the reality behind them. The best vaccine against it? Truth and information, not letting your own values and kindness be corrupted. The book can be found here: https://en.pilulerouge.com/shop/pp/ https://www.redpillpress.com/shop/political-ponerology/ https://www.amazon.com/Political-Ponerology-Science-Adjusted-Purposes/dp/1897244258/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=political+ponerology&qid=1598556725&sr=8-1

Most English speakers struggle a lot when learning languages which use the subjunctive quite frequently. Indeed, although it is not always so complicated to learn the form, it is quite difficult to learn how to use it properly in context. But little do native English speakers know that the subjunctive they dread so much is very present in English too! We use it all the time. The main difference is that the form of the verb doesn’t vary a lot in English, as opposed to other languages which allow you to distinguish the difference more easily. Do you want to see how often you use the subjunctive yourself? Check this video out. And by the way, it’s NOT a tense, it’s a mood! I explain why in the video. Resources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subjunctive_mood https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_mood https://www.englishpage.com/minitutorials/subjunctive.html Test yourself: https://www.englishpage.com/minitutorials/subjunctiveexercise.htm

And the drama continues. This time I bring to your attention a press briefing during which you get to relish in a huge amount of lies and hypocrisy from the mouths of some of the best “advisors” to governments and the press: Tedros Adhanom, the Director-General of the World Health Organization, and Kristalina Georgieva, the Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund. What a wonderful team they make! As usual, language is exploited to the max to make you fall for the worst type of virus: lies that warp your mind and heart. Enjoy! References: https://www.dailywire.com/news/watch-dr-birx-we-have-very-liberal-recording-of-covid-deaths-if-they-test-positive-we-are-counting-that https://www.grassfire.com/what_total_u_s_deaths_down_10_in_march_from_prior_years_further_raising_question_of_covid_impact https://www.who.int/dg/speeches/detail/who-director-general-s-opening-remarks-at-the-media-briefing-on-covid-19--3-april-2020 https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/dec/19/christine-lagarde-avoids-sentence-despite-guilty-verdict-in-negligence-trial https://www.sott.net/article/354585-WHO-116-million-African-children-to-get-polio-vaccines https://www.sott.net/article/431860-How-to-Create-a-Fake-Pandemic https://www.sott.net/article/431750-Empty-Hospitals-Where-Are-All-The-Coronavirus-Patients https://www.foxnews.com/world/who-chief-tedros-questionable-past-coronavirus https://youtu.be/bmtEGNdee2Y (Copyright: FOX News Channel)

Do you ever struggle with understanding or pronouncing specific sounds in the language you are learning or already know? Do you ever wish you could understand some subtle differences in sounds, so as to be able to better communicate with native speakers, and not have to repeat yourself in order to be understood? Here is a very simple exercise you can do to train your ear. Only 5 minutes a day, and you’ll be an expert in no time! Plus, it’s a fun challenge. Minimal pairs rock! Resources: English minimal pairs : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDIATTsn1e4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SLBxBwE_y6U https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LO7bmikk-3U For other languages, check this channel out! He has done a great job, and has lists of Minimal Pairs available for many languages. Fluent Forever https://www.youtube.com/user/sirionn/videos

If you are crazy enough to work on the entire dictionary of a specific language, and group words according to which sounds they have, and what pieces of meaning they share, see what happens! Suddenly all sounds carry certain meanings, and if you replace them, the meaning changes! I bet you never noticed it before. And it's not just a "mere coincidence" when thousands of words, and their corresponding sounds, show the same patterns. References: - Margaret Magnus, "Gods of the Word: Archetypes in the Consonants" (1999) - Margaret Magnus' website: http://www.trismegistos.com/ - Her dissertation: http://www.trismegistos.com/Dissertation/ Also in this series: Sounds and Meaning: Part 1 - Introduction https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bkbw3jZDTPc

Do sounds have meaning? A question ignored for centuries could hold the key to understanding how language emerged, and what it is. In this first part, I introduce you to a few misconceptions in Linguistics, and the idea that maybe, just maybe... sounds may carry in them the essence of the entities they describe. References: - Ferdinand de Saussure, "Cours de Linguistique Générale" (1916) - Plato, Cratylus (ca. 390 BC) - Edward Sapir on sounds and meaning (1930) https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwiindOV-qvxAhWOGBQKHSgDBC0QFjANegQIAxAD&url=https%3A%2F%2Fweb.stanford.edu%2Fclass%2Flinguist1%2FRdgs%2FSapir.1.pdf&usg=AOvVaw17O5eWaSQ6wE_-ex1gXiZu

Have you read recently in the news that speaking English may contribute to the spreading of deadly viruses? Oh yes, you must stop speaking English right now! Learn Japanese, for example. Nothing better to protect the elderly... The nonsense that you read in the news nowadays… Here is an explanation for why that claim is utterly ridiculous from a language point of view. Sources: https://www.forbes.com/sites/alisonescalante/2020/09/08/why-speaking-english-may-spread-more-coronavirus-than-other-languages/#33f03be56eea https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7263261/ https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(03)13874-3/fulltext https://youtu.be/SrPCgh4UkAU

In this part, I introduce another path towards finding the hidden meaning behind sounds and the words they form. As sneaky as ever, this time they are hiding in plain sight, in each syllable or sound of names of places, and common names. References: Carmen Jimenez Huertas, "No venimos del latin: Edición revisada y ampliada" (2015) In english: "Romance Did Not Begin in Rome: A critique of the Latin origin of Romance languages" (2018)

Dans cette première vidéo en français, je parle du fameux mythe qui veut nous faire croire que « les Français nuls en langues », des mauvais et des bons côtés du système éducatif français, des croyances concernant l’anglais, et de l’importance d’apprendre ce dernier, ou bien d’autres langues. N’ayez pas peur du ridicule, ni de perdre votre identité ! Tout le contraire arrive lorsqu’on ose faire les premiers pas. Et vous êtes tout à fait capables (voire parfois mieux équipés que d’autres cultures) pour vous servir de cet apprentissage pour enrichir votre vie. Ressources citées (articles et vidéos) : • Pour en finir avec le mythe du français « nul en langues » ; https://www.mondelangues.fr/pour-en-finir-avec-le-mythe-du-francais-nul-en-langues • Pourquoi les Français sont (vraiment) nuls en langues ; https://www.mondelangues.fr/pourquoi-les-francais-sont-vraiment-nuls-en-langues • Pourquoi la mentalité française nous rend « nuls en langues ». https://www.mondelangues.fr/mentalite-francaise Article du professeur Daniel Emilio Rojas : Les Français et les langues étrangères https://www.larevuedesressources.org/les-francais-et-les-langues-etrangeres,2920.html

What is a good translation? In this video I describe two different theories about translations (contrastive vs. interpretive), and why one is better than the other. No more boring translations, no more translations that read as if they had been done by an automatic translator. No more struggling with finding exact “linguistic correspondences” while forgetting that what matters is the message conveyed by the author. If you aren’t yet familiarized with the interpretive method, give it a try! It is more fun, it takes less time, and you will be happy about the results. References: Durieux, Christine – "¿Qué es una buena traducción?", Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, 1987. Durieux, Christine – Fondement didactique de la traduction technique, Didier Erudition, Paris, 1988. And about Danica Seleskovitch, who developed the Interpretive Theory of Translation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danica_Seleskovitch https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Interpretive_Theory_of_Translation

What is a good translation? In this video I describe two different theories about translations (contrastive vs. interpretive), and why one is better than the other. No more boring translations, no more translations that read as if they had been done by an automatic translator. No more struggling with finding exact “linguistic correspondences” while forgetting that what matters is the message conveyed by the author. If you aren’t yet familiarized with the interpretive method, give it a try! It is more fun, it takes less time, and you will be happy about the results. References: Durieux, Christine – "¿Qué es una buena traducción?", Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, 1987. Durieux, Christine – Fondement didactique de la traduction technique, Didier Erudition, Paris, 1988. And about Danika Seleskovitch, who developed the Interpretive Theory of Translation: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danica_Seleskovitch https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Interpretive_Theory_of_Translation