Editing 2421: Tower of Babel
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− | The story of the {{w|Tower of Babel}} is the Biblical explanation for the existence of different languages in the world. In the story, humans | + | The story of the {{w|Tower of Babel}} is the Biblical explanation for the existence of different languages in the world. In the story, humans endeavor to build a tower reaching heaven. Their arrogance angers God and prompts him to sabotage the project. He does this by "confounding their speech" (commonly interpreted as giving everyone their own language), inhibiting their ability to work together. |
− | In this retelling, however, the events are the same, but the motives changed. God is pleased with the tower, and promises to create a diversity of languages, not as a punishment, but as a reward for the member of the party who finds words interesting. Megan seems to recognize the potential issues this would cause, but the word-loving woman is enthusiastic. This plays on [[Randall]]'s various geeky interests, recognizing that complexities of the world, which frustrate many people, are a source of great joy and interest to others. A world with only one language would make travel and global communication much easier, but for those with an interest in linguistics, it would be deeply limiting, as there would be only one language to study | + | In this retelling, however, the events are the same, but the motives changed. God is pleased with the tower, and promises to create a diversity of languages, not as a punishment, but as a reward for the member of the party who finds words interesting. Megan seems to recognize the potential issues this would cause, but the word-loving woman is enthusiastic. This plays on [[Randall]]'s various geeky interests, recognizing that complexities of the world, which frustrate many people, are a source of great joy and interest to others. A world with only one language would make travel and global communication much easier, but for those with an interest in linguistics, it would be deeply limiting, as there would be only one language to study. |
− | + | The party that ascends to the top of the tower consists of [[Cueball]], [[Megan]] and a curly-haired woman, who may be the linguist {{w|Gretchen McCulloch}} as she was depicted in [[2381: The True Name of the Bear]]. | |
− | {{w| | + | {{w|Phonology}} is the study of the sounds used in a language or dialect, or of the systems that languages use to organize sounds. For example, English has the words "light" and "right", indicating a distinction between /l/ and /r/, but other languages, such as Japanese, do not, resulting in the (in)famous stereotype. On the other hand, English does not make a distinction between /u/ and /y/, while French does, having words such as "le but" (the goal) and "le bout" (the tip). |
− | The title text expands the joke by suggesting that the miscommunication caused by the Tower of Babel is not due to language barriers, but instead because linguists have created intentionally meaningless sentences to illustrate points about grammar and identifies two famous examples of such. "{{w|Colorless green ideas sleep furiously}}", coined by linguist {{w|Noam Chomsky}} in 1957, is an example of a sentence that is structurally correct but contains paradoxes and meaningless comparisons: Something cannot be both colorless AND green (see {{w|Invisible Pink Unicorn}}), ideas do not sleep, and sleeping generally is not done furiously.{{Citation needed}} That said, the sentence "colorless green ideas sleep furiously" is so well known in linguistics that a competition to make the sentence meaningful was held in 1985 and {{w|Colorless_green_ideas_sleep_furiously#Attempts_at_meaningful_interpretations|attracted a number of entrants}}. "More people have been to Russia than I have" is an example of {{w|comparative illusion}}. | + | {{w|Morphosyntactic alignment}} is the study of the relationship between the subject and object, as well as how languages indicate which is which. For example, in the sentence "the dog chased the cat", it's indicated that the dog is the one doing the chasing because it comes before the verb "chased". Other languages might switch it around: "the dog the cat chased", or use affixes to mark which is which: "the doga chased the cato" / "the cato chased the doga". (Note that all four sentences mean the same thing.) |
+ | |||
+ | The title text expands the joke by suggesting that the miscommunication caused by the Tower of Babel is not due to language barriers, but instead because linguists have created intentionally meaningless sentences to illustrate points about grammar, and identifies two famous examples of such. "{{w|Colorless green ideas sleep furiously}}", coined by linguist {{w|Noam Chomsky}} in 1957, is an example of a sentence that is structurally correct but contains paradoxes and meaningless comparisons: Something cannot be both colorless AND green (see {{w|Invisible Pink Unicorn}}), ideas do not sleep, and sleeping generally is not done furiously.{{Citation needed}} That said, the sentence "colorless green ideas sleep furiously" is so well known in linguistics that a competition to make the sentence meaningful was held in 1985 and {{w|Colorless_green_ideas_sleep_furiously#Attempts_at_meaningful_interpretations|attracted a number of entrants}}. | ||
+ | |||
+ | "More people have been to Russia than I have" is an example of {{w|comparative illusion}}. This sentence seems to make sense at first, but upon deeper analysis does not. Many people misinterpret its meaning as "I do not own/have in my household as many people as those who have been to Russia." | ||
==Transcript== | ==Transcript== | ||
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:Curly haired woman: '''''YESSSSSS!''''' | :Curly haired woman: '''''YESSSSSS!''''' | ||
:Megan: We should '''''not''''' have brought a linguist. | :Megan: We should '''''not''''' have brought a linguist. | ||
+ | |||
+ | ==Trivia== | ||
+ | In [[2381: The True Name of the Bear]], sentences spoken by the curly haired-woman, the suspected Gretchen McCulloch do not have periods at their ends, a fact which she mentioned on Twitter. However, in this comic, she uses periods, so her previous periodlessness might be a coincidence and not a trait of her character on xkcd. Then again, she might not have been intended to be representing Gretchen McCulloch. | ||
{{comic discussion}} | {{comic discussion}} | ||
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[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]] | [[Category:Comics featuring Megan]] | ||
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]] | [[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]] | ||
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[[Category:Religion]] | [[Category:Religion]] | ||
[[Category:Language]] | [[Category:Language]] |