Do we need language to think?

I had a small (and random) debate with a friend today on the beach on this subject. I am to torn to make a final decision on the matter.

I know that I always talk to myself in my head for any menial task and in chess. I cant think without an internal monolog. However, when a bird swoops down on some prey, is this a thought process or a reaction. Or is a reaction identical to thought just faster.

I definatly dont feel it would be possible for the great philosophers of the past and preasent to have addapted such complex ideas without language.

Such a daft question to have taken up my day!

What do others think?

i am leaning towards no. 

for the bird example, when i am doing tasks i am not running a commentary in my head.  "reach left hand out and pick up the fork.  poke assparagus with the fork.  hmm, i wonder if this is too big to fit in my mouth...." etc.  even more complex tasks do not require a running commentary.  i think that when i talk to myself..in my head, or out loud, it is a method of focusing my thoughts.  but there my be other methods for that. 

ok, so then i went to this question.  and this may be complete ignorance and i may be wrong (and i mean no disrespect or offence).  someone who is born deaf may have no concept of a spoken language.  it would seem difficult to think in a language that has never been spoken.  perhaps people that picture things in their heads will have ASL going on, i really don't know.  but short of that, they would be thinking without talking to themselves. 

edit - perhaps that should be ignored.  i spoke to someone smarter than me, and it seems that my definition of language was too rigid.  if you consider language in the broadest sense, which is applying symbles to concepts, then language is probably required for abstract and complex thought.  i have trouble imagining how this will be done because i think verbally and do not form mental images. 

Depends what you mean by "language", and depends what you mean by "thought". A cat has simple mental processes that could be considered thought, but I doubt it enumerates it them in any real language.

 

I would guess that thought tends to manifest language.

---

That was a realy interesting pice of research!

Elona, there is nothing wrong with rationalizing a situation.  You are a thinker.  Most thinkers speak to themselves about ideas.  For instance, in chess.  We are thinking - "My king is undefended, and he has a knight and queen ready to pounce on my h7 square - what can I do? I can move my knight to f8..." and so it goes.  We are thinkers.  If anyone tells you that it is weird to rationalize, maybe they only act by impulse, and never really think.  

The bird example is neat.  A bird doesn't automatically go for prey - they evaluate the position as well before they attack.  There is a blend of reaction coupled with intelligence in that example.  

On whether language is necessary for thought I have noticed, conversely, in many comment sections and forums that thought often isn't necessary for language (not this one, of course!). Steven Pinker in 'The Language Instinct' gives a nice roundown of contemporary thinking on your question. 

---

after thinking about this, i think it is pretty funny. 

Perhaps language is the cessation of thought.

Quod erat demonstrandum. You've made a convincing case Trysts.

---

?

Ford theorized that humans talk all the time, or else their brains might start working.

This is more true of the people of Kakrafoon, who, as punishment for being intelligent, beautiful, well-spoken and kind all the damned time, were cursed with the ability of telepathy. In order to prevent one's every thought being broadcast within a five mile radius, it became vital to talk incessantly about the weather or politics or how loud it has become all of a sudden.

---

THIS made me laugh. You have noticed in the forums... haha.

On the other hand, is thought necessary for language?  If you listen to most politicians you will easily see that thought is not necessary for a spoken language.

Yes, check out the theories of Saussure. Acorrding to him, you don't "think up" something and then "express it" in some language. You think in and by language.

---

Would you elaborate that a little please?

words are essential for thought. learning the basic tactical patterns in chess required me to learn their names, the pin, fork and skewer. what good are the names in actually recognizing the patterns, though? - each name designs a thousand of different positions that fall into the same pattern. so... we use the names of things to remember certain patterns. Id say we use nouns to facilitate memory. as for conjunctions like "and", "or" and especially "if", these words help make sentence structure more precise. each sentence represents a thought, and when a thoughtor sentec nce is precise it is easier to judge if it is logical. this is why a wide chess vocabulary and precise, logical assessments will earn you wins at chess.

---

It may be that instead of language being a bridge where thought crosses from us to the Other, thought remains elusive and one is unable to share it. Perhaps one's reaction to this is to negate thought, replacing it with language.

interesting subject.  i'd never considered it before lol.  i'm leaning toward yes, for cognitive/conversational thought, obviously. 

The answer is relatively simple. An internal dialogue is simply an association of the thought at hand. The question is, however, is this "association" with words necessary for the thought? No. It is as it is called, an association. People who are visual learners associate aspects of the task at hand with visuals.

To apply the above text to a real situation:

You are on chess.com doing a tactics trainer when  you get a super easy puzzle... What do you do? You look for a visual pattern. You see that it's a fork in the puzzle, but did you reall you really think "oh there's a fork! ddeeerrppp". Take for example the next scenario: You get a very hard puzzle. You look for a visual pattern, but you may now use the association of words to help you figure out the situation. Did you really have to use the words? No. Did the words help? Yes.

Question answered: Internal dialogue is a method of association used to help one's thought process, but it is not trully necessary.

Language is obviously a popular tool for thinking among humans, but of course it's not required. When animals and little kids have to figure something out (it won't be especially complicated, but that doesn't matter) they will think in their own way, but they won't be able to express that to themselves in a coherent language. Older humans could of course, if they desired.

All language does is express ideas anyway; puts them into words. This often elucidates or materializes thoughts, to yourself or to others, but you don't actually need it to think.  Philosophers would merely be unable to communicate about their thoughts without language, but what they felt about life should still be very well within them, shouldn't it? They are still disappointed if they don't feel they lived their life in a satisfactory way. Anything they regret would still be played through their head, etc -- it'd just be really weird that's all.

There really isn't too much to this one -- no need to daydream about it! I dunno, to me it's like saying we need, like, the concept of time for example -- an invention -- to grow old and die. Before time, we still did that, we just didn't keep track of it.