On: My Forgotten Language: the brain can lose and recl...

[thaumasiotes]

> I picked human usage of computer language, which got me a C+ because the prof was adamant computer languages aren't human languages

It's not like he was wrong about this?

[fao_ → thaumasiotes]

Computer languages are human languages, because the purpose is to communicate to humans what you're doing. Unless you want to write raw bytecode?

[taejo → fao_]

The same is true of the diagrams in IKEA instructions, but that doesn't mean that the human brain works with them in the same way as it works with human languages.

[marci → taejo]

And now, so many more questions. I wonder:

- how the brain "reads" an Ikea instruction?

- is it similar to non-verbal communication?

- do you vocalize an interpretation of the instructions?

- 3D projection in your head?

- What are the differences between seeing an object, hearing a word that represent it, reading the word? (Now thinking about sign-language, braille...)

I just picked an Instruction set to see, but realised I was already biased with the expectation I had of how I would decipher it.

[kazinator → fao_]

That's just equivocating on the definition of the term "human language"; that's not what a linguist means by human language.

I.e. your argument isn't really that Javascript or C are human languages as defined by the linguistics professor but that he or she ought to augment or alter his or her definition of "human language" to include them.

[fao_ → kazinator]

That didn't stop Larry Wall getting a degree in "Natural and Artificial languages" :)

[kazinator → fao_]

Rather, it stopped him from getting a degree in natural and artificial languages which was called "Natural Languages".

[rytill → fao_]

I would argue the primary purpose is to abstract away low-level and repetitive actions while retaining the ability to tell a computer what to do.

A fully visual programming environment would have more in common with standard programming languages than a spoken language.

[frandroid → fao_]

Programming languages don't have the grammatical complexity of languages we use to communicate with each other.

[fao_ → frandroid]

Have you seen perl? It's designed to be like a natural language, by a linguist