Topic: Episode #354

[Silly Llama]

I'm curious to know if language changes less (or more slowly) with a higher literacy rate and standard, written dictionaries?

That's a very good question, I would be interested to hear the answer to it as well.  One interesting fact about changing language that I heard was that words that are used more often are less likely to change in pronunciation from their ancestral language whereas words that are used less often are more likely to change.  This is why many European languages have a similar sounding word for "2" but their words for "ankle" are very different.

[seaotter]

Thanks for the podcast and the community!

[GodSlayer]

One interesting fact about changing language that I heard was that words that are used more often are less likely to change in pronunciation from their ancestral language whereas words that are used less often are more likely to change.  This is why many European languages have a similar sounding word for "2" but their words for "ankle" are very different.

seems a little observation bias'y.
'night' sounds the same in a lot of languages, but 'hello' doesn't.
...which are we to assume are the more common words, and how many really are that similar? and do we get to rule out counterevidence on cultural grounds ('oh, this isolated event changed their usage to something radically different, so that instance is disqualified')?

[arthwollipot]

I have always been somewhat sympathetic to those in sports who latch onto superstitions or rituals. The problem, as several have told me is that they are attempting to do the same incalculable thing with their bodies each week (such as hit a baseball coming at them faster than their brain can actually process it) and the truth is, they have absolutely no real conscious idea how they do it. Worrying about it just tempts their conscious mind to interfere with their muscle memory, a sure way to fail. So, what many of them do is latch onto rituals that are anti-thought, which frees them to not to think about what they are doing. (a true description of ritual if I do say so myself, but in this case, not overthinking is the goal)

I've heard that the three most superstitious professions were sailor, actor and sports professional. And the reason is that these professions were highly dependent on chance - while you had a certain amount of control over your environment, there was always some aspect that you couldn't control and could blame on luck. For sailors, the sea. For actors, the audience. For sports professionals, the other team. So they are most susceptible to trying to change their luck with talismans and superstitious behaviours.

[rwh]

Transcript is done:
http://www.sgutranscripts.org/wiki/SGU_Episode_354
Live shows are a lot harder than normal ones!
-Rob

That was crazy fast!

I guess I'm crazy, have no life, or both.

One interesting fact about changing language that I heard was that words that are used more often are less likely to change in pronunciation from their ancestral language whereas words that are used less often are more likely to change.  This is why many European languages have a similar sounding word for "2" but their words for "ankle" are very different.

Yes, this has been an intersting area of study in the last few years. Using evolutionary principles to study the regularisation of verbs is one example.  According to this study, "The half-life of an irregular verb scales as the square root of its usage frequency: a verb that is 100 times less frequent regularizes 10 times as fast."

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2460562/

Cheers,

Rob

[av8rmike]

In keeping with another topic discussed on the show I will be pedantic. The original diameter of an asteroid broken into a thousand Volkswagen sized pieces would be 10 times the diameter of a Volkswagen. A small but horrifying asteroid, say 200 meters in diameter, would need to be broken into about 300,000 pieces to get that Volkswagen atmospheric benefit. But reading the PopSci article Steve discussed it would seem a large asteroid could be nuked and most pieces, big and small, would miss the Earth entirely.

As a Volkswagen owner, I had no idea that it was the standard unit of measure for asteroid pieces!

Who is introducing the Rogues at the beginning of the episode?

[Chew]

Who is introducing the Rogues at the beginning of the episode?

Jamy Ian Swiss

[Chew]

Yes, this has been an intersting area of study in the last few years. Using evolutionary principles to study the regularisation of verbs is one example.  According to this study, "The half-life of an irregular verb scales as the square root of its usage frequency: a verb that is 100 times less frequent regularizes 10 times as fast."

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2460562/

Steve twisted this into Fiction for Science or Fiction in episode 116: "Harvard linguistic scientists have created a mathematical model of language evolution that predicts that the past tense will eventually disappear from the English language. "

[rwh]

Who is introducing the Rogues at the beginning of the episode?

Jamy Ian Swiss

Great, I've added that to the transcript.

Yes, this has been an intersting area of study in the last few years. Using evolutionary principles to study the regularisation of verbs is one example.  According to this study, "The half-life of an irregular verb scales as the square root of its usage frequency: a verb that is 100 times less frequent regularizes 10 times as fast."
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2460562/

Steve twisted this into Fiction for Science or Fiction in episode 116: "Harvard linguistic scientists have created a mathematical model of language evolution that predicts that the past tense will eventually disappear from the English language. "

Cool, maybe I'll do 116 for my next transcript.

[Chew]

Cool, maybe I'll do 116 for my next transcript.

116 was one of their best shows. It started the Skeptical Utility Belt concept, a great discussion on chi masters and the vagus nerve, and they interviewed Marc Abrahams of the Ig Nobels.

[Skeptic]

Another mention for my home city of Birmingham believing crap.  First it was the city of science quiz where people thought time travel was possible. (It is of course, only British time travel is possible). Now it's Manager Barry Fry when he brought gypsies to Birmingham City Football Club to lift a gypsy curse which has caused the team to be shite for decades.  This may have been more a publicity stunt.

In it's defence it was home to the Lunar society en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_Society_of_Birmingham#_ , a real life 'Super Science Academics and Industrialists Friends' team.

There was a weird bit in the podcast were some one said "Steve and Jay" and my mind automatically expected the word Gould to be uttered next.

[Thorloar]

I'm curious to know if language changes less (or more slowly) with a higher literacy rate and standard, written dictionaries?

That's a very good question, I would be interested to hear the answer to it as well.  One interesting fact about changing language that I heard was that words that are used more often are less likely to change in pronunciation from their ancestral language whereas words that are used less often are more likely to change.  This is why many European languages have a similar sounding word for "2" but their words for "ankle" are very different.

language does not change mcuh in written forms. The changes in language come about through speech and only show up in written forms once it has become pervasive in the spoken language. Once language has been written down it is in a way frozen in place, changes happen much more slowly. One exception to this could be words produced in technical fields that will show up in writing before many people have used it because the technical authors have some form of authority over the language used in a specific field. 

[Jeremy's Sea]

I'm curious to know if language changes less (or more slowly) with a higher literacy rate and standard, written dictionaries?

That's a very good question, I would be interested to hear the answer to it as well.  One interesting fact about changing language that I heard was that words that are used more often are less likely to change in pronunciation from their ancestral language whereas words that are used less often are more likely to change.  This is why many European languages have a similar sounding word for "2" but their words for "ankle" are very different.

language does not change mcuh in written forms. The changes in language come about through speech and only show up in written forms once it has become pervasive in the spoken language. Once language has been written down it is in a way frozen in place, changes happen much more slowly. One exception to this could be words produced in technical fields that will show up in writing before many people have used it because the technical authors have some form of authority over the language used in a specific field.

Interesting, I just had to ax that question. 

[GodSlayer]

Interesting, I just had to ax that question. 

'saiight. 

[Trinoc]

Another mention for my home city of Birmingham believing crap.  First it was the city of science quiz where people thought time travel was possible. (It is of course, only British time travel is possible). Now it's Manager Barry Fry when he brought gypsies to Birmingham City Football Club to lift a gypsy curse which has caused the team to be shite for decades.  This may have been more a publicity stunt.

In it's defence it was home to the Lunar society en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lunar_Society_of_Birmingham#_ , a real life 'Super Science Academics and Industrialists Friends' team.

There was a weird bit in the podcast were some one said "Steve and Jay" and my mind automatically expected the word Gould to be uttered next.

Birmingham (my old home town as well) was built on the idea that nothing is impossible until you've tried damned hard to do it and failed. This attitude made it the hub of the Industrial Revolution, so we can forgive it if ideas occasionally stray into the cranky zone. I'm confident that for everyone who believes the Gypsy curse crap or other superstitions there are hundreds who think it's daft and the real problem is just that the playing is rubbish.