September 2007
21 posts
Numbers station - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia →
Numbers stations are shortwave radio stations of uncertain origin. They generally broadcast voices reading streams of numbers, words, letters (sometimes using a phonetic alphabet), tunes or morse code. The voices that can be heard on these stations are often mechanically generated. They are in a wide variety of languages, and the voices are usually women’s, though sometimes men’s or...
The Analytical Language of John Wilkins →
The Essay by Jorge Luis Borges, mentioned by Foucault as containing the famouse ‘Chinese Encyclopaedia’, incorporating the categorisation of objects “that from a long way off look like flies”.
George Lakoff — Rockridge Institute →
Contra-Chomskyan linguist George Lakoff’s homepage. Proponent of metaphor-based cognition and language
Wildlife reappears in Chernobyl
The resurgence of wildlife in the Chernobyl exclusion zone, though great has more to do with the lack of humans, than the lack of negative effects of radiation. Tests by Robert Baker from the Texas Tech University, and others, have shown that like for like, wildlife levels are lower than similar areas without exposure to radiation.
The effects of radiation are great, but not as great as the...
“It cannot be said that radiation is good for wildlife. Instead, the elimination...”
– Robert J. Baker Since 1994 Dr. Baker has worked extensively examining the effects of radiation on the animals surrounding Chornobyl.
“We’re not measuring the number of horses we see: We’re measuring the...”
– pricing (27 October 2005, Interconnected)
Xenoglossy
What if you remember everything: everything you see, hear and experience (through all senses)?
If there is any explanation for xenoglossy, it may well be that we do store everything that we experience, but are ‘blocked off’ somehow from this experience the vast majority of the time.
Example: you can’t name all the books on your bookshelf, but can happily tell if a book has...
“just how much can one understand of a language one doesn’t know, after...”
– Language Log: Stupid Dead People Communication Tricks
“The OED dates its first appearance to 1914; it’s from Greek xenos, stranger or...”
– World Wide Words: Xenoglossy
“Xenoglossy is the putative paranormal phenomenon in which a person is able to...”
– Xenoglossy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
“A speedway rider from the Czech Republic woke after being knocked out in a crash...”
– Czech who bounced into English | Metro.co.uk
A Reporter at Large: The Interpreter: Reporting... →
“Dan Everett believes that Pirahã undermines Noam Chomskyâs idea of a universal grammar.”
About Translation →
A specialist industry blog about translation by a freelance translator. Lots of information about language, language theory and all that implies
Maskingtape →
A tumblog of art, culture, theory, miscellany and multiplicity
Mirror box - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia →
A system used to help alleviate pain from phantom limb syndrome - where an amputated limb is felt as if still present.
Utopalgia
There should well be a word to describe a feeling of homesickness for somewhere never visited, that never existed or that is assumed to have existed in someone else’s past.
A utopia, from Thomas More’s Utopia stems from the greek ‘U’ (not/nowhere) and ‘topos’, a place. It is a description of a fictional communal society and has come to mean any ideal, if...