Random Thought #127

So I was reading a post on meaning and how something can have a universal meaning to all parties who consider the idea/thought/object. For example, if I simply said door, would everyone conceptualize the same thing in their head? I'm sure we'd get quite a variety of doors, but they would all have likely the same general construct so the answer is infamously "it depends". At some very basic level, I think most everyone can agree on some very general characteristics but everyone's door is likely going to be different based on past experiences with the concept "door". This is kinda like navigating with a partially drawn map. The basic general concepts are like road markers along the road or they could be major cities or landmarks. We can get to the same place generally as long as we have some major points of reference that we all agree on.

This works the same way with translating languages....to an extent. There is a literal translation of a word in most cases or at least a couple of words that describe the word you are trying to translate. Outside of memorizing the corresponding word though, you would have to understand the concept (in your head) in order to have that same major landmark to reference). Otherwise, the word is just garbled gunk to you. If I gave you the same poem in 3 different languages, you could translate it a couple of different ways. The first is literally, but that will likely make very little sense. The words would translate but they would sound "funny". Why is this? Is there something deeper than just words in a poem? Is there a style in writing in a particular language? Are there cultural pretexts that embue a piece of literature with some sort of identity? When you read a fantasy book, you develop a picture of what the far-away world and the characters look like and how they act. You do it in dreams too. What is the basis for this? There is some sort of previous experience that influences how we see the world. I particularly like the poetic example because when I lived in Siberia, I decided to write a poem in Russian for a local talent show. I would gauge how "russian" I had become by how well I was able to embue my words with the local culture and relate the local people there. Needless, to say, it was a hit but it took concerted effort to write as if I were a Russian and had grown up in Russia. A different perspective indeed.