Program Information:
Title: Steven Pinker: Language as a Window into Human Nature
Location: London, The RSA
Date: Feb 4 2011
language a window into social relations away I'll begin with I'll puzzle in langauge with what is taken
from the movie Fargo on the scene early in the movie in which the kidnapper as
a hostage been tied up in the backseat of the car and you conveniently is pulled
over by the fire police because he's missing his plates the police officer asks him to
show his driver's license the proper says wallet with the likes of showing a fifty dollar
bill extending ever so slightly and this is the officer is the maybe be the best
thing would be to take care of it here in Brainerd which the audience and presumably
the officer recognized as the old bribe this is an example but linguists call him indirect
speech act the case in which we don't work out what we mean so many words but
we veil our intentions in innuendo hoping for listener to be between the lines I can
for our viewing something we do all the time off without the realizing it for example he
could pass the guacamole that would be awesome now when you think about it but those
making less sense he effortlessly recognize it as a polite request I'm counting on you to
show leadership campaign for the future of anyone who is set to a fundraising dinner was
familiar with euphemistic this fiction or am I like that which can be translated as give
us morning it would like to come up and see my etchings that has been recognized
as sexual come on for so long that the nineteen thirties teams to revert to a
New Yorker cartoon was an a man says to his date you wait here at I'll bring the etchings that II the the
it it is not my store thought there would be it be a real shame something happened to it anyone
you were in the soprano ousted recognizes the veiled threats the puzzle is why our bribes
requested seductions solicitations threats so often veiled when both parties presumably know exactly what key
language
has to do two things start to convey some content such as a bribe command or
proposition the same time it's got to negotiate we relationship shut tight the solution is to
use language of two levels speaking uses a literal form to signal the safest relationship to
twist counting on the listener to be between the lines dedicated proposition that might be incompatible
with that relationship and politeness is that simple example what's going on with a if you to
pass the guacamole that would be awesome I begin to woo would agree that it's gonna
be an overstatement I also want to know why you should be wondering counter factual world's
how right they are intended the dinner table now be listener thinks the sending of the
speakers not lost its mind of the speaker says the outcome is good therefore he must
be requesting of the overall effect is that the intended content gets to me meet the
imperative but without the presumption of dominance that would ordinarily company an imperative the median
expectation that
you can be commanding some of the person to do what you want spoke Wednesday anthropologist
Alan Fiske there are only three major human relationship types of across the world's cultures he describes
the distinct way of distributing resources he has a distinct evolutionary basis and it applies to
most that lead to certain people that can be extended to negotiations to others that's what
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language dominance as I mentioned his logic is don't mess with me and which presumably we
inherited from the dominance hierarchies that are ubiquitous among primates very different from that is
communality
the melody the ethos share and share alike which I am evolved by different root weekend
kin selection mutualism is it therefore is extended by default you kin I've to spouses and among
close friends finally there's reciprocity you scratch my back I'll scratch yours which pertains to the
business like tit for tat exchange of goods and services that characterizes reciprocal altruism behavior did
with acceptable of the blue one relationship type can be anonymous in another for example at
a drinks party you might go over to your husband or wife or boyfriend and girlfriend
and help yourself to a prawn off their plates but you wouldn't want your boss and help yourself
to be on a prawn because what you can get away with it communality in our relationship
you can't get away with the dominance relationship likewise at the end of the dinner party
if you pulled the out wallet and offered to pay the host for the dinner I
would not be perceived as fair that would be perceived as crass because of the clash
between reciprocity which he does well with the appropriate say the restaurant and communality which is
what we deem appropriate I'm among friends those cases where everyone knows what's appropriate but in
cases where the two sides are sure that there are the same wavelength the divergent understanding
can lead to an unpleasant emotions I'm the one that we call awkwardness for example they
can be awkward moments in a workplace when a an employee cousin or a student doesn't
know whether to address a supervisor I by first name invite them by tonight after work for
a beer because of the ambiguity as to whether the relationship is covered by dominance or friendship
it's well known well known bit of wisdom that good friends did not engage in a
major business transaction like one of them sell his car to the other the very act
of negotiating a price can put a strain on the friendship because what's appropriate in reciprocity
to the relationship is not appropriate in a communality relationship contrast between the dominance of sex
as Lana the supervisor solicit sex from an employee defines the battleground of sexual harassment even
the two claims of communal relationship of friendship and sex I'd give rise to the anxieties
dating oh one remaining problem which is why we resort to the indirectness even when there
is no way you'll uncertainty example in the listener knows the speakers and intent have people
aren't naive it's hard to believe that any grown woman could be fooled by that point
about the etchings nonetheless there is something that is more comfortable about asking ITC etchings then
asking for sex so what is going on don't be deniability is not really plausible why
should the obvious innuendo still feel more comfortable in that direction overture that is in substance
on the record to illustrate the problem without a scene from the romantic comedy when Harry
met Sally wherein you really see the movie how he makes a remark that Sally interpretes
as sexual and she accuses enough I hear coming on to me he says what wanted
to buy a ticket back ok I take it back you can't take it back when
not because it's already on their faces old jeans when we supposed to call the cops
it's already out there well what is the psychological stress of the overture that we feel
to be out there to know more on the record that makes it feel so much more
awkward than veiled which this conveyed indirectly I think the key to this paradox is the
concept of economists and magicians called mutual knowledge was a distinguished from individual knowledge in
individual
knowledge A knows X B knows X in mutual knowledge A knows X B knows X
A knows that B knows X to B knows that A knows X A knows that B
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knows that A knows X I ad infinitum and this is a difference the house for family consequences
for example why his freedom of assembly point is the fundamental rights and democracy and while
political revolutions often triggered when a crowd gathers to the public square to challenge the president's
Palace because when people were called out everyone knew that they loathed the eye dictator but
no one knew that other people that they knew out once you assemble in a place
where everyone can see everyone else everyone knows everyone else knows everyone else knows that the
dictator is loathed and that gives them the collective power to challenge the authority of the
dictator who otherwise could pick off center is one of the time another example is that
the Emperor's new clothes is a story about a mutual knowledge with a little boy said
the emperor is naked he wasn't telling anyone anything that they didn't already know any new
couldn't see with their own eye balls he was nonetheless changing the state of their knowledge because the
moment everyone now knew it everyone else knew it everyone else once again but gave them
the collective power to challenge the dominance of the Emperor speaking at their outlet for the
moral of this story is the explicit language is an excellent way of creating mutual knowledge
so here's the hypothesis the innuendos even obvious ones he provides the divisional knowledge was direct
speech provides mutual knowledge and relationships are maintained and nullified by mutual knowledge of the
relationship
type so if Harry were him I would say would like to come up to see
my etchings Sally says no then so he knows that she's turned down an overture how
he knows the keys to the sexual overture picture Sally know that Harry knows she can
be I'm thinking maybe how he could sign naive and is carrying out that Sally knows
that he knows he could be wondering be the Sally against this bill mutual knowledge they
can maintain the fiction of friendship where's that I would say would like to come up
and have sex and Sally turns him down now how he knows that Sally knows that I
know it's only knows he cannot maintain the fiction of a friendship and I think this
is the basis for our intuition that with overt language you can take it back it's
out there
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