8 famous scientists' quotes about language and culture
Language has always been the subject of interest for many scientists from different fields, including physics, linguistics, anthropology, programming, and educators. Famous personalities have spoken about how culture transmits knowledge and how crucial this is for the evolution of the human race.
The list below includes some famous quotes about language from famous personalities such as Albert Einstein, Noam Chomsky, Maria Montessori, Charles Darwin, and others.
So, without further ado, here is a list of famous quotes about language:
Albert Einstein about language and science
“Most of the fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple, and may, as a rule, be expressed in a language comprehensible to everyone”.
On top of this list, we have one of the greatest scientists that ever lived: German theoretical physicist Albert Einstein was born on March 14, 1879, and died on April 18, 1955. He developed theories on Quantum Mechanics and general relativity, and he received the Nobel Prize in Physics for his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect.
Einstein was well aware of the importance of his work, and he strongly believed that everyone should have access to scientific knowledge. He believed that even though many of his ideas were quite complex, they had an impact on everyday life and that they should be explained to people in a language that everyone understands.
Maria Montessori about language and education
“The only language men ever speak perfectly is the one they learn in babyhood, when no one can teach them anything!”
Maria Tecla Artemisia Montessori (August 31, 1870 — May 6, 1952) was an Italian physician and educator. She is best known for her role in scientific pedagogy, having developed the Montessori education philosophy, which considers that all children are capable of learning when being provided with the proper and supportive environment.
Montessori knew perfectly that language was one of the first main tools that children learn how to use. As part of this, her approach includes teaching early literacy through a phonics approach embedded in a rich language context.
Noam Chomsky about language and creation
“Language is a process of free creation; its laws and principles are fixed, but the manner in which the principles of generation are used is free and infinitely varied. Even the interpretation and use of words involves a process of free creation”.
- From Noam Chomsky (2003). “For Reasons Of State”, p.402, Penguin Books India
American linguist and philosopher Noam Chomsky was born on December 7, 1928. A well-known anti-war activist and social critic, his theories on universal grammar and transformational-generative grammar are highly regarded.
As a Linguist, Chomsky is very interested in the way that language is learned and how its creative force grows not only in individuals but in society as a whole. He acknowledges language as a diverse and powerful force. Especially since the mid-’50s, his works on transformational-generative grammar aimed to show the abstract structures of a specific language as they may relate to structures in other languages.
Claude Levi-Strauss about language
“Language is a form of human reason, which has its internal logic of which man knows nothing”.
French anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss was born on November 28, 1908, and died on October 30, 2009. His best know works include Tristes Tropiques (Sad Tropics) and Anthropologie Structurale Deux (Structural Anthropology). For many of his research projects, he followed the principle of participatory interaction with subjects to gain a full understanding of a culture.
As a scientist, Levi-Strauss was very interested in the diversity of culture’s myths and also in how language works. Being an anthropologist from the structuralist school of thought, he based his works on Phonemic analysis. He theorized that the entire sound structure of a language may be generated from a relatively small number of rules.
Bertrand Russell about language and the human mind
“Language serves not only to express thought but to make possible thoughts which could not exist without it”.
Bertrand Arthur William Russell was a British polymath, who was born on May 18, 1872, and died on February 2, 1970. He was known for his proficiency in a wide variety of scientific fields, such as mathematics, logic, linguistics, artificial intelligence, cognitive science, and computer science.
An anti-war activist, Bertrand Russell asked himself the question “how do we use language?”, and made this a central piece of philosophy. His views on the Philosophy of language were highly influential for a vast number of philosophers, such as Ludwig Wittgenstein, David Kaplan, Karl Popper, and John Searle.
Charles Darwin about language and biology
“A language, like a species, when extinct, never… reappears”.
Well known for his work on evolution theory, English biologist Charles Robert Darwin was born on February 12, 1809, and died on April 19, 1882. His most famous book On the Origin of Species had a significant impact on the scientific community and the way we conceive the human species and its many cultures.
Charles Darwin was very interested in how living beings adapt and how they interact with the ecosystem and surroundings. “To survive is to be able to adapt”. But also, he was aware that the importance of preserving endangered languages and cultures, as they are key to understanding our future.
Edward Sapir about language and society
“No two languages are ever sufficiently similar to be considered as representing the same social reality.”
American anthropologist and linguist Edward Sapir was born on January 26, 1884, and died on February 4, 1939. He was the first to prove that the methods of comparative linguistics were also valid when applied to indigenous languages.
Sapir dedicated his life to studying language and cultural diversity and his work is fundamental to the development of linguistics in the United States. He was a professor at Yale University, where he became the head of the Department of Anthropology during the last years of his life.
Grace Hopper about how important language is
“The most dangerous phrase in the language is, “We’ve always done it this way.”
Computer programmer pioneer Grace Hopper was born on December 9, 1906, and passed away on January 1, 1992. She helped develop some of the earliest electromechanical computers and she is also credited with inventing the computational term “bug” when she found a dead moth was causing the computer to malfunction.
Hopper certainly had an accurate view of the future: she frequently talked about how information and knowledge were to become more valuable than the hardware that processes them. Also, she spoke on several occasions about the increasing amounts of information available and how people were going to need new and better ways to make sense of it.
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So these were some inspirational quotes about language by some of the most famous scientists in the world. As you have read, they were all well aware of the importance of transmitting knowledge and connecting with the rest of the community. After all, sharing knowledge is power :)
Photo credits:
- Albert Einstein: photograph by Orren Jack Turner
- María Montessori: from Nationaal Archief 119–0489
- Noam Chomsky: photograph by Marcello Casal Jr/ABr
- Grace Hopper: photograph by James S. Davis, US Navy
- Charles Darwin: unknown
- Photo by Michel Ravassard / UNESCO