Excellent reply. I cheaply agree-voted but am not agree-voting in a costly manner because that would require me backing up my cosmopolitan values by learning a language.
Skeptical that language learning is actually the most pivotal part of learning about wild (to you) perspectives, but it’s not obviously wrong.
Thank you! I don’t think it’s necessarily the most pivotal [1] but it is one part that has recently begun having its barrier of entry lowered [2]. Additionally, while reading broadly [3]could also help, the reason why language-learning looks so good in my eyes is because of the stones-to-birds ratio.
If you read very broadly and travel a lot, you may gain more “learning about wild(to you) perspective” benefits. But if you learn a language [4]you are:
1) benefitting your brain,
2) increasing the amount of people in the world you can talk to, and whose work you can learn from,
3) absorb new ideas you may not have otherwise been able to absorb,
You can separately do things that will fulfill all four of those things (and even fulfill some of the other benefits that language learning can provide for you) without learning another language. But I am very bad at executive skills, and juggling 4+ different habits, so I generally don’t find the idea of say…
doing 2 crosswords, 2 4x4x4 sudoku a day, and other brain teasers +
taking dance classes or learning a new instrument +
taking communications classes and reading books about public speaking and active listening +
engaging in comparative-translation reading +
ingratiating myself to radically different communities in order to cultivate those modes of thought [6]
...to be less onerous than learning a new language. Especially since language-learning can help and be done concurrently with these alternatives [7].
Language learning is also something that can help with community bonding, which would probably be helpful to the substantial-seeming portion of EAs who are kind of lonely and depressed. It can also help you remember what it is like to suck at something, which I think a lot of people in Rationalist spaces would benefit from more broadly, since so many of them were gifted kids who now have anxiety, and becoming comfortable with failure and iteration is also good for you and your ability to do things in general.
I find that personally, I am more socially conservative in Spanish and more progressive in English, which has allowed me to test ideas against my own brain in a way that most monolinguals I talk to seem to find somewhat alien and much more effortful. Conversely, in French, I am not very capable, and I find that quite useful because it allows me to force myself to simplify my ideas on the grounds that I am literally unable to express the complex version.
Music terminology is often in French or Italian, learning languages will just broaden your vocabulary for crossword puzzles, knowing another language is a gateway to communities that were previously closed to you, and you can engage in reading different translations of something more easily if you can also just read it in the original language.
Excellent reply. I cheaply agree-voted but am not agree-voting in a costly manner because that would require me backing up my cosmopolitan values by learning a language.
Skeptical that language learning is actually the most pivotal part of learning about wild (to you) perspectives, but it’s not obviously wrong.
Thank you! I don’t think it’s necessarily the most pivotal [1] but it is one part that has recently begun having its barrier of entry lowered [2]. Additionally, while reading broadly [3]could also help, the reason why language-learning looks so good in my eyes is because of the stones-to-birds ratio.
If you read very broadly and travel a lot, you may gain more “learning about wild(to you) perspective” benefits. But if you learn a language [4]you are:
1) benefitting your brain,
2) increasing the amount of people in the world you can talk to, and whose work you can learn from,
3) absorb new ideas you may not have otherwise been able to absorb,
4) acquire new intuitions [5].
You can separately do things that will fulfill all four of those things (and even fulfill some of the other benefits that language learning can provide for you) without learning another language. But I am very bad at executive skills, and juggling 4+ different habits, so I generally don’t find the idea of say…
doing 2 crosswords, 2 4x4x4 sudoku a day, and other brain teasers +
taking dance classes or learning a new instrument +
taking communications classes and reading books about public speaking and active listening +
engaging in comparative-translation reading +
ingratiating myself to radically different communities in order to cultivate those modes of thought [6]
...to be less onerous than learning a new language. Especially since language-learning can help and be done concurrently with these alternatives [7].
Language learning is also something that can help with community bonding, which would probably be helpful to the substantial-seeming portion of EAs who are kind of lonely and depressed. It can also help you remember what it is like to suck at something, which I think a lot of people in Rationalist spaces would benefit from more broadly, since so many of them were gifted kids who now have anxiety, and becoming comfortable with failure and iteration is also good for you and your ability to do things in general.
Travelling broadly will probably provide better results to most people, but it also costs a lot of money, even more if you need to hire a translator.
Especially with Duolingo offering endangered languages now.
Say, reading a national award-winning book from every nation in the world.
Or, preferrably, if you learn 2, given that the greatest benefits are found in trilinguals+.
I find that personally, I am more socially conservative in Spanish and more progressive in English, which has allowed me to test ideas against my own brain in a way that most monolinguals I talk to seem to find somewhat alien and much more effortful. Conversely, in French, I am not very capable, and I find that quite useful because it allows me to force myself to simplify my ideas on the grounds that I am literally unable to express the complex version.
+ [whatever else I haven’t thought of yet that would help obtain these benefits]
Music terminology is often in French or Italian, learning languages will just broaden your vocabulary for crossword puzzles, knowing another language is a gateway to communities that were previously closed to you, and you can engage in reading different translations of something more easily if you can also just read it in the original language.