Yahoo Tuning Groups Ultimate Backup tuning different languages (was: 12-equal Vs. Just tuning)

hi Daniel,

Jon did a pretty thorough job of giving the kind
of response i was going to give about your statements
regarding music as a "universal language". but i
still had to comment on this ...

> From: <soundburst@lycos.com>
> To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Tuesday, December 17, 2002 11:54 AM
> Subject: [tuning] Re: 12-equal Vs. Just tuning
>

> Hi Jon,
>
> ...
>
> >> I do only speak English - having seen no real need
> >> (as yet) to learn another language. May I enquire
> >> as to why you asked? :)
>
> > Absolutely. You are approaching music in the same
> > way as language: you see no need for anything else.
> > In doing so, you are making a critical error, one that
> > I attribute to youth, inexperience, hubris, or simple
> > human nature - one size does not fit all.
> > There are centuries of writings in other languages that
> > were written by authors speaking their native tongue.
> > And there are endless pieces of prose and poetry
> > that [would lose] all their charm, passion, anger,
> > intent, thrust if translated into another language
> > (such as English). If you haven't travelled to
> > 'foreign lands', then you haven't experiences -
> > first hand - the reality of "it must lose something
> > in the translation".
>
> I readily admit to certain aspects in other languages
> being preferable to English. What one appreciates in
> each language is all the different tones and forms of
> expression. Even the subtleties in the pronounciation
> of words are obviously more than just trivial.

the point is: it's not a matter of something being
*preferable* in any particular language, it's that one
particular language *may not even be able to express
a concept* which is expressible in a different language.

if you decide to study French, Spanish, German, or
Russian as a foreign language, you still may not get
so much of a sense of this, because those are all
Indo-European languages which are closely or distantly
related to English.

but try grasping how Arabic, Japanese, Swahili, or
Navajo work, and you'll begin to understand what i'm saying.

each language family (which may contain anywhere from one
individual to several thousand different languages) has
its own particular way of comprehending and describing the
universe. any two of them may have so little in common
that learning a new one which is vastly different from
the one you already know may entail a comprehensive
retooling of your entire thought process.

to give one example: the Indo-European language family
(and probably several others) quantizes the visible color
spectrum into 7 basic categories ordered along a continuum:
red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet. of
course there are lots of adjectives which describe the
colors which fall in between these, but those are the
basic ones. in contrast, there is a Native American language
of the northwest USA (i forget which language it is) which
breaks the entire spectrum of colors down into only 3
categories, roughly analogous to red-orange, yellow-green,
and blue-indigo-violet. that is a fundamentally different
way of perceiving the universe, something that goes way
beyond "forms of expression".

i'm pretty sure that getting you to understand this is
what Jon was getting at. (Jon, correct me if i'm wrong!)

-monz

🔗Gene Ward Smith <genewardsmith@juno.com> <genewardsmith@juno.com>

🔗wallyesterpaulrus <wallyesterpaulrus@yahoo.com> <wallyesterpaulrus@yahoo.com>

thanks gabor, for throwing a little "sense" into this discussion :)

now back to music -- and no, i don't think daniel white is ever going
to try composing microtonal music, he just wants to ignore history
and geography and prove that . . . well, see his website . . . so
with all due respect, it may be time for him to leave . . .

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "alternativetuning
<alternativetuning@y...>" <alternativetuning@y...> wrote:
> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "monz" <monz@a...> wrote:
>
> > to give one example: the Indo-European language family
> > (and probably several others) quantizes the visible color
> > spectrum into 7 basic categories ordered along a continuum:
> > red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet.
>
> This is not true. Please let us know the Attic Greek words for blue
> and green.
>
>
> of
> > course there are lots of adjectives which describe the
> > colors which fall in between these, but those are the
> > basic ones.
>
> There are no such basic sets. Colors are adjectives, no matter how
> many words they are composed of, and any distinction between colors
> can be communicated in any language, if there is a need to do so.
The
> limitations you are thinking of are cultural not linguistic.
>
> in contrast, there is a Native American language
> > of the northwest USA (i forget which language it is) which
> > breaks the entire spectrum of colors down into only 3
> > categories, roughly analogous to red-orange, yellow-green,
> > and blue-indigo-violet. that is a fundamentally different
> > way of perceiving the universe, something that goes way
> > beyond "forms of expression".
> >
>
> This is the eskimo-words-for-snow fallacy. Every Colorado skier
knows
> many words for snow (snow, slush, powder, etc.), even Hungarian
> skiers have many words for snow, But English or Hungarian speakers
who
> live in the desert and never go skiing will be satified with one
word.
> Does that Native American see colors differently from English
> speakers? No. Can he see a difference between yellow and green. Yes.
> Can he communicate in words a difference between yellow and green.
Yes.
>
> Gabor B.

🔗monz <monz@attglobal.net>

hi Gene,

> From: <genewardsmith@juno.com>
> To: <tuning@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Wednesday, December 18, 2002 1:44 AM
> Subject: [tuning] Re: different languages (was: 12-equal Vs. Just tuning)
>
>
> --- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "monz" <monz@a...> wrote:
>
> > to give one example: the Indo-European language family
> > (and probably several others) quantizes the visible color
> > spectrum into 7 basic categories ordered along a continuum:
> > red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet.
>
> That's not a part of language, that is simply Newton's way
> of describing the spectrum, which he based, believe it or not,
> in part on music. The idea being of course that light should
> be analogous to sound and the spectrum to the diatonic scale.

hmmm ... thanks, didn't know about that. Newton, AFAIK, was
also the first person to suggest using "Semitones" the same way
i do: a quantization utilizing the 12edo degree before the
decimal point. one of these days i'm going to delve deeper
into a study of Newton's musical writings.

anyway, what you say still doesn't negate the point i was
making: Indo-European languages have a wide variety of words
to describe color, whereas some other languages don't ... the
main point being that different languages conceptualize the
universe in very different ways.

-monz

🔗Jon Szanto <JSZANTO@ADNC.COM> <JSZANTO@ADNC.COM>

Paul,

--- In tuning@yahoogroups.com, "wallyesterpaulrus <wallyesterpaulrus@y...>" <wallyesterpaulrus@y...> wrote:
> thanks gabor, for throwing a little "sense" into this discussion :)

Um, huh?

> now back to music -- and no, i don't think daniel white is ever
> going to try composing microtonal music, he just wants to ignore
> history and geography and prove that . . . well, see his website .
> . . so with all due respect, it may be time for him to leave . . .

Hey Paul, that's not only harsh but it's unlike you! You did see Daniel's age, and therefore must know that we *all* develop as the years go by. I'd just ask Daniel to take a little bit more of the advice from the list and go check some things out, and also realize that his arguements haven't swayed anybody so he has to dig deeper to check the validity of his beliefs.

But showing him the door? C'mon...

Cheers,
Jon

🔗Gene Ward Smith <genewardsmith@juno.com> <genewardsmith@juno.com>

🔗Daniel White <soundburst@lycos.com> <soundburst@lycos.com>

🔗gdsecor <gdsecor@yahoo.com> <gdsecor@yahoo.com>

Any particular language (either verbal or musical) is an expression
or reflection of the culture from which it arose. Of course it is
possible that distinctions between colors (for example) *can* be
communicated in one way or another, but more to the point is whether
a culture values a particular aesthetic. If so, it is inevitable
that it would have in its language those particular words or musical
devices (including intervals) that would be necessary to *readily and
clearly* communicate those fine shades of meaning or emotion that are
a part of that aesthetic.

> in contrast, there is a Native American language
> > of the northwest USA (i forget which language it is) which
> > breaks the entire spectrum of colors down into only 3
> > categories, roughly analogous to red-orange, yellow-green,
> > and blue-indigo-violet. that is a fundamentally different
> > way of perceiving the universe, something that goes way
> > beyond "forms of expression".
> >
>
> This is the eskimo-words-for-snow fallacy. Every Colorado skier
knows
> many words for snow (snow, slush, powder, etc.), even Hungarian
> skiers have many words for snow, But English or Hungarian speakers
who
> live in the desert and never go skiing will be satified with one
word.
> Does that Native American see colors differently from English
> speakers? No. Can he see a difference between yellow and green. Yes.
> Can he communicate in words a difference between yellow and green.
Yes.

But how many different words for colors ranging from yellow to green
or green to blue do you know and understand -- or *care* to know and
understand? Yes, maybe a "simple" person can distinguish the
difference between two colors that might be labeled "turquoise"
and "aquamarine" when these are seen side by side, but if one is
ignorant of labels then the subtlety is lost when these colors are
seen separately, because no necessity has been placed on making the
distinction by that person's culture, insofar as it has had any
influence on that individual.

Now substitute 64:81 and 4:5 for turquoise and aquamarine in the
above example, and you'll get some idea how this all applies to the
situation at hand. The current musical vocabulary of our culture has
only one term, "major third," that *readily and clearly* applies,
beyond which any finer shade of meaning requires a technical
explanation. (But go someplace like India and it's a different
story.)

--George

🔗Joseph Pehrson <jpehrson@rcn.com> <jpehrson@rcn.com>

🔗Daniel White <soundburst@lycos.com> <soundburst@lycos.com>

Hi Monz,

>> I readily admit to certain aspects in other languages
>> being preferable to English. What one appreciates in
>> each language is all the different tones and forms of
>> expression. Even the subtleties in the pronounciation
>> of words are obviously more than just trivial.

>the point is: it's not a matter of something being
>*preferable* in any particular language, it's that one
>particular language *may not even be able to express
>a concept* which is expressible in a different language.

This still doesn't negate the fact that languages are good/better in
different ways. Perhaps a theoreticallly ideal language would combine
the best aspects of all languages, even if it meant that sometimes
there would be more than one way of expressing something because of
this.

>but try grasping how Arabic, Japanese, Swahili, or
>Navajo work, and you'll begin to understand what i'm saying.

Yes, I can well believe that.

>to give one example: the Indo-European language family
>(and probably several others) quantizes the visible color
>spectrum into 7 basic categories ordered along a continuum:
>red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet. of
>course there are lots of adjectives which describe the
>colors which fall in between these, but those are the
>basic ones. in contrast, there is a Native American language

As a point of interest, the absolute basic ones scientifically are
Red, Green and Blue. These are the colors that make up all others
(next 'secondary' level is cyan, magenta and yellow and all three
mixed - white). All three opposites (Yellow & Blue, Cyan and Red,
Magenta and green) make grey/white. I think it's amazing how the
emotion of any colour can't really be explained mathematically - for
example 'red' has to be 'experienced', not explained. Actually it's
one of the reasons I believe in a soul :)

Cheers,
Daniel (soundburst@lycos.com)