I've been thinking a lot on the subject of language. How do we use it and how is it interpreted in the 21st century? I was thinking specifically about the relations between emotion, logic, and how we communicate these things to others. When we express an opinion on politics, theology, ethics, etc., we may think that we are making our judgments solely on logic. In fact most of our views on ethics and the world are based on emotional foundations and that's okay. Some of the more pretentious educated types may scoff at anyone who bases their world view on emotion, but they too fall victim to the emotional foundation of logic. It's terribly important to maintain that emotional core; it is in fact the root of our humanity.
That said, these two things, emotion and logic, play an unusual role in light of the recent developments in technology. Since the dawn of the Internet we have made virtually all information in the world accessible from the comfort of our home. I do the majority of my research on the Internet. It's a great source when used correctly but can be the worst source when used incorrectly.
Since the Internet we've discovered faster more efficient ways of communicating with each other, but we have also seen a decadence rise from the wonders of technology. When we use these shorthand ways of communicating over the Internet or our cell phones we leave out the important details and the aesthetic appeal. When this void of logic or humanity occurs I think the loose soil foundation of emotions seeps into the rigid structure of logic creating a structural weakness in our whole establishment. We have a lack of factual detail and therefore fabricate uninformed, strictly emotional, details to formulate our opinions. For example: “If the terrorists from 9/11 claim to be Muslim then I don't like the religion of Islam.” We have such a lack of interest in the details or the deeper issue that we are willing to accept not just what simple-minded details we come up with in our heads but also what simple answers other people come up with.
Online social networking sites can be a detriment to the fight for well written language. Twitter, for example, limits a person to 140 characters per post. At first I thought this was wonderful. I didn't really want to hear a narrative about the latest episode of Gilmore Girls. The problem was not the length of the Gilmore Girl narrative it was actually the problem of uninteresting writing. Nobody is really interested in poorly written work long or short on, for example, what one may have had for lunch that day. Instead of fixing the problem we've decided to eliminate the use of vocabulary that expressed this awful writing. I didn't realize that I was in favor of a band aid solution to the gangrene of language. Now instead of the long description of the Gilmore Girls episode, I find myself reading one sentence descriptions of uninteresting life events. I do believe that some people are losing interest in, not just the usefulness, but the beauty of words due to the fast-paced world we live in. Even when talking I find that some people have such a short attention span that I need to speak like a Twitter post in order to make my point. I'm not claiming to be the most interesting man in the world but when I have someones undivided attention and I watch it fly away when I break into detail I cannot help but feel perplexed.
I may seem cynical but if I'm wrong correct me. As a child growing up we were too poor for the Internet or cell phones. It wasn't until later in my life that I acquired these luxuries. At the age of fifteen I was struggling to keep up with a shorthand lingo of acronyms such as, lol, lmao, omg. I was taking guitar lessons with kids who were taught shortcuts instead of sheet music. Call me an old soul if you will but I still play guitar, text on my cell phone, and use the Internet and I try to do it with conviction and my full attention. We find all these ways of saving time and then we die.
