Language Game Quotes

Contractions, 'U' for 'you' and the like are wonderful to make communication brief and efficient - but we wouldn't want all our talk to be only brief and efficient. Taking pauses out of language would be like taking the net away from a tennis game. Where would all the fun go? ~ Pico Iyer

These rules, the sign language and grammar of the Game, constitute a kind of highly developed secret language drawing upon several sciences and arts, but especially mathematics and music (and/or musicology), and capable of expressing and establishing interrelationships between the content and conclusions of nearly all scholarly disciplines. The Glass Bead Game is thus a mode of playing with the total contents and values of our culture; it plays with them as, say, in the great age of the arts a painter might have played with the colours on his palette. ~ Hermann Hesse

Rationality is a matter of making allowed moves within language games. Imagination creates the games that reason proceeds to play. Then, exemplified by people such as Plato and Newton, it keeps modifying those games so that playing them is more interesting and profitable.

Reason cannot get outside of the latest circle that imagination has drawn. It is in this sense, and only in this sense, that imagination holds the primacy. ~ Richard M. Rorty

Here the term 'language-game' is meant to bring into prominence the fact that the speaking of language is part of an activity, of a form of life. ~ Ludwig Wittgenstein

project sought to establish a language that would enable the world to be comprehended in its totality. The name of this system of significations varied with context: sometimes it was called Reason, sometimes History, sometimes Science - but I prefer to call it Westernese. For this language game arose from extrapolating a very specific reading of the West and projecting it into the future as the destiny of the planet. ~ Salman Sayyid

When philosophers use a word
"knowledge," "being," "object," "I," "proposition," "name"
and try to grasp the essence of the thing, one must always ask oneself: is the word ever actually used in this way in the language-game which is its original home?
What we do is to bring words back from their metaphysical to their everyday use. ~ Ludwig Wittgenstein

To understand the real meaning of what others want to say to us, we must understand which 'language game' they are playing. ~ Prem Jagyasi

Āryāvalo kitesvaro bodhisattvo gambhīrām prajñāpāra mitācaryām caramāno... That was close!! I almost opened my hands! ~ Keiichi Arawi

Sadness and grief aren't the same thing. It's why they have different words. Maybe it's a subtle distinction, but we don't keep a word in a language if it doesn't still have a purpose of its own. Synonyms are never exact things. ~ Dot Hutchison

In this age of instant communication, emoticons are replacing words, body language replacing language and visuals replacing text. ~ Haresh Sippy

It's like the man is an open book but whatever his story is just happens to be written in a different language. ~ J.M. Darhower

I've worked with a lot of really fine actors, both on stage and on screen. The level of their game lifts me up and brings the level of my game up to theirs. Always. It's like a constant upgrade. ~ Gary Sinise

It is said that when you miss someone ... then love will come when you meet again ... Just like the game of hide and seek, no matter where it hides or even if you can't see it ... He must be there waiting somewhere for me ... Amid the countless chaos ... Just like the sincerest prayers ... two people in love will surely meet again ... ~ Oh Eun-young

My plays are made up of long monologues, which is similar to prose working with the language. ~ Elfriede Jelinek

An ardent supporter of the hometown team should go to a game prepared to take offense, no matter what happens. ~ Robert Benchley

When you knock people out, it's sometimes a very scary situation - but I always hoped that no one got seriously hurt. Now when I see them get knocked out, I laugh. When you finish the game, it's funny. And when I look at film of myself, I think, 'I wouldn't fight that guy.' ~ Marvin Hagler

Faction is the greatest evil and the most common danger. "Faction" is the conventional English translation of the Greek stasis, one of the most remarkable words to be found in any language. ~ Moses Finley

We teach brilliance bias to children from an early age. A recent US study found that when girls start primary school at the age of five, they are as likely as five-year-old boys to think women could be 'really really smart'. But by the time they turn six, something changes. They start doubting their gender. So much so, in fact, that they start limiting themselves: if a game is presented to them as intended for 'children who are really, really smart', five-year-old girls are as likely to want to play it as boys - but six-year-old girls are suddenly uninterested. Schools are teaching little girls that brilliance doesn't belong to them. No wonder that by the time they're filling out university evaluation forms, students are primed to see their female teachers as less qualified. ~ Caroline Criado Perez

But we enjoyed playing games and were punished for them by men who played games themselves. However, grown-up games are known as 'business' and even though boys' games are much the same, they are punished for them by their elders. No one pities either the boys or the men, though surely we deserve pity, for I cannot believe that a good judge would approve of the beatings I received as a boy on the ground that my games delayed my progress in studying subjects which would enable me to play a less creditable game later in life. ~ Saint Augustine

Astronomy is not the science of all objects with mass and weight and velocity. The objects it describes do not include '56 Chevies. Biology is not the science of all objects that consume and excrete and have inherited characteristics. The objects it describes do not include '56 Chevies. Linguistics is not the study of all possible symbols or symbol systems. The objects it describes do not include '56 Chevies. ~ Randy Allen Harris

Perhaps that's why they had been so happy to learn a new tongue in the first place : the self consciousness of it, the effort of it, the grammar of it, pulled you up; a new language provided distance and kept the heart intact. ~ Kiran Desai

Like music and art, love of nature is a common language that can transcend political or social boundaries. ~ Jimmy Carter

You have to lose yourself in the team and you have to lose yourself in the game ~ John Calipari

That's what it was supposed to be, but then we started meeting up for morning workouts, which led to a joint trip to the GNC, and then we discovered we both play chess, which led to inviting him over for a game night, and then I quoted Mallrats but he didn't get it, which led to a movie enlightenment mission and several movie-at-home nights…" I trail off, leaving the "etcetera etcetera" unspoken. Huffing out an exasperated sigh, I explain, "The more we hung out together, the more couple-y we got, and before I knew it we were buying extra toothbrushes to keep at our apartments and doing silly shit like giving each other keys. Add in the most amazing porn star sex ever, and it's apparently enough for me to want to have his puppy."

"You mean baby."

"God, no. You know better than that. I'm not the nurturing type."

"Yeah, well, you also used to say you weren't the falling in love type, either."

I narrow my eyes at her. "No one likes a wise-ass, Janey."

"Maybe not, but sometimes a hard-ass like you needs a wise-ass like me. ~ Gina L. Maxwell

Whenever you pray, make sure you do it at school assemblies and football games, like the demonstrative creatures who pray before large television audiences. That is the real goal of the thing. But do not, I urge you, pray all alone in your home where no one can see. That does not get you ratings. ~ Garry Wills

Graphics experts led by computer scientists at Harvard have created an add-on software tool that translates video game characters - or any other three-dimensional animations - into fully articulated action figures, with the help of a 3D printer. ~ Anonymous

Between two throw-ins in a soccer game, right behind my back, three thousand people had been put to death. ~ Tadeusz Borowski

I'm very lucky to be at this level and it is very hard to catch up. It is all about holding on and it is very important to learn from the other drivers. I tend to put a lot of pressure on myself, wanting to be very good very quickly, which forces me to up my game. ~ Liz Halliday

Defense usually doesn't make many headlines, but it goes a long way towards winning baseball games. There are a number of ways to make an impact during the course of a game, and playing solid, sound defense is one of them. ~ Derek Jeter

To invoke a Kierkegaardesque figure of speech, the beauty of the language of the Bible can be like a set of dentist's instruments nearly laid out on a table and hanging on a wall, intriguing in their technological complexity and with their stainless steel highly polished
until they set to work on the job for which they were originally designed. Then all of a sudden my reaction changes from "How shiny and beautiful they all are!" to "Get that damned thing out of my mouth! ~ Jaroslav Pelikan

We didn't want to dilute or soften the material because that would really be irresponsible, in its own way. The [Hunger Games] books are very intense and very demanding of the reader, and the movie should be that too. ~ Nina Jacobson

This therefore is the praise of Shakespeare, that his drama is the mirrour of life; that he who has mazed his imagination, in following the phantoms which other writers raise up before him, may here be cured of his delirious extasies, by reading human sentiments in human language; by scenes from which a hermit may estimate the transactions of the world, and a confessor predict the progress of the passions. ~ Samuel Johnson

You can go super American and get barbecue and beer and be like, 'Whatever, I'm watching a football game.' That's exactly what I'm going to do. ~ Emily Ratajkowski

Paul Scholes is the best player I've ever played with. There's talent in every part of his game. ~ Gary Neville

You know, I'll tell you, nothing changed after 'No Strings' for me. A lot of people said, like, 'Your game will be different,' but it wasn't. It really wasn't. ~ Jake Johnson

I try not to write more than two or three, I try to just write one if possible, I write till the end at least a draft of a play or a novel; but sometimes, I'll take a break for a couple weeks for a project that is paying me money like a television project which I try to stay away from just to stay financially ahead of the game. ~ Adam Rapp

There are other reasons we use math in physics. Besides keeping us honest, math is also the most economical and unambiguous terminology that we know of. Language is malleable; it depends on context and interpretation. But math doesn't care about culture or history. If a thousand people read a book, they read a thousand different books. But if a thousand people read an equation, they read the same equation. ~ Sabine Hossenfelder

I've always felt, even as a songwriter, that the rhythm of speech is in itself a language for me. ~ Cyndi Lauper

Just the usual formality before the chaos begins. Like playing the National Anthem before a Cubs game. ~ Berkeley Breathed

I do not say 'good-bye.' i believe that's one of the bullshittiest words ever invented. it's not like you're given the choice to say 'bad-bye' or 'awful-bye' or 'couldn't-care-less-about-you-bye.' every time you leave, it's supposed to be a good one. well, i don't believe in that. i believe against that. ~ David Levithan

Science is like a love affair with nature; an elusive, tantalising mistress. It has all the turbulence, twists and turns of romantic love, but that's part of the game. ~ Vilayanur S. Ramachandran

There are faces which charge with a meaning and pathos not belonging to the single human soul that flutters beneath them, but speaking the joys and sorrows of foregone generations -- eyes that tell of deep love which doubtless has been and is somewhere, but not paired with these eyes -- perhaps paired with pale eyes that can say nothing; just as a national language may be instinct with poetry unfelt by the lips that use it. ~ George Eliot

I have failed many times, but I have never gone into a game expecting myself to fail. ~ Michael Jordan

Accept loss forever Be submissive to everything, open, listening No fear or shame in the dignity of your experience, language, and knowledge Be in love with your life ~ Natalie Goldberg

I'm Sorry are two of the most powerful words in our language, especially when they are not flipped blithely over the shoulder but spoken from the heart. They help restore order, balance, harmony. They reduce pain. They heal broken friendship. If they were medecine, they'd be called a miracle. ~ Jerry Spinelli

I went to school for marketing and advertising, so I have a special interest in good and funny commercials and why they work and why they're funny - which is one of the reasons I, like many people, like watching the Super Bowl, besides the game. ~ Kevin Nealon

And power is a game of smoke and mirrors,' said her ladyship, reaching for the wine. 'Oddly enough, Commander Vimes reminds me of that nearly every day. No civil police force could hold out against an irate and resolute population. The trick is not to let them realize that. Yes? ~ Terry Pratchett

It is one thing to be a man's wife - quite another to be the mother of his children. In fact, once you become a mother, being a wife seems like a game you once played or a self-help book you were overly impressed with as a teenager that on second reading is puffy with common ideas. This was one of the many things I had learned since crossing over into the middle place - that sliver of time when childhood and parenthood overlap. ~ Kelly Corrigan

Non-violence means dialogue, using our language, the human language. Dialogue means compromise; respecting each other's rights; in the spirit of reconciliation there is a real solution to conflict and disagreement. There is no hundred percent winner, no hundred percent loser - not that way but half-and-half. That is the practical way, the only way. ~ Dalai Lama XIV

It hardly needs explaining at length, I think, how much authority or beauty is added to style by the timely use of proverbs. In the first place who does not see what dignity they confer on style by their antiquity alone? ... And so to interweave adages deftly and appropriately is to make the language as a whole glitter with sparkles from Antiquity, please us with the colours of the art of rhetoric, gleam with jewel-like words of wisdom, and charm us with titbits of wit and humour. ~ Desiderius Erasmus

Man feels the urge to run up against the limits of language. Think for example of the astonishment that anything at all exists. This astonishment cannot be expressed in the form of a question, and there is also no answer whatsoever. Anything we might say is a priori bound to be nonsense. Nevertheless we do run up against the limits of language. Kierkegaard too saw that there is this running up against something, and he referred to it in a fairly similar way (as running up against paradox). This running up against the limits of language is ethics. ~ Ludwig Wittgenstein

Up and down' is Irish for anything at all
from crying into the dishes to full-blown psychosis. Though, now that I think about, a psychotic is more usually 'not quite herself'. ~ Anne Enright

Language is properly the servant of thought, but not unfrequently becomes its master. The conceptions of a feeble writer are greatly modified by his style; a man of vigorous powers makes his style bend to his conceptions. ~ William Benton Clulow

In this country, people buy T-shirts extolling their survival skills after snowstorms and heat waves. I used to get angry about this behavior, which I considered to be a childish display of false endurance. How can a country be so weak to think that a little snow or a little spike in a thermometer is actual hardship? But now … I'm almost pleased to see these T-shirts appear every few years. Now they indicate to me that this country is so secure and wealthy that actual hardship for many is almost impossible. These celebrations of minor calamities are in essence a signal that the people of this country feel so safe that they've turned survival into a silly game. Unfortunately, most nations are not like the United States. Danger is real for almost everyone most anywhere else. ~ Stuart Rojstaczer

Woman, in the picture language of mythology, represents the totality of what can be known. The hero is the one who comes to know ... And if he can match her import, the two, the knower and the known, will be released from every limitation ... The hero who can take her as she is, without undue commotion but with the kindness and assurance she requires, is potentially the king, the incarnate god, of her created world. ~ Joseph Campbell

Just like every show has a tone, every show has different people on it playing different games. I don't say 'game' in a pejorative sense, I just mean, these are different stories that we tell ourselves when we go to work. ~ David Duchovny

Normally leaving one's country is a grave step: it involves leaving the society and culture in which we have been raised,, the society and culture whose language we use in speech and thought to express and understand ourselves, our aims, goals and values; the society and culture, customs, and conventions we depend on to find our place in the social world. In large part, we affirm our society and culture, and have an intimate and inexpressible knowledge of it, even though much of it we may question, if not reject. The government's authority cannot, then be freely accepted in the sense that the bonds of society and culture, of history and social place of origin, begin so early to shape our life and are normally so strong that the right of emigration does not suffice to make accepting its authority free, politically speaking, in the way that liberty of conscience suffices to make accepting ecclesiastical authority free. ~ John Rawls