Language Understanding Quotes

Oh child, your language is so utterly simple and limited that it has the affect of extreme complication.
-Aunt Beast ~ Madeleine L'Engle

If I had to create a god, I would lend him a "slow understanding": a kind of drip-by-drip understanding of problems. People who understand quickly frighten me. ~ Roland Barthes

Language is not the barrier, the heart is".

~R. Alan Woods [2012] ~ R. Alan Woods

Anguish is the universal language ~ Alice Fulton

They started the meeting out by saying, "Everybody please take your seats"
I was halfway back to my cubicle with mine before they stopped me ... ~ Neil Leckman

I was pretty good at picking up new languages when I was little, but it's not like I had superpowers or anything.
Kids just have an easier time with words. ~ Brian K. Vaughan

If you want to truly understand something, try to change it. ~ Kurt Lewin

Of all the languages that have existed upon the Earth, the Hebrew language is unique and extraordinary in its ability to paint vivid pictures with words that lodge within the heart conveying deep and profound Truth".

~R. Alan Woods [2012] ~ R. Alan Woods

The physicist may be satisfied when he has the mathematical scheme and knows how to use for the interpretation of the experiments. But he has to speak about his results also to non-physicists who will not be satisfied unless some explanation is given in plain language. Even for the physicist the description in plain language will be the criterion of the degree of understanding that has been reached.
Physics and Philosophy ~ Werner Heisenberg

Words are not static.Language shape our memories, and it is also shaped by our memories. ~ John Green

Heaven and earth
begin in the unnamed:
name's the mother
of the ten thousand things. ~ Ursula K. Le Guin

Computers are everywhere and you can't even begin to function with a computer unless you have comprehension and an understanding of the English language. ~ Wally Amos

Facing a language you don't know is like returning to your infancy when your mother tongue used to be a foreign language to you ~ Munia Khan

If words were nuts and bolts, people could make any bolt fit into any nut: they'd just squish the one into the other, as in some surrealistic painting where everything goes soft. Language, in human hands, becomes almost like a fluid, despite the coarse grain of its components. ~ Douglas R. Hofstadter

The greatest obstacle to international understanding is the barrier of language. ~ Christopher Dawson

One must not assume that an understanding of science is present in those who borrow the language ~ Louis Pasteur

My mission at Google is to develop natural language understanding with a team and in collaboration with other researchers at Google. ~ Ray Kurzweil

At the limit it could be said that every speaking being has a personal language of his own, that is his own particular way of thinking and feeling. Culture, at its various levels, unifies in a series of strata, to the extent that they come into contact with each other, a greater or lesser number of individuals who understand each other's mode of expression to varying degrees, etc. ~ Antonio Gramsci

She stared into his eyes and announced, "A good-bye kiss."
It was at that Raid stopped dead. "What?"
"Raiden, the gig is up," she declared, and Raid closed his eyes.
Jesus, how could the woman be so infuriating and so fucking cute all at once?
He opened his eyes and asked, "The gig is up?"
She leaned into him and hissed, "Yes."
Fuck, he wanted to kiss her.
He also wanted to shake her.
"Baby, it's jig," he corrected, and her head jerked, which made that mess of hair on her head jerk, which reminded him he wanted his hands in that hair.
Then elsewhere.
He needed to speed this shit up.
"Sorry?" she asked, sounding confused, and he looked from her hair to her eyes and saw she was, in fact, confused.
Yeah. Infuriating. And fucking cute.
"The jig is up, not the gig," he told her.
Her eyes narrowed. "Seriously? You're correcting my street lingo?"
"Think that street lingo was the street lingo about eight decades ago, Hanna. So now it's just lingo. ~ Kristen Ashley

Every other man spoke a language entirely his own, which he had figured out by private thinking; he had his own ideas and peculiar ways. If you wanted to talk about a glass of water, you had to start back with God creating the heavens and earth; the apple; Abraham; Moses and Jesus; Rome; the Middle Ages; gunpowder; the Revolution; back to Newton; up to Einstein; then war and Lenin and Hitler. After reviewing this and getting it all straight again you could proceed to talk about a glass of water. "I'm fainting, please get me a little water." You were lucky even then to make yourself understood. And this happened over and over and over with everyone you met. You had to translate and translate, explain and explain, back and forth, and it was the punishment of hell itself not to understand or be understood. ~ Saul Bellow

We all have struggle in our lives. We're all searching for personal freedom, whether we're in a bad place or trying to be true to ourselves. ~ Barbara Becker Holstein

If I program 'ware with an Anglo-Ubiq word and play it, you understand it," Scile said. "If I do the same with a word in Language, and play it to an Ariekes, I understand it, but to them it means nothing, because it's only sound, and that's not where the meaning lives. It needs a mind behind it. ~ China Mieville

Birds scream at the top of their lungs in horrified hellish rage every morning at daybreak to warn us all of the truth, but sadly we don't speak bird. ~ Kurt Cobain

So many people understand language, but few people understand the real meaning of language. They that understand the meaning of language understand language and life better! ~ Ernest Agyemang Yeboah

The essential business of language is to assert or deny facts. Given ~ Ludwig Wittgenstein

Music acts on the whole of the organism like a magic force which suppresses the understanding and irresistibly takes possession of the entire being. To insist on analysing this force is to destroy its very essence. ~ Emile Jaques-Dalcroze

Our starting-point must be the fact that God cannot be named ... no mind has yet contained or language embraced God's substance in its fullness. No, we use facts connected with Him to outline qualities that correspond with Him, collecting a faint and feeble mental image from various quarters. Our noblest theologian is not one who has discovered the whole - our earthly shackles do not permit us the whole - but one whose mental image is by comparison fuller, who has gathered in his mind a richer picture, outline, or whatever we call it, of the truth. ~ Gregory Of Nazianzus

At the end of the day, flirting is a pretty universal language. Americans are more direct. British people are more indirect about everything ~ Rachel Weisz

In trying to make the slave experience intimate, I hoped the sense of things being both under control and out of control would be persuasive throughout; that the order and quietitude of every day life would be violently disrupted by the chaos of the needy dead; that the herculean effort to forget would be threatened by memory desperate to stay alive. To render enslavement as a personal experience, language must first get out of the way. ~ Toni Morrison

In French culture, the best way of buying time or getting off the hook entirely in a thorny personal situation is to claim that it's complicated. The French did not invent love, but they did invent romance, so they've had more time than any other culture on earth to refine the nuances of its language. ~ Mark Zero

I'll never marry. No man could want me in battle, and I wouldn't want anyone who might keep me away from my duty."
"Don't be so hasty to rule out gentlemen's understanding," Magnus said. "There are some who admire a capable girl. One of them might be closer than you think, if you'd take the time to notice what's before you." He leaned closer. For a second, I didn't dare breathe. Since our moment in the library, Magnus had returned to his old, harmless flirtation. I'd half hoped it would stay that way. He sighed gently and said, "Can't you see the way Palehook looks at you?"
He laughed. I was so relieved that I joined him. ~ Jessica Cluess

Big Brother is not the only danger facing the country. Another is the rising tide of distrust, the corrosive spread of cynicism, the fraying of the social fabric and the rise of people who are so individualistic in their outlook that they have no real understanding of how to knit others together and look after the common good. ~ David Brooks

In the solitude of death, the young child or the mature adult can turn to another for comfort without feeling childish or dependent. The newly emancipated, self-sufficient young adult may have too much personal pride to allow himself to accept the support and the understanding he so desperately needs as he moves toward death. The specific emotional reaction of the newly mature young man to the prospect of personal death is RAGE. He feels that life is completely within his grasp so that death above all else is the great ravisher and destroyer. These mature young men who have worked, trained and striven to reach self-confidence and self-sufficiency now appreciate what they can do and what they can enjoy and that suddenly it will all end. They are so ready to live, to them death is a brutal, personal attack, an unforgivable insult, a totally unacceptable event. ~ Ronald J. Glasser

So what was it then exactly, this truth-telling? ... It was about being true to the very stuff of life, it was about trying to capture, though you never could, the very feel of being alive. It was about finding a language. And it was about being true to the fact, the one thing only followed from the other, that many things in life - of so many more than we think - can never be explained at all. ~ Graham Swift

We are born into a realm of constant change. Everything is decaying. We are continually losing all that we come in contact with. Our tendency to get attached to impermanent experiences causes sorrow, lamentation and grief, because eventually we are separated from everything and everyone we love. Our lack of acceptance and understanding of this fact makes life unsatisfactory. ~ Noah Levine

Each of you possesses the most powerful, dangerous and subversive trait that natural selection has ever devised. It's a piece of neural audio technology for rewiring other people's minds. I'm talking about your language. ~ Mark Pagel

Imagine (if you dare) a whimsical marriage of Lord Dunsany and S.J. Perelman, and you have something approaching the tales of Rhys Hughes, filled with gaudy colour, slapstick, puns, fantastic creatures, and the occasional unexpected chill. Hughes' world is a magical one - and his language if the most magical thing of all. ~ T.E.D. Klein

'The Rime of the Ancient Mariner' had a formative effect on me. I think it's one of those works that if you encounter it very early you're doubly enchanted by the beauty of the language and the strangeness of the vision. It stays with you. ~ Ben Okri

He then bespattered the youth with abundance of that language which passes between country gentleman who embrace opposite sides of the question; with frequent applications to him to salute that part which is generally introduced into all controversies that arise among the lower orders of the English gentry at horse-races, cock-matches, and other public places. Allusions to this part are likewise often made for the sake of jest. And here, I believe, the wit is generally misunderstood. In reality, it lies in desiring another to kiss you a-- for having just before threatened ti kick his; for I have observed very accurately, that no one ever desires you to kick that which belongs to himself, nor offers to kiss this part in another.

It may likewise seem surprizing that in the many thousand kind invitations of this sort, which every one who hath conversed with country gentlemen must have heard, no one, I believe, hath ever seen a single instance where the desire hath been complied with; - a great instance of their want of politeness; for in town nothing can be more common than for the finest gentlemen to perform this ceremony every day to their superiors, without having that favour once requested of them. ~ Henry Fielding

The simple model of a bridge is great, and you could not build a bridge without understanding it well. But if you're actually building the bridge, you need to know the site. A lot of economics is like that: When prices go up, demand is gonna go down. You can't forget that and run your economy. But it's not the only thing you need to know. ~ Alvin E. Roth

the brain of a child learning a language can cope with a mind-boggling amount of linguistic complexity. ~ Guy Deutscher

When you are not the doer how can the attachment happen? You do a small thing and you become attached. You say, "I have done this." You would like everybody to know that you have done this and you have done that. This ego is the barrier for the supreme understanding. Drop the doer and let things happen. That's what Tilopa means by being loose and natural. ~ Rajneesh

When I speak of life and love as expanding with age, sex seems the least important thing. At any age we grow by the enlarging of consciousness, by learning a new language, or a new art or craft (gardening?) that implies a new way of looking at the universe. Love is one of the great enlargers of the person because it requires us to "take in" the stranger and to understand him, and to exercise restraint and tolerance as well as imagination to make the relationship work. ~ May Sarton

For these reasons they should not hesitate to exchange peace for war. If wise men remain quiet, while they are not injured, brave men abandon peace for war when they are injured, returning to an understanding on a favourable opportunity: in fact, they are neither intoxicated by their success in war, nor disposed to take an injury for the sake of the delightful tranquility of peace. Indeed, to falter for the sake of such delights is, if you remain inactive, the quickest way of losing the sweets of repose to which you cling; while to conceive extravagant pretensions from success in war is to forget how hollow is the confidence by which you are elated. ~ Thucydides

The next night, alone in the tent, Laurent said: 'As we draw closer to the border, I think it would be safer
more private
to hold our discussions in your language rather than mine.'
He said it in carefully pronounced Akielon.
Damen stared at him, feeling as though the world had just been rearranged.
'What is it?' said Laurent.
'Nice accent,' said Damen, because despite everything, the corner of his mouth was beginning helplessly to curve up.
[ ... ]
It was of course no surprise to find that Laurent had a well-stocked armoury of elegant phrases and bitchy remarks, but could not talk in detail about anything sensible. ~ C.S. Pacat

When we're in the story, when we're part of it, we can't know the outcome. It's only later that we think we can see what the story was. But do we ever really know? And does anybody else, perhaps, coming along a little later, does anybody else really care? ... History is written by the survivors, but what is that history? That's the point I was trying to make just now. We don't know what the story is when we're in it, and even after we tell it we're not sure. Because the story doesn't end. ~ James Robertson

I think of the chimp, the one with the talking hands.
In the course of the experiment, that chimp had a baby. Imagine how her trainers must have thrilled when the mother, without prompting, began to sign her newborn.
Baby, drink milk.
Baby, play ball.
And when the baby died, the mother stood over the body, her wrinkled hands moving with animal grace, forming again and again the words: Baby, come hug, Baby come hug, fluent now in the language of grief. ~ Amy Hempel

Michael seems to have lost his values temporarily. He just has to be worked with, disciplined and talked to and given some tender loving care and understanding. ~ Don King

If you talk to a man in a second language , your talking to his brain ,if you talk to him in his mother language you're talking to his heart - ~ Nelson Mandela

Modesty in dress and language and deportment is a true mark of refinement and a hallmark of a virtuous Latter-day Saint woman. ~ Ezra Taft Benson

Dasein itself
and this means also its Being-in-the-world
gets its ontological understanding of itself in the first instance from those entities which it itself is not but which it encounters 'within' its world, and from the Being which they possess. ~ Martin Heidegger

#36: ... Something has happened to our intelligence. My reasoning is this: arrangements of part of the Brain is a language. We are parts of the Brain; therefore, we are language. Why, then, do we not know this? ~ Philip K. Dick

The scientist's inquiry into the causes of things is providing an ever more extensive understanding of nature. ~ Kenneth G. Wilson

The thing to do, it seems to me, is to prepare yourself so you can be a rainbow in somebody else's cloud. Somebody who may not look like you. May not call God the same name you call God - if they call God at all. I may not dance your dances or speak your language. But be a blessing to somebody. That's what I think. ~ Maya Angelou

There is a common language, a mode of consciousness, almost a secret sign which can be read and recognized by all who are similarly engaged. Such realizations help fend off the feeling of isolation which can dog the steps of those who seek the Grail. ~ John Matthews

We learn to become more empathic when we slow down, become present, and are fully committed to understanding another person's uniqueness. ~ Arthur P. Ciaramicoli

The way I regard those who hurt me today will affect how I experience the world in the future. In any encounter, we have a choice: we can strengthen our resentment or our understanding and empathy. We can widen the gap between ourselves and others or lessen it. ~ Pema Chodron

A truly sustainable relationship between earnings and operating cash flow requires that the two measures grow at comparable rates over the long term. When their rates of growth depart, an understanding of the causes can provide insight into how that discrepancy might be resolved. Such insight will provide guidance on the direction of future earnings and cash flow. ~ Charles W. Mulford

It isn't until you come to a spiritual understanding of who you are - not necessarily a religious feeling, but deep down, the spirit within - that you can begin to take control. ~ Oprah Winfrey

Yeah, because off the ice the only language Stephanie speaks is fluent Bitch. ~ Jennifer Comeaux

The marvellous logic of the mad which seems to mock that of the logicians because it resembles it so exactly, or rather because it is exactly the same, and because at the secret heart of madness, at the core of so many errors, so many absurdities, so many words and gestures without consequence, we discover, finally, the hidden perfection of a language. ~ Michel Foucault

That is also an idiom." Wilem grumbled. "Your language is thick with nonsense. I wonder how any of you understand each other. How is everything going? Going where?" He shook his head. ~ Patrick Rothfuss

my beautiful friend,
even on your darkest day i have benefited from the warmth of your light. and i know i'm not the only one. even when you are not consciously giving, you are still giving so much. with your openness, your kindness, your understanding. see yourself through my eyes, for just a moment. feel yourself through my heart.Allow me the honor of reflecting back to you the love you have shown me, time and again, when it was only real love, and real friendship that could have pulled me from the pain. let me take some of your pain now. I am here. I am yours. You are mine, my friend. I am grateful. ~ Scott Stabile

I can admire the solemn and stately language of worship that recognizes the greatness of God, but it will not warm my heart or express my soul until it has also blended therewith the joyful nearness of that perfect love that casts out fear and ventures to speak with our Father in heaven as a child speaks with its father on earth. My brother, no veil remains. ~ Charles Spurgeon

Once, Turner had himself lashed to the mast of a ship for several hours, during a furious storm, so that he could later paint the storm. Obviously, it was not the storm itself that Turner intended to paint. What he intended to paint was a representation of the storm. One's language is frequently imprecise in that manner, I have discovered. ~ David Markson