If there’s one skill I wish I had, it’s the ability to learn languages and get good at them. (I’m not talking about computer languages.) I took Greek and Latin in high school, but I didn’t stick with either one. A while ago, I tried learning French with the app Duolingo, with the same result. Now, I’m trying French again, and I’m finally making some real progress. But the process has made one thing clear to me: There’s a lot I still don’t understand about how languages work.
So who better to unconfuse me than the latest guest on my podcast, John McWhorter?
A professor of linguistics at Columbia University, John is someone I’ve already learned a great deal from. He’s dedicated his career to demystifying the roughly 7,000 languages spoken around the world—and when he isn’t teaching college students, he’s busy sharing his knowledge with the rest of us. I’ve read a few of his many books, listened to his podcast Lexicon Valley, watched his Great Courses lectures, and always look for his columns in The New York Times.
I’m lucky enough to have met John before, but each time I talk with him, I learn something new. Our latest conversation was no exception. He helped me understand what makes English so irregular, why the ideal language wouldn’t have gendered pronouns, why all dialects are created equal, and much more. We also shared the languages we each wished we could learn (him: Navajo, me: Mandarin) and the words or phrases that have become our linguistic crutches (his: “the fact of the matter,” mine: “um”).
Whether you’re a natural at learning languages or a novice like me, I’m pretty sure this episode—all thanks to John McWhorter—will still teach you something. I hope you’ll give it a listen. And you can catch up on recent episodes of Unconfuse Me on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Multiplication of changes is a certain analogy or interpretation of what happens from the point of view of the micro-world - the world of elementary particles in correlation to “ time ”. Of course, in our considerations we will apply our concept of “time” . Our Reality can only use the real part of our Complex description of time - this is our real time . This means that for our considerations, some extension of our “time” will be made. The description of this extension, will be expressed by means of the Complex Time Function , which refers to our concept of “ Time Quaternion ”.
The Time Continuum is a prerequisite for the stable continuity of our Reality . What exactly does this mean? Well, according to our concept of ToE-Quantum Space , “ time ” as we know it does not exist . All we have is our point in time embedded in the present - this is our Here and our Now . We are unable to access either our “past” or our “ future .” While our “ past ” is, was certain - it happened just a moment ago, our “future” is rather uncertain - we don't know how, what, when exactly something will happen. We are puzzled by a certain intriguing state - this state called the Time Continuum . I'm not sure if the term “state” is adequate.
ToE-Time Quaternion is a proposal to expand our concept of "time." We know that our time is an interpretation of the measure of change. If it were not for the changes taking place in the Reality around us, we would have no sense of the passage of time. From our point of view, Time is related to change - the Changes that occur around us. Time is one of the seven fundamental physical quantities in both the International System of Units (SI) and International System of Quantities .
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