Written only language to help you read faster
Posted by No_Seaworthiness7174@reddit | CrazyIdeas | View on Reddit | 46 comments
What’s the number one thing that slows people down while reading? Internal vocalization! But it’s not that easy to just stop doing. If the language has no spoken counterpart then you can’t vocalize it, problem solved!
lurkermurphy@reddit
they made up an artificial language that is supremely logical based on the theory that language influences your brain function, and it's nearly impossible to listen to someone speak it. Look up Lojban. They already essentially did this and it is not catching on.
hascalsavagejr@reddit
Personally, I prefer the original, Loglan. I didn't know anything about Lojban when I first started learning about it. It drew me in and it became my favorite language, but I've never dedicated the time to learn it
No_Seaworthiness7174@reddit (OP)
I’m not surprised, conlang’s never catch on except for maybe in their super niche community. That is interesting though.
Kapitano72@reddit
Evidene vi scias neniom pri la afero.
AstroCaptain@reddit
There are a couple hundred native Esperanto speakers some of which had parents who’s only language in common was Esperanto
Brandoncarsonart@reddit
I just looked up a video and it sounds like the sweedish chef speaking a mix of elvish and dwarvish
WhyWontThisWork@reddit
It doesn't sound any faster
Imajzineer@reddit
I don't internally vocalise ... and never have.
ExampleMysterious870@reddit
This hurts my brain. How?
Imajzineer@reddit
I could ask the same question. I mean, why would I? I'm not hearing them, not speaking them, they're no more vocal than any other visual stimulus.
The only time I bother to even 'hear' them is when it would be entertaining to do so (like say the Nac Mac Feegle). And even then it's an effort - I sometimes have to re-read a sentence a couple of times in order to force myself to hear it rather than just read it (because, unless I consciously 'listen', my brain doesn't pay attention to that aspect).
And it's not because I'm a 'visual thinker'. Far from it in fact: I'm multilingual (so, hearing/speaking language is kind of a thing for me), DJ and music producer (sound is a biiiiiiiiig part of my life). But the symbols (letters/words) transmit the ideas to my brain and I know what happened in the story (or whatever it is that's being described) without the need for vocalisation: I see/understand the concepts, not the sounds - I mean, not everything described in a text even makes a sound (what's the sound of the experimental procedure in which the subjects' response times were measured to determine the existence, or not, of a state dependency phenomenon? What's the sound of Love/Hatred? What sound does a month of Sundays make?)
FortWendy69@reddit
Wait at the end there you seem to imply that we are talking about hearing the noise that the thing being described makes. Like we read “Tim dropped a plate” and we hear a crash. But what we’re talking about is hearing the words “Tim dropped a plate”
So “a month of sundays” sounds like me saying the words “a month of sundays”
Imajzineer@reddit
I was just illustrating the point in a different way - you're quite right though: it probably wasn't the best one under the circumstances.
Persistent_Parkie@reddit
I'm curious, are you also one of those people with no internal monolog?
Imajzineer@reddit
I would largely state that not only do I not, no, but the very existence of one is dubious to begin with; it's one of those early theories that are (ironically, therefore appropriately) characteristic of the kind of thinking that occurs in children on the cusp between the pre-operational and concrete operational stages of development: tantamount to a sort of anthropomorphisation of neurological activity - there is no neurological locus given, merely a lot of handwaving about symbolic processes; it doesn't explain anything, just describes it and is not entirely dissimilar to a conspiracy theory: making grandiose claims without evidence to support them, but, trust me, bro, it's obvious, look (you use your voice when you read aloud, right).
Do I ever engage in 'rehearsal'? Of course - in fact I'm unaware of any case of someone who didn't/doesn't (and would, therefore, almost be prepared to brave positing that "We all do"). I have done so frequently during the course of my life. But ... imagining and rehearsing past/future (even entirely fictional) linguistic interactions with people is not evidence of an internal monologue, it's just linguistic activity for the purpose of analysing/improving performance - to claim otherwise is like those functionalists who conflate the manipulation of token (symbol) streams with thinking ... which is like mistaking aerodynamics for flight when the reality of things is that, whilst aircraft are flown, birds fly (the two are not the same phenomenon).
Nor is the fact that some (even many) may engage in such activity more frequently ... or even on a constant basis ... evidence of any more than that some people do - it doesn't evidence the cause of their behaviour only of the behaviour itself (and there could be a variety of reasons why they learned to engage in that particular one).
That said, I did once (very much to my own great surprise) involuntarily 'hear' myself think actual words. But, given other factors possibly relevant at the time, I couldn't say hand-on-heart that it wasn't a form of synesthetic transference of process (my brain simply firing neurons 'in sympathy' with itself). Moreover, that I have not once since had the same experience would seem to support the theory that it was an abnormal neurological performance, not normal.
The fact that your question can even be posed gives the lie to the idea that consciousness (if not even all cognition) is presaged upon the existence of an internal monologue - if there are those who do not experience it then both are clearly not the result of it (there must be some other mechanism that is the cause of them and any experience of it the product of its transference into conscious awareness, not mechanism itself).
CecilyRider@reddit
I’m way too high for this comment right now lol. Like I understood all of these words, I know their definitions, I am familiar with Piaget, I am familiar enough with linguistics and the other topics mentioned, but I have no idea what I just read. Gave me major whiplash throwing bro in there also. Not throwing shade or anything but please forgive me if I completely failed the reading comprehension part of this test. I wasn’t expecting to be taking one. Um something about inner monologues not actually being a real thing? Or at least not in the way they’re normally conceptualized? Maybe?
The thought of having an inner monologue or not being tied to subvocalization is an interesting one. If I understand correctly you (as in you personally not as in the pleural you) neither subvocalize while reading nor do you have an inner monologue. To add an anecdotal point of data I mostly don’t subvocalize while reading. If I think too hard about the fact that I’m reading I can be thrown into subvocalizing until I get back into it. And how long it takes depends on if I accidentally think about reading again. I also subvocalize when I don’t know how to pronounce a word which is interesting to me since it’s not like I’m pronouncing the other words in my head. I also mostly think I don’t have an inner monologue but sometimes I do. That’s a little harder to quantify for me because I’m not completely sure that inner monologues aren’t just made up because the idea of them doesn’t actually make sense to me. But I also think in words sometimes. And not just when rehearsing conversations.
Anyway please excuse my rambling and the fact that half of this comment would probably make more sense posted somewhere else. The idea of cutting and pasting the relevant parts right now is too much.
Imajzineer@reddit
In a nutshell, yes.
Correct.
Interesting. I don't end up subvocalising in those moments, but I do become divorced from the process ... watching myself read rather than actually reading. And then I can't read anymore (if you see what I mean). It can take a while for me to get over the hump of 'looking at words on the page' and back into reading again.
Again, interesting. I rarely find myself confronted with that problem (only when it's something like 'pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis') ... and then, if I can't simply solve it by reading 'slowly', rather than subvocalise, I'll outright vocalise it (albeit sotto voce,as it were, it's still audible).
I'm convinced it is: there's no evidence of it except by way of self-report - by those who've been primed to detect its presence by being enjoined to ... wait for it ... report on it.
It's also a typical of concrete operational stage thinking: a substantivisation of an abstract into 'concrete' form - in Pavlovian terms, the thinking/reasoning is 'classical' (words being spoken leads to the belief they must therefore be subvocalised when read) ... whereas, in reality, both you and I are evidence of reading being 'operant' in nature, in that the stimulus (symbols on the page) bypasses the vocal to provoke the response we experience as 'reading' (I'm 'mixing my metaphors' horribly there, but I trust you get my drift).
Another example is the idea of Time as 'the fourth dimension' ... as though Time had a physical existence and were somewhere we could go, when, in fact, it's simply a function of change: freeze the Universe to 0 degrees Kelvin and nothing changes (and no time passes as a result) - there is no fourth dimension (not in that sense) any more than there is a separate instance of me in some parallel universe, in which I have blue eyes, another in which I have one leg, another in which I have a Siamese twin, etc. etc. etc. ... it's truly infantile thinking, the product of an inability to conceive of things that don't exist in the physical realm (but Love isn't something you can purchase in a can either, and nobody imagines it to be 'The Nth Dimension' ^(1)).
The idea of the internal monolgue is formed of an inability to conceive of an emergent property (mind) that doesn't simply not have an isomorphic relationship with the substrate (brain) but is moreover presaged upon its having one with another emergent process performed by that very same emergent property itself - it's conceptually all over the place.
It also doesn't account for prelingual children, let alone non-humans - or do they not have minds?
You made sense to me 😀
___
^(1) Now there's a hokey 1950s/'70s sub-Jules Verne 'B' movie Science Fiction plot (Barbarella meets Fantastic Voyage).
Bocaj1126@reddit
Wait is that not what they were talking about?
Persistent_Parkie@reddit
There's reading books "aloud" in your head and there is also thinking your thoughts "aloud" in your head, usually referred to as an inner monolog. While I would assume someone who doesn't do one also wouldn't do the other I don't know that for sure so I am curious.
DasAllerletzte@reddit
That's interesting. Is it like traffic signs? As in you don't hear a speed limit or a "danger, falling rocks" sign?
That kind of reminds me of how I read musical scores. I don't read the notes as their names but rather directly translate them into the fingerset of my instrument.
Imajzineer@reddit
Pretty much, yeah. I don't see a stop sign and hear a voice shout "STOP!" ... I just see a stop sign and know I'm gonna have to.
I don't read music myself, but I did learn to maaaaaaany moons ago and, like you, I didn't see 'A', 'B', 'C#', 'E', etc. ... I saw a string of symbols representing instructions for what to do with my fingers. But it just didn't take: I can't make music by thinking about it, only by doing it (whether in terms of performance or composition makes no difference ^(1)). The most disconcerting experience I had was deciding, one day, that I'd play the theme tune to some program that had started on TV ... and just did so: there were no fits and starts as I fumbled around, looking for the correct notes, I played it flawlessly the first time, by ear - which was more than a little disturbing (my body did what was necessary without informing me of what it was going to do ^(2)).
I had a not dissimilar experience when looking a LISP function one day: it was on paper, but I suddenly 'saw' all the substitutions take place as though it were actually running on a computer, and the end result (the new function returned as the lambda) appear in my mind's eye ... but almost superimposed over the paper - it was uncanny.
On both occasions, there was no conscious involvement on my part ... my brain just did its thing without any executive function required (i.e. without my permission!) ... which I think we can all agree, is not a little disconcerting: it might only be the first step on the path, but that way lies psychosis (yes, I'm being hyperbolic, but you take my point 😉).
___
^(1) Thank goodness for the invention of home computers!
^(2) If I'd been in charge of the performance, mistakes would've been made!
DasAllerletzte@reddit
Oh, programming languages might be a great example too, I aagree. I also don't count a loop through all iterations or when I do some "object.attribute.attribute.conversion.attribute" kind of stuff, while it's a bit contradictory as I read/"hear" the letters to not get lost or make a typo, my mind just hops through the attribute steps.
Imajzineer@reddit
I'm somewhat on the fence about programming languages.
On the one hand, I not altogether infrequently find myself remarking to people who talk about Maths as though it were the very foundation of Reality that, no, it's not ... it's not Physics, it's a language that may be used to describe (amongst many other things) Physics (the map is not the territory) - otherwise, the Universe and Music are English simply because they may be described in English. So, clearly, I'm happy about more ... dammit, I don''t want to muddy the waters with 'symbolic' in this context, but you get the idea ... about more symbolic forms being languages.
But, when it comes to programming languages, I feel uneasy about describing them as languages per se.
I dunno ... I mean, I'll happily accept that PROLOG is a programming language, for instance, but then balk at according HTML that same status, because it's only declarative (wait, what?) ... and, if you were to suggest LISP were anything less than sublime, we'd be meeting at dawn with pistols drawn ^(1) (but, that's really no less cognitively dissonant) ... but others?
Maybe it's because I think about programming more visually: I see things not dissimilarly to an ERD when conceptualising/modelling (including processes in Time in that visualisation) and my experience of things more like this than it is mathematical ... so, it's not even really a symbolic experience for me, but more like painting/drawing (which, ironically, is not something I do). That may be because I'm not a mathematician (one of my qualifications is in Computer Science, but I don't have even a school-level one in Maths ^(2)): I'm happier thinking in terms of Set Theory and Graph Theory, fractals and holograms, if I have to do any thinking about the relationships between things (in space or time) - do not ask me to integrate/differentiate the Cos, Sin or Tan of anything, however (or it's pistols at Dawn).
___
^(1) Actually, we wouldn't: I'm with Fester when to comes to duels - but you get my point 😉
^(2) I could never get past the phenomenon of:
Schoolwork: find X, where X+2 = 4
Homework: find X, where X+2x4 = 16
Exam: If Johnny has two apples and his train is four minutes late, what is the mass of the Sun?
Direct_Bad459@reddit
Ridiculous. Written language was invented to represent vocal language. Unlike abstract art, a series of characters I read is intended to remind me of a concept - the word! - that in many cases I learned first as a sound. It's cool and unusual that you don't internally vocalize but it is silly to pretend that there's no reason people do it. Writing descends from and alludes back to spoken language. We speak and listen before we can read.
Imajzineer@reddit
I didn't suggest there were no reason why other people do so - that's an assumption on your part, not something I said.
Nor is anything I said or think 'silly' .. nor 'am I pretending' anything ... and there's no call to be rude.
Neither is it unusual that I don't internally vocalise: I'm a fast reader and consequently part of a wider group of people who do not:
I'm fluently multilingual, have formally taught two of those languages (to adults and children, native and non-native speakers alike), musically/sonically focussed and a psychologist of thirty-six years in total (qualified thirty years ago) ... so, whilst I don't mean to appeal to argumentum ad verecundiam, I am pretty confident that my understanding of language (both written and spoken) functions not only in practical usage but neurologically too - and the fact remains that written language was not invented to represent vocal language ... only some written languages: the hieroglyphs on the pyramids in Egypt do not represent spoken words ... Chinese, Japanese (and other) pictograms do not represent spoken words (even though they can also do so, along with representing language phonetically as well).
You subvocalise, fine ... that's cool and all ... not even unusual ... but it isn't the measure of things - only of you and others like you (we are not alike).
Direct_Bad459@reddit
Hi! Sorry to have offended you, I can be overly blunt and forget how rude it reads, my bad. I didn't mean you were ridiculous or silly.
You make a really good point about ideograms and other languages going directly from idea to symbol without the intermediate sound. Latin/alphabet-centric bias on my part. But this written language and all of its cousins do represent sounds that represent ideas.
What I found ridiculous was saying words are not more vocal than other visual stimuli and suggesting subvocalizing doesn't make sense (why would I) when reading aloud is, as far as I know, a pretty normal part of reading. It's not clear to me why that would be unfathomable for you if you find it makes sense that other people do.
I am also a fast reader, believe it or not. I don't think not subvocalizing is crazy or unheard of, I just meant by "unusual" that I think it is less common than the alternative. Your list of qualifications is impressive but unnecessary and a little condescending (couldn't say appeal to authority?).
You're a smart person & too smart for that little you-and-others-like-you dig at the end. We might or might not be alike, here I am replying to your defensive comment with one of my own. There's shared humanity in that + in having a disagreement. I'm glad we both feel invested in discussing reading silently! Genuinely, I hope you have a great week, it's hard here on earth.
Imajzineer@reddit
You do need to get a grip on that bluntness, yes.
They aren't: the visual stimuli are themselves simply visual stimuli. The association with words by way of sounds represented is (ironically) a classic case of operant (not classical) conditioning and how that connection is made, therefore, indirect. Consequently, there is no direct association between the visual stimulus and any given subsequent behaviour: I learned to read the same as anyone else and yet my brain does not respond with subvocalisation (that link simply isn't there when I read silently, only when I do so aloud).
And engages different cognitive (and neural) functions than does silent reading - the two functions are related, but not the same.
I understand that others do ... that does not mean I understand why - not in the sense of being able to say I have a shared experience (my abstract understanding of the processes and functions notwithstanding).
I'm sorry, but what?
There is no superior way to say it, just ways to say it ... and the subtext here seems not a little hypocritcal: you are critcising me as a person because I didn't say it in the manner of which you approve - because my use of language doesn't meet the standards you think they should, you feel justified in engaging in what, for all the World, looks very much like inverse snobbery.
Now who's being condescending?
There are two types of people relevant to the discussion we were having: those who subvocalise and those who don't. We had established that you do and I don't. Therefore, anyone else who does is like you ... and anyone who doesn't isn't (they are like me instead).
Unlike other languages, English doesn't have a form to express 'you' in the plural, so, If I wish to describe you and others like you, I will consequently be obliged to say exactly like that, lest you take my statement of 'you' to mean you alone.
It wasn't a dig, but a linguistic necessity; any other reading thereof is a fabrication of your own imagination: there was nothing tonal in the way I expressed the idea that might lead to that conclusion on its own - I expressed nothing more than the simple fact that your subvocalisation whilst reading and that of others who, like you, also do so ... others who are like you ... others like you ... are not representative of anyone but yourselves, not of all human beings.
Where is this even coming from? The only person getting digs in is you - there was absolutely no need for that remark.
My comment wasn't defensive; it was a simple statement of fact: when it comes to subvocalisation when reading, we are not alike and our individual experience thereof, therefore, not a measure of the validity of the other's experience. My original expression of my experience in my previous reply ^(1) was of precisely that: my own, individual experience (as requested by the person to whom I was actually replying). There was no more to it than that and you aren't in a position to gainsay it (not least because you in fact subvocalise yourself and aren't therefore in any more position to understand my own than I am that of people who don't ^(2)).
Thankyou - and likewise.
It is, yes.
___
^(1) Which wasn't even to you, remember ... you just jumped in, both feet first, with 'Ridiculous' (about my life experience, of which you can, by definition, make no such judgement).
^(2) Although, that said, maybe I can at least somewhat, in that I can (with conscious effort) make myself 'hear' characters' voices - but I couldn't swear that that involves subvocalisation, because I don't actually speak with the accents I hear when I do it (not in English at least).
griddle9@reddit
it's cool to hear that someone else is like this. i don't either and most people i try to explain this to don't understand. what helps people understand is saying it's more like i think in text than audio, but that's not quite right either. my thoughts are completely abstract, and can be converted to/from audio or text without the other being an intermediate step.
also, i'm pretty much always imagining music, so i quite often subvocalize lyrics while thinking about something else.
Imajzineer@reddit
Oh, the irony 😉
Exactly.
Me too.
But, not music with lyrics (i.e songs, not music).
Otoh, even on those occasions when I do hear songs in my head (e.g. right now, for no good reason other than we're talking about it,I can hear this), unless I'm imagining singing along to it, I don't subvocalise even then. And even, if I do imaging doing so, I'm still not convinced I subvocalise: I can hear her voice singing the lyrics, fast forward/rewind in my head ... and even, with some effort, hear the pitchbending as I do so - which is something I couldn't do with my voice, so ...
Equally, I have it on in the background as I write this, whilst still processing the lyrics - so, if I were subvocalising, I'd surely end up glitching out ... unable to subvocalise either as they competed for control of my executive function (which would be determining which words to subvocalise) ... and grind to a halt (unable to either write or listen).
TheRoadsMustRoll@reddit
i read computer language all the time as it makes it easy to spot problems/errors -not syntax errors that the computer can fix, but design errors that would pass debugging but look stupid in the interface.
a logical formula in a spread sheet might look like: if(this variable, 0,1) and my brain translates it into "if 'this variable' then zero, otherwise one." so i don't know about others but removing the vocalization aspect wouldn't work for me; i would just translate whatever is being presented into english and vocalize it in my head anyway.
ghotiermann@reddit
Back in the Dark Ages (the 1970s), my sister was planning to be a secretary, so she learned Greggs shorthand. She ended up going to college and getting a degree in computer science instead, but she never had a problem writing down everything her professor said (shorthand was invented for taking dictation). Of course, nobody else could ever read her notes.
yafashulamit@reddit
Internal vocalization helps with learning to read and trains your brain in a certain way to aid in written expression. I've read that it is significantly more difficult for many Deaf people to learn to read and write since they aren't using their native language - and internal vocalization isn't aiding with understanding or intuitive grammar. For someone who has never used English as a primary language for communication, and written English IS a written only language, I can't imagine that leads automatically to faster reading. You have the extra step of translating.
Also, as you get faster at reading, you don't usually vocalize every individual syllable. You gain meaning from chunks of words or sentences. I still hear my internal voice but not at normal speaking speed unless I need to slow down to figure out something unclear. When I slow down for better comprehension, the deliberate vocalization is an aid for understanding, not a hindrance.
So, I disagree that a written only language would be faster or superior in any way.
But just because you're wrong doesn't mean it's not a crazy idea, thanks for making me think!
SandsnakePrime@reddit
Vocalization by default slows down intake speed. It also reduces storage and recall by only using the auditory centres of the brain, where is visual storage is far more efficient.
One of the fastest speed readers was JFK. He was reported to be able to read 1500 words per minute.
Direct_Bad459@reddit
Exactly! Well said. יפהפיה
SandsnakePrime@reddit
Just go do a speed reading course. The premise behind it is two fold.
1) Train your mind to read without vocalizing.
2) Train your mind to use peripheral vision to increase your reading focus area.
This works in any language you are fluent in.
Upset-Basil4459@reddit
Chinese is kinda like this. There's tons of different dialects but they are all written with the same symbols
HK_Mathematician@reddit
I suppose you can use Hongkongers to investigate this.
I'm from Hong Kong. Our native language is Cantonese. Different people have varying levels of fluency in English and Mandarin. According to census data, 58.7% of us can speak English, and 54.2% of us can speak Mandarin. Personally, I speak fluent English, but my Mandarin is very bad.
In school, we had to learn something called "standard written Chinese". It's basically using Chinese characters in a way that follows Mandarin grammar. It is possible to pronounce each character using Cantonese pronunciation, and that's usually what happens in those lessons, but nobody ever speaks Cantonese like that. Imagine like if everyone in the US has to learn written Latin, but without learning how to speak Latin, and the teacher just pronounce each letter as if it's English.
So, what happens when I read text that is written in Standard Written Chinese? I can understand it because I learned it and I know the meaning of each character, but also I tend to subvocalize it less because I never speak like that in Cantonese, and my Mandarin is also too bad for me to subvocalize in it. In some sense, you can argue that it's a "written only language" to me. I suppose I'm not the only one in Hong Kong who is like that.
actuarial_cat@reddit
Ancient Chinese （文言文) is even more crazy on that. There is huge distinction between what was written from what was spoken, which was only changed during 20th century. And definitely not read faster.
In the HK professional world, the fastest and most common way of communication is pure written English but spoken Cantonese with English nouns.
deleted_by_reddit@reddit
[removed]
AutoModerator@reddit
Your post was automatically removed because it contains political content, which is off-topic for /r/CrazyIdeas. Please review the subreddit rules and guidelines.
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.
Direct_Bad459@reddit
That is so cool thanks for sharing
Maddogenes@reddit
Even the largest Constructed Languages are only used by linguist nerds.
technoexplorer@reddit
Ancient Hebrew?
Someone already said Chinese.
Kibichibi@reddit
I'm a speed reader (when I want to be) and internal vocalization doesn't slow me down 😊
Teagana999@reddit
I'm pretty sure I can internally vocalize faster than my eyes can read.
josephhitchman@reddit
People who learned Spanish as a first language as children, and went on to learn English later still internally vocalise in Spanish. If your none vocal language was to be internalised, it would have to be someone's first language, not second or later.
Meaning they would have to be mute until they learned a second language...
I think your idea qualifies.
No_Seaworthiness7174@reddit (OP)
I didn’t know that… it’s even crazier than I thought.