Language That Has No Words for Numbers

In his book "Asimov on Numbers", Isaac Asimov talks about a tribe of Kalahari bushmen who have no number set, and specifically no concept of zero.

Barbaric natives! Quickly, we must teach them our civilized western ways and religion through spread of disease, sexual exploitation of their women and children, enslavement, etc. Let's start off as goodwill missionaries.

I only made that point since the article states "scientists found one such number-less language" and this may be more common than we imagine.

Weird. It's a difficult concept to wrap one's brain around for those of us in a very numbery culture.

Fifth!

I wonder how hard it must be to set up a dinner party for those folks.

"Honey, how many of them are coming over for dinner because I need to know how much chicken to bake?"

"Some."

"Uhhh...what?"

"Ok, many!"

"I hate you..."

if the language has no concept of number what is the use of the word 'more'

if you think our culture is so evil, get off the internet. :P

"Two! Not more than two!"
-Bupu

I read about them in Linguistics. It was a great essay from Chomsky about the faculty of language.

Notice that they don't say that they have no concept of three-ness, just that they don't have a word for 'three'. Surely they have something equivalent to "I'll trade you {holds up three fingers} goats for your cow."

I've spent the last few minutes thinking of all the math that can be done without numbers. You can certainly have a set without numbers, you can partition it. You could have an equivalence relation without numbers. I think there's quite a bit.

Note that I'm not saying these people did or even could invent math without inventing words for numbers first, but isn't it an intriguing idea?

I'm from the 'language is a social construct' camp. Linguistic determinism is the hypothesis that language shapes thought. Ludwig Wittgenstein and Sapir & Whorf provide some interesting reading on this topic. For example: What we cannot say, we cannot think. What we cannot say must be passed over in silence. The words we possess determine the things that we can know. If we have an experience, we are confined not just in our communication of it, but also in our knowledge of it, by the words we possess. You can find the above on Wikipedia Linguistic Determinism page.

As a side note, if you ask the Aymara of central America to point to the future, the point behind themselves. We would point straight ahead.

I reckon there is some crucial knowledge out there that shows us our true relationship with the universe but we are yet to develop the language or the scientific measuring instruments (categorisation systems) to understand it.

Interesting stuff indeed.

Amazing! I can't imagine living with numbers. I would have enjoyed growing up with that tribe as I hated algebra.

One, two, many, lots?

I was always horrible at math, so seeing something like this makes me smile.

Terry said,

"As a side note, if you ask the Aymara of central America to point to the future, the point behind themselves. We would point straight ahead."

You would point ahead? I would point up.

I have to disagre with that point. I'm fully capeable of experiencing or concieving things that I have no words for.

In fact, all human have this potential. We did as babies. And look at Hellen Keller - before she learned language she certialy was able to think as much as any human (just not communicate her thoughts to others). And she stands as one example of any number of humans who didn't learn any language but can still think, concieve, experience, and understand.

Language can *shape* how people think, certianly, but it's not perfect barrier of understanding.

Wow, I'm impressed. This article brought out the deep thinkers. You all make very valid points without any extra crap included. thanks for the mind candy for the day.