Unified conceptualization

No wonder they call this place ‘sunshine city’. We have had really nice weather for the last few weeks. I like to listen to the sound of wave during the night and be able to wake up in sunshine as well. School is all right; and I am getting used to reading a lot. A lot means excessive, incredibly huge amount, etc. Then I realize it’s better to do some key-point speed reading otherwise it would take forever finishing tasks.

I still find neuroscience very fascinating. The more I read the more interest I develop. After all, this is a perfect time doing a great variety of reading in various fields. As for cognitive linguistics, my personal feel is if this cannot be applied in the pragmatic fashion, it is just a theory, not much attractive to the general public. Of course, for those who like philosophical stimulation, debate, analysis, it is indeed a good medium elevating one’s intellectual level. But I am more concerned how lay audience can also benefit from this sort of research as language is an integral part of human activity. I believe many people would like to know more about language they use daily and the ones they wish to master apart from their mother tongue.

Cross-cultural and cross-linguistic research gives rise to certain results demonstrating people’s conceptual structures and metaphorical implications are different. Yet how do human beings conjure up metaphors at conceptual level? Is it a natural mechanism or is it mainly influenced by the speech community and pedagogy? Do people have a choice or not? Having a common ground for conveying metaphorical meanings is necessary but how do people know the message receiver has the similar knowledge domain?

My other question is the easy and prevalent access to the Internet. The world has become smaller and smaller. Does this mean in the near future humans will have, on the average, similar cognition towards the external world as well as the internal one regardless of which society you are from? Is it a good thing to go in that direction? If this day really comes, then what’s fun being an individual, being able to conceptualize things in singular ways and proving the existence of self in this universe? I reckon this day, if not impossible, will greatly impact on every aspect of our civilization in human history, and perhaps bring about consequences we never expect.