Noise from the Right and Left: Barak Obama, Presidential Candidates and Faulty Language Use

“Barack Obama is a muslim” says the mass email and cordial whispers being circulated by poor, middle, upper middle class and wealthy Americans. Some, but not all, of the persons that write and verbally repeat the “Obama is a muslim” reframe are conservative; while some are liberal; many profess to be Christians; some are white collar professionals and others are blue collar workers; a few appear to be employed as journalists or have affiliation with the news industry; many are highly educated while others have little or no formal education; a large number appear to be of Caucasian ethnicity but there may be some other ethnic groups that have picked up on the noise and spread the rumor. One thing for sure, a large proportion seem to be native born Americans.

The U.S. with it’s abundance of free schooling and large number of universities prides itself on having a learned and literate populace; however, the recent firestorm of unsubstantiated innuendos and accusations against Barack and Michelle Obama validate the hypotheses developed by mathematician/linguist Alfred Korzybski half a century ago. Namely that “our perceptions/conceptions (called Reality Tunnels by Dr. Timothy Leary) are also shaped by the structure of the language we use.”

Korzybski’s opus on the study of semantically inaccurate word usage is entitled “Science and Sanity”. The proponents of Korzybski and later Richard Bandler (advocate of neuro-linguistic programming) define the aforementioned linguistics work as ‘General Semantics’. As such, advocates and proponents of General Semantics, state great displeasure with Western language (English) mis-use. Korzybski’s followers state the chief culprit of the “Obama is a muslim” hysteria gripping America would be the verb “is” and cognates like “was” and “be”. Essentially these cognates suggest “constant assumption of identity”.

Notice the difference in the following absolute statements: “The photon is a wave. Barack Obama is a Muslim. Hillary Clinton is a racist.” In Korzybski’s system of general semantics these absolutes might be re-stated as: “The photon behaved like a wave when measured with this particular scientific apparatus.” The unsubstantiated, dogmatic, Obama is a Muslim might read: “Many people have assumed Barack Obama is a Muslim because his father was a Muslim and his middle name is common amongst Muslims in Saudi Arabia.” The over-simplified “Hillary is a racist” would become “Hillary came off as being a racist to some because of comments made during the election concerning Obama and white voters.”

Korzybski said that Isness is an illness.

The writing and speaking of English without “is” and other cognates (was, be, will be, etc. “appears as E-Prime. However, E-Prime can prove clunky and stylistically unfeasible.

Worse still, I wonder how much “human anger and violence and wars” have resulted from poor semantics. Imagine if a nationwide ban on “IS” and other guilty cognates had been applied on this year’s presidential campaign?

The Meaning of the 21st Century

In the cover blurb of his outstanding book “The Meaning of the 21st Century” entrepreneur, scientist, philanthropist and the founder of Oxford’s 21st Century School Sir James Martin says: humanity is “traveling at breakneck speed into an era of extremes–extremes of wealth and poverty, extremes in technology, extremes in weapons, extremes of globalism. If we are to survive, we must learn how to manage them all.” If we do not, then according to Martin “we may be headed for a new Dark Ages”.

Martin notes unequivocally, that if humanity is to survive on planet earth, it will do so because of the 21C Transition Generation. These are the creative, innovative and tech saavy teenagers and college students, currently living, very well may experience fresh water running out in many parts of the world (that will ultimately make food production difficult and bring about conflict and war); they will also experience increased climate catastrophies that caused Hurricane Katrina, and significant increases in human population. This generation will be responsible for implementing many of the changes Martin mentions in “The Meaning of the 21st Century”.

In chapter 13 The Awsome Meaning of This Century the author ask the question, “So, what is the meaning of the 21st Century?” Good question. Martin says emphatically that the 21st Century will bring us the following challenges:

1). The Earth 7). The Biosphere 13). Existential Risk
2). Poverty 8). Terrorism 14). Transhumanism
3). Population 9). Creativity 15). Advanced Civilization
4). Lifestyles 10). Disease 16). GAIA
5). War 11). Human Potential 17). The Skill/Wisdom Gap
6). Globalism 12). The Singularity

Not content to just produce a book on the 21st Century Martin also has plans to release a film of the very same title. A gifted futurist, Martin’s ideas about the future and the earth’s sustainability were well-received by attendees at a lecture on the campus headquarters of Microsoft computer software.

The issue that all educators in higher education should be ultimately concerned with is: Are today’s first generation 1.0 colleges and universities prepared for the world their students will inhabit?