Headcanon: Language shapes the mind. Why ponies aren't proactive about the dangerous Everfree Forest · 12:16am Apr 24th, 2014
I've got a small idea about how adult ponies' thought process is shaped by their language.
Anyone notice how most ponies don't seem to take their safety into their own hooves? I got a theory on that.
You know how in English, a grammatically correct sentence is "It is raining." ? Well, I was thinking that in Equish, that same sentiment is expressed by just saying "Raining."
The language of English sets people up with a sense of curiosity because it draws attention to the fact that there's a cause and effect going on. "It is raining." But what is "it?" Something is causing the rain. This thought exists in the back of people's minds.
Compared to Equish, which just accepts things at face value. "Raining." Which might as well be "rain is happening." Speakers of Equish are not given that extra push to question 'why' or 'how,' they just accept it. And if they just accept it, they're less likely to try and do anything about it. I'm thinking that this sense of 'just accepting it' is why ponies in Ponyville don't try to get on the offensive and burn down or fence off the Everfree Forest.
I'd like to hear your thoughts on how pony language, pony biology, and outside circumstances influence pony society.
...Sorry to bore you with this crap. I've had a bad day and this is my method of fishing for complements.
Wait, nevermind.
Fuck I'm stupid...
it does make sense i had always assumed fluttershy wouldn't let them because her friends live there
In my head cannon the ponies see the soul as a nested hierarchy.
The most basic tier is the nutritive soul, that part of the soul which all living things posses. This part of the soul allows all living creatures to reproduce, grow, and absorb nutrition. Plants poses only this tier.
The next tier is the locomotive soul, that which allows creatures to move and perceive things. Animals have this part of the soul.
Next is the rational soul which only sapient creatures posses. This portion of the soul allows us to think and make reasoned decisions instead of reacting on instinct like animals. Emotion is seen as a function of logic, we logically perceive the state of the world around us and our body/mind concocts a physical/psychological reaction to that reality.
The highest tier is the harmonious soul which allows us to interface with magic and produces the cutie mark. The harmonious soul is unique in two respects: firstly it can reach outside the physical form and interact with other instances of the harmonious soul, for instance in spontaneous instances of song, secondly some philosophers argue that the harmonious soul can be possessed to differing extents, or at least a creature can be more or less in tune with their harmonious soul. Ponies obviously are the most harmonious and connected of all species, many scholars will argue that donkeys are also fairly harmonious because they integrate so well into civilized society and can interbreed with ponies despite their inability to get cutie marks. Griffons, on the other hand, seem to posses the harmonious soul in a lesser degree, being uncouth and generally lacking in magic. What causes this is subject to debate.
2040786 Damn. That's brilliant.
And it explains why ponies seem to be slightly xenophobic when they're constantly spouting ideas about harmony: gryphons, minotaurs, and cows are considered lower life forms because they don't reach Tier 5, despite being sapient. Getting a cutiemark isn't just an indicator that one has a destiny (purpose in life), but that one is a Tier 5 being.
The more harmonious a pony is to his/her soul, the more magic he/she displays. This comes in the form of having more songs and being able to preform more spells, prime examples being Pinkie (who is a unicorn in all but name) and Twilight (who got advanced enough she became an alicorn.)
It also explains the hierarchy between pony races as a gradient of most to least magical ability: Unicorns on top, Pegasi second to highest, Earth ponies on the bottom.
...Mind if I shamelessly steal your idea?
2040847
Seeing as I shamelessly stole it from Aristotle, not at all.
Yeah, could definitely be some Sapir-Whorf business going on here... Though that tends to be more along the lines of what metaphors people use to describe objects in very abstract terms, like if their language has genders what "gendered" characteristics they tend to apply to inanimate objects, or what "direction" they think immaterial things like the past are, as opposed to a radical reconception of the role of an object in their world... But there's got to be some synergizing between their language and how they directly control their environment, to be sure...
And yeah, I do think Equish would be a completely bonkers language... I can only imagine the screwy, irregular, byzantine grammar related to what kind of creature said what and what kind of magic was involved that things like "everypony" represent, or the special verbs having to do with the three tribes' respective magic and pony anatomy, and the layers of irony and double-meaning that would be possible with those kinds of rules ("That means, like, 'to point,' but to point with a wing, so an Earth Pony saying it was obviously a jab at Salty Breeze's observational skills..."). Can't wait till I get to the point in my own story where I can start writing about that stuff.
Personally, I think they just don't want to slash and burn the Everfree because it'd make them, in their eyes, no different from the monsters they're displacing. The Everfree presumably took over a portion of their land after NMM's banishment, absorbing the old castle, etc., but they seem to have reached an equilibrium and ponies just sort of think of it as "always" having been there, so taking back that land would seem to everyone like an act of aggression.
I dont think that line of thought is correct. The ponies dont deal with the Everfree because they dont see it as part of their right to the world. Even the name of the Forest show that they view it as unconquerable. They are so tied down by MAGIC that it has made them dependent. They are a prey race while we are predators. They see themselves as part of their world while we see ourselves as masters of ours. They see a frontier unlike any they have seen and leave it alone, we would explore it and claim it. The language idea may have some ground but I do not see evidence for it that can not be explained by the ponies "prey" nature.
2041483
They seemed to have conquered and domesticated the rest of the world- taken everything out of its state of nature. Weather, the sun and moon's orbit, seasonal cycles, animal husbandry... They seem to skillfully manipulate their world to improve crop yields and living conditions in a similar manner as us with agriculture.
My guess is that the Everfree was historically more resistant to their efforts at domestication and now the current population just accepts that there's untamed wilderness within walking distance of town.
Maybe their just-accept-it mentality came from their pray nature and their language just reinforces it.
2042425 Likely. Prey will develop like prey. Explains why they are even willing to lose ground to the Everfree.
2042686
That brings up an interesting question, actually: what happens when a predator species raises a pray species? With pets, at least, we can see certain aspects of wilderness survival being bred away, like not wanting to bolt when a human attempts to reach out and pet the animal.
But what about a pray species's thinking process? How does that change?
2042714 Define what you mean by raise. Do you mean like a human adopts a pony infant and raises it like a human, or Raise as in uplifting as in the human race taking pony kind under its wing so to speak.
2042730 "Raise" in the other sense would imply that they are lesser species, which I don't think is the case. They've domesticated their entire planet, for goodness sakes. That's damn impressive. Oh, but, I don't mean that humans are inferior to ponies either. We're differently adapted to our situations.
P.S.
This is an edited duplicate post. I thought it might be rude to delete it since you'd still get a "2 responses" notification in your inbox.
2042730 "Raise" as a parent does to a child, a pony having human parents and being expected to act like a young human. I never even considered the other option.
2042765 We are a race of Explorers, warriors and Builders. We are an apex predator of the highest caliber. While I would view ponies as equal I would not expect them to be like us. We have different instincts. While I could see a pony raise among humans adopting our customs or habits, they would still be a pony. Can we teach it what drives us when that is apart of our DNA?
2042781 But how much of our culture is based purely on biology? Nurturing children can be either encouraged or squashed, depending on culture. In 3rd world shanty towns where adults and children alike must go out into the sugar plantation fields and work, acceptance of infant death happens. Passive infanticide tends to happen. "Your baby is thin, too sick to cry, and too weak to suckle? Well, some children are born wanting to die. You'd be a bastard parent if you deny the child its desire to reunite with Saint Michael."
Nurturing children is supposed to be something that's common to mammals, and yet, we can rid ourselves of it.
I have to find my old anthropology text book to give you the name of that culture. I think the town was in South America somewhere. I think the title of the article was... "no tears at a child's coffin" or something like that.
2042846 I was refering to what drives us cant be taught. We are driven to expand our holding, explore for more, and claim things because why not. We would not have allowed the Everfree to expand into our lands. We would have firestormed and clear cut it back and hunted the monstors that call it home if they tried to fought us. Why because we have the the right of dominion. We would view the land as ours and the trees and animals be damded. The forest is dangerous and Human lives are at risk. The ponies just accepted it.
2042892 Hmmm... well, ya' got me. I can't think of a counter argument.
2042962 You were not wrong, you just misunderstood me.
2043009 You were thinking of the culture as a whole, meanwhile I was thinking of individuals or very small settlements. I think...
I'm sorry.
2043020 You did nothing wrong why are you sorry?
Some ponies might understand our way, but the vast majority wont. And vise versa.
2043052 I was apologizing for sounding bitchy in my previous posts and for assuming you weren't correct when I first started arguing with you.
This is an impressive insight into how languages might be able to affect thought, and it actually has a name, the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis.
You seem to be interested in language lately. Have you considered learning a foreign language, or have you already done that?
2063267 Uh... Well, I've got Rosetta Stone Spanish on my computer, but that's not why I'm so interested in language. I'm just interested in anthropology in general and I just happened to remember an article in my anthropology text book that showcased a culture whose language had "raining" instead of "it is raining." I'm going off of memory on what interested me back during my class.
I'd eat up anything in anthropology if only it was presented concise theories or explained patterns rather than... uh... a description another culture that offers no rhyme or reason as to 'why' and 'how'.
Also, THANK YOU FOR GIVING ME THE NAME! No really, thank you very much for name dropping the theory.