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To what extent do our words influence our perceptions? Is the whorfian hypothesis completely wrong? Does referring to "mail carriers" or "mailperson" (as opposed to "mailman") contribute to the increase of woman mail carriers? Or, does a change in our thought result in a change our words?
Accepted:
December 29, 2005

Comments

Nicholas D. Smith
January 12, 2006 (changed January 12, 2006) Permalink

I hope others will add to what I have to say here. But it seems to me that the actual question you ask here is really more one for social science than for philosophy--in other words, the answer to your questions, as framed, strike me as likely to come from empirical study (which is not the main province of philosophy). My own hypothesis, for what it is worth (probably little!) is that the way we speak very much DOES influence the way we act. If I am right about this, then a legitimate philosophical question would be: How should we speak?

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