Re: ГлубиннаяРеференцияОтнсительно"Я" - ЗапакованнаяСЦ ↑

некто 05 июня 2004, 13:46 в посте Openmeta (оригинал в ЖЖ)

It is seen that language employed the simplest possible means in forming its original spartial terms. The transportation from the sensuous to the ideal is so gradual that it could be scaresly perceived at first. Thus, fluidity of the dividing line between imitative or affective sounds and the simplest spatial terms and we ancounter the same continuous, imperceptible transition between the linguistic spheres embracing local and temporal determinations that even in modern civilized languages these two often form an inseparable unity. It is common to find one and the same word used to express both spacial and temporal relations. The simple local adverbs are used indifferently in temporal sense, so that, for example, the word for "here" merges with the word for "now", the word for "there" with that for "earlier" or "later".

As in the intuition of space, everything is here reduced to the simple distinction of near and far. The only essential difference that is clearly expressed is that between "now" and "not-now": between the immediate present and that which lies outside it. This present should not, to be sure, be conceived as a strict mathematical abstraction but as a psychological "now", encompassing all those contents which can be intuited as an immediate temporal unity, which can be condensed into an elementary unity of experience. This form of primary temporal intuition, the whole of consciousness and its contents falls into two spheres: a bright one, illuminated by the light of the present, and another, dark sphere; and between these two, there are as yet no mediation of transition, no shading or degrees.

Developed consciousness, especially consciousness of scientific cognition, does not content itself with this simple opposition of "now" and "not-now", but raises it to its richest logical state. It produced abundant gradations of time, all encompassed in a unitary temporal order in which every moment has its specific position. Epistemological analysis shows that this order is not "given" by sensation and cannot be derived from immediate intuition. It is rather a work of the understanding - particularly of causal inference. It is the categoryof cause and effect which transforms the mere intuition of succession into the idea of unitary temporal order of events.

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Re: ГлубиннаяРеференцияОтнсительно"Я" - ЗапакованнаяСЦ

некто 05 июня 2004, 14:23 (оригинал в ЖЖ)

The development from the feeling to the concept of time reveals three differen stages, which are also of crucial importance. At first stage the consciousness is dominated by the opposition of "now" and "not-now", which has undergone no further differentiations; at the second, certain temporal "forms" - completed and incompleted, continued and momentary action - begin to be distinguished so that a definite distinction of temporal modes is developed; the final stage is characterized by the pure concept of time as an abstract concept of order.

In highly developed languages, the specification of time adheres essentially to those parts of speech which express a process or activity. Humboldt also thought that there is a necessary relationship between the specific nature of time conception and of the verb, but in Malay languages were developed a usage indicating that they connect time with the noun. This phenomenon is apparent where language designates time relations by the same means which it has developed for the designation of local relations. Somali uses the variations of vowels of the definite article not only to express differences of spacial position and situation, but also to present temporal differences. Pure nouns, which to our way of thinking embody not the slightest temporal reference, e.g., words such as "man" or "war", can be provided with a certain temporal index by changes of the vowel in their article. The vowel -a serves to designate the temporally present, the vowel -o designates the temporally absent, and no distinction is made between the future and the not yet distant past.

The development of child language shows that adverbs of time are formed appreciably later than those of place, and that terms such as "today", "yesteday", "tomorrow" have at first no sharply defined temporal sense. "Today" is the expression of the present in general, "tomorrow" and "yesteday" the future and the past in general. The same one can see in Ewe. Here one and the same adverb serves to designate both "yesteday" and "tomorrow" in general.

The Semitic languages start, not with the trichotomy of past, present and future, but with the simple dichotomy of completed and incompleted action. The "perfect", the tense of completed action can be used equally well to express the past and the present, for example it may designate an action which has begun in the past but extends into the present - on the other hand, the "imperfect", which designates an incompleted action in process, can be used for a future, as well as a present or past action. In this linguistic family the pure relative concept of time and the expressions of pure temporal distinctions have achieved their highest development.