A blackboard displaying the word 'Language' with students in silhouette looking on
Philosophy

A New Blog Series

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Greetings, friends, and God bless you.

In recent months, God has been bringing to my mind examples of phrases and commonly used manners of speech which are somewhat irrational, as they do not accord with the Truth about the way reality is.

Some general examples of this would be as follows:

  • Making claims about future events with certainty, when in reality, the future is not certain.
  • Making statements that imply we have the power to control events, when in reality, God is in control of everything that happens.
  • Making a promise to someone when we have no idea what the future holds and whether or not the promise will be fulfilled.

I believe that we can, and should, adjust our language so that it is more true to the way things really are, and I believe that in doing so we will experience relief, as old clichés and manners of speech are replaced with utterances that are more meaningful and truthful, and will therefore be more satisfying to use and will carry more weight.

To some people, this proposal might seem strange and perhaps overly ambitious, but I feel it is a natural progression from my book God’s Grand Game, as it will use the philosophical insights I shared in that book to justify the arguments I will make in relation to the way our use of language could evolve in the future.

I have already sketched out a plan for the series. With a different focus for each post, I will be working through the philosophy behind the way we use language and will be making suggestions, with examples, in relation to how our use of language might be improved. I think this will be a fun and enlightening process.

I will not be making heady technical arguments, because I have always been a firm believer in accessible philosophy and I hate it when when philosophers alienate people by being overly technical and obscure.

As the series unfolds, I would very much like to get your insights, thoughts, and feedback in the comments, as long as you are willing to be constructive and stay on topic. Hopefully, readers from around the world will contribute comments using their knowledge of non-English languages and how the arguments I will make relate to those languages. This will add great value to my posts and I wholeheartedly encourage your participation.

Thank you for reading this post, and God willing, I’ll get this new series underway next week. If you’re not yet subscribed and would like to follow the series, please do subscribe so that you will receive an email for each new post.

(Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay)

14 comments

    1. Hello! I’m so glad you’re interested in the series. If you do follow along, please feel free to share any thoughts as I’d appreciate your input! (But otherwise just read, that’s also fine!)

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  2. Words are fascinating to me because they contain such an enormous amount of power to influence the unaware masses. The media knows this all too well. For example, consider their overused term, “bombshell.” I look forward to your series.

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    1. Hi Rollie, very much agree with you about the power of words! I’ll be saying something in the series about why I believe words communicate (I believe the technical term for this kind of thing is hermeneutics). I’m grateful for your interest in the series and I really hope it will be interesting. Thanks so much.

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  3. “Making a promise to someone when we have no idea what the future holds and whether or not the promise will be fulfilled.”

    That’s why the Muslims, specifically the Arabs, say “In’Shallah” or “God willing.”
    I look forward to reading your futures posts.

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  4. I’m looking forward to this series, Steven! My interest is in the phenomenology of Christianity, and the way people talk (especially about the future) without realising what they are actually saying is a favourite topic of mine.

    In English we’ve lost the subtle distinctions of “future more certain” and “future less certain” that other languages retain. We’ve ended up with “future certain” which is indeed presumptuous.

    All the best!

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    1. Wow, thanks for this! That is a really valuable insight you shared. I really hope I’m able to do this series (note the caution, because it depends on God’s will, haha) and I would love for you to contribute your insights as we go along. Are you able to give an example of the other languages you mention which use those subtle distinctions? Don’t worry if not, but that would be really helpful. Thank you, friend!

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    1. Hi Joan! Glad you’re interested, I was honestly worried no one would be, so that means a lot. I agree with what you said, and will look forward to your input as we explore the issue in more depth (God willing!) 🙂

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  7. Our Hindu Philosophy also accepts that God has confered on man the power to control the events around him. This is called the #Karma_Siddhanta. So, we Indians are already familiar with this.

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