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#151865 12/12/05 07:35 PM
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Quote:


Say I'm out in the shop working on a project, and I have to change a dimension on a piece of wood. I say to myself (silently though at times I might mutter out loud), Let's see, this is 100 mm long, and doesn't fit by 3 mm. I need to set the saw stop to 97." The words actually form in my mind, just as they are doing right now when I am typing this sentence.




Oh, I see you already answered this and I missed it the first time around. But are there really no mental pictures to go along with what you're muttering?

#151866 12/12/05 08:21 PM
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Mental word-pictures.

For me, it's just words. I am not at all a visual person, and I absolutely and unequivocally think in words. I recognise the difference between thinking and talking to myself, but even my most internal thinking is done in words. For a few years in my late teens, I had two thinking languges, English and German, but now it's just the one, although I did dream in Italian once.

#151867 12/12/05 08:23 PM
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Betsy:

I see what you're saying. Whenever I am about to do something in the shop which involves a power tool, I have one hard and fast rule. Go through all the motions in my mind at least once and usually twice before I go through the motions with my body. The absolutely most dangerous thing I could do out there is to do something without being fully prepared.

I guess this is a combination of images and words, and I actually see myself doing the task from two perspectives, outside the body and inside the body. What this does is it makes me think about the safety issues. I would NEVER EVER push a piece of wood into a sawblade with my bare hands if doing so brought me within the red zone of the blade, which is defined by the red table insert that surrounds the blade.

So when I am planning the action I see the need for a push block or similar aid to keep my fingers away from the blade, and then I make sure I have the push block available, because many times I start a cut without the push block and then reach for it during the operation.

I guess I don't use words that much in thinking through these operations, but I guess I hadn't thought of that as thinking.

I'm trying to imagine what it would be like to see music, as has been referred to above, and I cannot wrap my mind around the concept.

Somewhere recently I saw (may have been a part of) a conversation about woodcarving. And what came across to me was that I am unable to do subtractive woodworking. My mind won't let me go from a big block of wood to a carving of a bird. Were I to start whittling I'd end up eventually with no block of wood and a big pile of shavings.

But I can look at a pile of wood and imagine a desk arising out of the pile piece by piece. Right now I'm building four bedside tables for Christmas presents for my immediate family, and though I'm about half finished with the project I've probably picked up a ruler only once or twice, and that was to verify that my height to width ration was somewhere around 1.6 (The Golden Ratio). For all the rest I merely use a story stick or hold a piece of wood up to the place it's supposed to go and use a knife to mark the cut.

In a way I guess this is along the lines of Helen's knowing what the next stitch just naturally has to be, but I'm in complete awe of her ability.


TEd
#151868 12/12/05 09:01 PM
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> story stick

always loved that name.


Anna:
math is in English? I thought math was in Math.


I need to think more about this thread.....


formerly known as etaoin...
#151869 12/12/05 11:29 PM
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Quote:



One question: what's a "gram" as a part of speech?




Quote:

B: gram. (used with the conditional and subjunctive moods); should, would; may, might




I know almost enough Russian to get into trouble trying to buy something in a store, but I think it's not so much a part of speech as sort of a verbal marker of some sort.

Just out of curiosity, what was the one letter word you remembered.

#151870 12/12/05 11:35 PM
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yeah, but i still can spell to save my life! and articles and tenses (not in spoken language, but most certainly in written) remain obscure concepts!

#151871 12/12/05 11:37 PM
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i still can spell to save my life!




You can say that again!

#151872 12/13/05 12:55 AM
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The word for I (backwards capital R), pronounced ya. I cannot believe I forgot the word for and, which is ee, written with an i (I think).

I've always found it interesting that Russian has not only the sound shch (as in Khrushchev), but they have a single letter to represent it. I wonder what Cyril was smoking at the time.


TEd
#151873 12/13/05 06:17 AM
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I wonder what Cyril was smoking at the time.

Incense.

#151874 12/13/05 09:41 AM
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Quote:

...Cyril was smoking at the time.



Incense.




Is that what makes the Orthodox cross?

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