How Typing Transformed Nietzsche's Consciousness(thereader.mitpress.mit.edu)
thereader.mitpress.mit.edu
How Typing Transformed Nietzsche's Consciousness
https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/how-typing-transformed-nietzsches-consciousness/
46 comments
This article might be better:
Friedrich Nietzsche and his Typewriter – a Malling-Hansen Writing Ball
http://www.malling-hansen.org/friedrich-nietzsche-and-his-ty...
(via https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6100076, but no comments there)
Friedrich Nietzsche and his Typewriter – a Malling-Hansen Writing Ball
http://www.malling-hansen.org/friedrich-nietzsche-and-his-ty...
(via https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6100076, but no comments there)
I think it’s far more likely that his blindness influenced his writing style than his choice of writing implement.
If you can’t go back and read what you just wrote, it results in a concision of thought - formulate a sentence in your mind, transcribe. Repeat.
When you can read back what you’re writing, it lends much more scope for punning, for long, tangential sentences - as the paper becomes your short term memory.
This holds particularly true for a not only blind but aging mind, with a slowly diminishing capacity for short-term recall.
So, did the typewriter turn him into a machine-man? No. His blindness mandated a modification to his mode of expression, and the transcription technology he chose.
I can’t help but think of the allegory of the tightrope walker and the jester, reading this.
If you can’t go back and read what you just wrote, it results in a concision of thought - formulate a sentence in your mind, transcribe. Repeat.
When you can read back what you’re writing, it lends much more scope for punning, for long, tangential sentences - as the paper becomes your short term memory.
This holds particularly true for a not only blind but aging mind, with a slowly diminishing capacity for short-term recall.
So, did the typewriter turn him into a machine-man? No. His blindness mandated a modification to his mode of expression, and the transcription technology he chose.
I can’t help but think of the allegory of the tightrope walker and the jester, reading this.
i thought he was only blind in one eye
Seems to have been a combination of ophthalmic issues and severe migraine photosensitivity - apparently he could only bear to read or write in short snatches.
Yeah the title was a little Click-Baity, compared to what it really contained.
This is only an analysis of the surface level presentation style of Nietzsches work… not the ideas themselves, which he claimed he came up with while walking, not while writing. I can’t help but suspect that the author was unable to understand or evaluate the ideas themselves- which has been mostly the case with all of the English language translations as well- it’s hard to understand a translation when the translator did not. Carl Jungs seminar on Zarathustra is in my opinion the best presentation and analysis of Nietzsche’s ideas in English- because Jung actually understood them.
How should one read Nietzsche without learning German?
There are no really easy answers there...
What I referenced above is the book I recommend, "Jung's Seminar on Nietzsche's Zarathustra." It is a transcription of academic lectures Carl Jung gave on Nietzsche- where he offers his own semi-translation and interpretation of the meaning.
I cannot think of a non-arrogant way to say this, so won't try (Nietzsche sure wouldn't have): but Nietzsche was an extremely smart person with subtle ideas, and most people- including academic translators that are supposed to be experts on his work, simply cannot understand his ideas, and therefore cannot translate them properly. One needs to be able to relate to his ideas from personal experience and (for lack of a better word) spiritual development, and also be able to appreciate complex nuance to really get it. This is confounded by the fact that Nietzsche had an obtuse style on purpose- he actively wanted his work to be exclusive, and not easily understandable, and actually often tried to be misleading or confusing on purpose. Carl Jung had a deep understanding of Nietzsche, that none of the English language translators have.
I have read all of his work, and it took me quite a while, including reading Jung's seminars to really feel I could grasp the bigger picture of his ideas. And once I did, I could clearly see that the translators who had translated and commented on his work were really only getting at the surface, and not really understanding- and then also choosing the wrong words when translating as a result, which was making it even harder to understand.
Also, if you are going to directly read his work, don't read Zarathustra first as it is an especially hard read- it is written in the style of an ancient religious text and not philosophy- The Gay Science would probably be my recommendation.
What I referenced above is the book I recommend, "Jung's Seminar on Nietzsche's Zarathustra." It is a transcription of academic lectures Carl Jung gave on Nietzsche- where he offers his own semi-translation and interpretation of the meaning.
I cannot think of a non-arrogant way to say this, so won't try (Nietzsche sure wouldn't have): but Nietzsche was an extremely smart person with subtle ideas, and most people- including academic translators that are supposed to be experts on his work, simply cannot understand his ideas, and therefore cannot translate them properly. One needs to be able to relate to his ideas from personal experience and (for lack of a better word) spiritual development, and also be able to appreciate complex nuance to really get it. This is confounded by the fact that Nietzsche had an obtuse style on purpose- he actively wanted his work to be exclusive, and not easily understandable, and actually often tried to be misleading or confusing on purpose. Carl Jung had a deep understanding of Nietzsche, that none of the English language translators have.
I have read all of his work, and it took me quite a while, including reading Jung's seminars to really feel I could grasp the bigger picture of his ideas. And once I did, I could clearly see that the translators who had translated and commented on his work were really only getting at the surface, and not really understanding- and then also choosing the wrong words when translating as a result, which was making it even harder to understand.
Also, if you are going to directly read his work, don't read Zarathustra first as it is an especially hard read- it is written in the style of an ancient religious text and not philosophy- The Gay Science would probably be my recommendation.
> where he offers his own semi-translation and interpretation of the meaning.
Jung's takes on Nietzsche are quite personal.
> Carl Jung had a deep understanding of Nietzsche, that none of the English language translators have.
That's extremely debatable.
Jung's takes on Nietzsche are quite personal.
> Carl Jung had a deep understanding of Nietzsche, that none of the English language translators have.
That's extremely debatable.
> That's extremely debatable
I completely agree. People will have different interpretations and perspectives on it, and there is often no way to know which is closer to what Nietzsche was thinking. Jung is certainly not without his own biases, and very unconventional framing of things. I don’t intend to claim that his perspective is perfect. I’d say he was mostly unique in having the courage to think about ideas from Nietzsche that made him personally uncomfortable, and not try to avoid it or pretend Nietzsche must have meant something else.
However it is a matter of degree- a lot of the translations and commentary have really egregious basic misinterpretation and misunderstandings.
I completely agree. People will have different interpretations and perspectives on it, and there is often no way to know which is closer to what Nietzsche was thinking. Jung is certainly not without his own biases, and very unconventional framing of things. I don’t intend to claim that his perspective is perfect. I’d say he was mostly unique in having the courage to think about ideas from Nietzsche that made him personally uncomfortable, and not try to avoid it or pretend Nietzsche must have meant something else.
However it is a matter of degree- a lot of the translations and commentary have really egregious basic misinterpretation and misunderstandings.
As the sole arbiter of the true and false interpretations of Nietzsche's writing, its not debatable.
I should have done a better job of adding some caveats to my recommendation of Jung- for example that his perspectives are indeed heavily biased through the lens of his own philosophy, and he mostly ignores things important to Nietzsche that don't relate to his own interests.
However, this type of sneering/mocking tone is unbecoming of HN discussions, and goes against the HN community guidelines.
However, this type of sneering/mocking tone is unbecoming of HN discussions, and goes against the HN community guidelines.
That you missed the irony of my comment makes me think the one I was responding too may have been correct about your views on Nietzsche.
They are correct.
Didn't Nietzsche's sister edit his texts heavily after his death?
Yes, but the original unedited texts still survive and are the basis for the better translations. Specially she edited his work to turn it into proto-Nazi antisemitic propaganda… which is something Nietzsche deeply disapproved of. To this day people associate Nietzsche with these ideas he abhorred, which is quite sad.
Kaufman translations are going to be the best you're going to get. He offers some helpful context in the footnotes through the books.
Kaufmann's are the best, but also still not good. Along with the translation he wrote detailed notes and commentary, and it is clear from that that he was often just completely missing Nietzsche's actual point.
The main thing Kaufmann had going for him was that he wasn't doing a motivated mis-translation of Nietzsche to support an agenda of white supremacy... which you'd think is a low bar, but it makes for the gold standard in Nietzsche translation apparently.
The main thing Kaufmann had going for him was that he wasn't doing a motivated mis-translation of Nietzsche to support an agenda of white supremacy... which you'd think is a low bar, but it makes for the gold standard in Nietzsche translation apparently.
For someone who writes all day every day, their ability to explore ideas is somewhat limited by the speed of their writing mechanism (hand v.s. machine), because they're not really "just sitting and thinking" most of the time but trying to "capture each thought" before moving to the next idea, which is laborious and slow.
So simply by being able to move faster along the process means you can fit more ideas into your short term memory, because you're traversing thru the ideas at a faster rate. Once you can fit more ideas in, then each idea can have room to become more complex. I think that's the "mechanism" (pun intended) by which your consciousness/intelligence improves simply by being able to write faster.
It's probably partially also why stimulant drugs can make people appear more intelligent. The faster you move thru ideas, the more information you can fit into working/reasoning memory. It's the same thing as lengthening the "context window" in an LLM btw.
So simply by being able to move faster along the process means you can fit more ideas into your short term memory, because you're traversing thru the ideas at a faster rate. Once you can fit more ideas in, then each idea can have room to become more complex. I think that's the "mechanism" (pun intended) by which your consciousness/intelligence improves simply by being able to write faster.
It's probably partially also why stimulant drugs can make people appear more intelligent. The faster you move thru ideas, the more information you can fit into working/reasoning memory. It's the same thing as lengthening the "context window" in an LLM btw.
I don't think this holds. That means given we have fast typists, our thinkers today should be way better than the ones who wrote by quill and ink. I don't think that's the case.
I think for mathematicians and certain fields, reading/writing can be slow without effecting productivity, or creativity, but when it comes to a "writer", speed is key. But you make a good point, because for example Newton invented Calculus but only had a quill.
Nietzsche is a very interesting example since there is a very obvious shift in his philosophy from The Birth of Tragedy to, say, The Gay Science. I understand the argument that the style of writing noticeably changes, and I'd be okay attributing that to "automated writing," but a lot of the shift in Nietzsche's work feels like a pretty drastic shift in ideology. I'm not convinced that shift entirely, or even largely, comes from the shift in medium.
I wouldn’t consider it a shift as much as a development- he kept landing on new ideas that built on his previous ones.
Focusing on his writing style rather than the ideas themselves feels a bit like bikeshedding to me. He claims he would come up with most of his ideas on walks and only later sit down to write about them- the process, according to him, was not central to the development of the philosophy- only the surface level presentation of it.
Focusing on his writing style rather than the ideas themselves feels a bit like bikeshedding to me. He claims he would come up with most of his ideas on walks and only later sit down to write about them- the process, according to him, was not central to the development of the philosophy- only the surface level presentation of it.
[deleted]
> To be precise, he purchased a top-of-the-line portable Malling-Hansen writing ball, which was sent specially to him from its inventor in Copenhagen.
Wikiepdia link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hansen_Writing_Ball
Wikiepdia link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hansen_Writing_Ball
I remember reading about this in the past, but wasn't the main reason for this his syphilis and not the typewriter?
This story is also told in Nicholas Carr's bestseller 'The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains' https://www.nicholascarr.com/?page_id=16
Typing has a certain reward function to it: that snap-snap-snap is satisfying. I wonder if he just got addicted to it?
Of course, Nietzschean teaching is not identical with the official ideology of Hitlerism. It cannot be because Nietzsche stopped thinking on the eve of imperialism: for him the age of imperialist barbarism is still a dream of the future, while fascist ideology arose as a repulsive product of decay of developed imperialism. This difference in periods also determines the difference in intellectual and aesthetic level. Nietzsche is a man of broad and varied culture, in contrast to the ignorance of Hitler or Goering, the boastful half-education of a Rosenberg or Goebbels; For all his mannerisms, he is a witty and important stylist who – albeit often problematically – has nevertheless worked creatively in language, in contrast to the barbarization and rape of the German language under Hitlerian tyranny. In addition, one could also point out many individual deviations. Nietzsche always despised anti-Semitism.
Despite all these conceptual, aesthetic, and moral differences, Rosenberg rightly named Nietzsche the ancestor of German fascism. For Nietzsche carried the glorification of barbarism into German philosophy, and the more justly one assesses his intellectual abilities, his cultural-critical work, the more clearly one must see that the change he made created the basis for that reactionary development in German ideology, from which fascism then drew its intellectual arsenal.
In other words, only he who acknowledges unflinchingly and without any reservations that murder is under no circumstances to be sanctioned can commit the murderous deed that is truly — and tragically — moral. To express this sense of the most profound human tragedy in the incomparably beautiful words of Hebbel’s Judith: “Even if God had placed sin between me and the deed enjoined upon me — who am I to be able to escape it?”
… we Communists are like Judas. It is our bloody work to crucify Christ. But this sinful work is at the same time our calling: only through death on the cross does Christ become God, and this is necessary to be able to save the world. We Communists then take the sins of the world upon us, in order to be able thereby to save the world.
Dionysus versus the “Crucified” there you have the antithesis. It is not a difference in regard to their martyrdom—it is a difference in the meaning of it. Life itself, its eternal fruitfulness and recurrence, creates torment, destruction, the will to annihilation. In the other case, suffering—the “Crucified as the innocent one”—counts as an objection to this life, as a formula for its condemnation.—One will see that the problem is that of the meaning of suffering: whether a Christian meaning or a tragic meaning. In the former case, it is supposed to be the path to a holy being; in the latter case, being is counted as holy enough to justify even a monstrous amount of suffering. The tragic man affirms even the harshest suffering ... Dionysus cut to pieces is a promise of life: it will be eternally reborn and return again from destruction.
> “Tactics and Ethics” – 1919
See [0] for the direct source, and see if you can find that quote. That is actually quote by Russian revolutionary Boris Savinkov. The relevant Lukacs quote is the following
> Quoted in Daniel Lopez, "The Conversion of Georg Lukács"
That is very far from a verified quote. In fact even the 'Jacobin' article you probably got it from states that it is according to an account by a Social Democratic observer [1]. Social Democrats and Georg Lukacs didn't exactly get along. It is also stylistically not Lukacs, and it would be very strange for Lukacs to talk about Judas in a positive light. Lukacs was a proponent of revolutionary asceticism and discipline. Judas being a historical embodiment of betrayal wouldn't be seen as a positive figure.
> The will to power
You can complain all you want that Hitler and whole of far right misread Nietzsche's Will to Power, extract him from his historical significance and look at his words in abstract, however the objective historical fact remains that Nietzsche had a tremendous influence on Fascism and Nazism (and likely continues to do so) and that is not an accident.
[0] https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1919/tactics-e...
[1] https://jacobin.com/2019/01/lukacs-hungary-marx-philosophy-c...
See [0] for the direct source, and see if you can find that quote. That is actually quote by Russian revolutionary Boris Savinkov. The relevant Lukacs quote is the following
ethical self-awareness makes it quite clear that there are situations — tragic situations — in which it is impossible to act without burdening oneself with guilt. But at the same time it teaches us that, even faced with the choice of two ways of incurring guilt, we should still find that there is a standard attaching to correct and incorrect action. This standard we call sacrifice. And just as the individual who chooses between two forms of guilt finally makes the correct choice when he sacrifices his inferior self on the altar of the higher idea, so it also takes strength to assess this sacrifice in terms of the collective action.
> Quoted in Daniel Lopez, "The Conversion of Georg Lukács"
That is very far from a verified quote. In fact even the 'Jacobin' article you probably got it from states that it is according to an account by a Social Democratic observer [1]. Social Democrats and Georg Lukacs didn't exactly get along. It is also stylistically not Lukacs, and it would be very strange for Lukacs to talk about Judas in a positive light. Lukacs was a proponent of revolutionary asceticism and discipline. Judas being a historical embodiment of betrayal wouldn't be seen as a positive figure.
> The will to power
You can complain all you want that Hitler and whole of far right misread Nietzsche's Will to Power, extract him from his historical significance and look at his words in abstract, however the objective historical fact remains that Nietzsche had a tremendous influence on Fascism and Nazism (and likely continues to do so) and that is not an accident.
[0] https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1919/tactics-e...
[1] https://jacobin.com/2019/01/lukacs-hungary-marx-philosophy-c...
You're right to point out I misattributed the quote from "Tactics and Ethics".
The point I wanted to make is that the parallels between Nietzsche and Lukács abound in these passages. Both advocate for a kind of "ethical self-awareness" that is attuned to "sacrifice in terms of the collective action" which leads to the "most profound human tragedy".
>The tragic man affirms even the harshest suffering
"Sacrifices his inferior self on the altar of the higher idea" even sounds like Nietzsche concept of übermensch.
As for the accusation that I
>complain all [I] want that Hitler and whole of far right misread Nietzsche's Will to Power
, this wasn't my goal, and the fact you went on misinterpreting my words – whereas someone with a virgin mind with respect to these matters would have seen the obvious parallels I pointed out, and nothing more - shows how bound you are to adversariality, as you fail to realize there is heavy irony in blaming the outcome of Nazism, on top of marxist ideology, which did worse and collapsed onto itself. But I guess marxism is but an avatar of Dionysos:
>Dionysos cut into pieces is a promise of Life: it will be forever born anew and rise afresh from destruction
As Girard once said,
>The peoples of the world do not invent their gods. They deify [vilify] their victims.
>It is not difference that dominates the world, but the obliteration of difference by mimetic reciprocity, which itself, being truly universal, shows the relativism of perpetual difference to be an illusion.
Aditionnally,
https://arxiv.org/pdf/0806.4164
The point I wanted to make is that the parallels between Nietzsche and Lukács abound in these passages. Both advocate for a kind of "ethical self-awareness" that is attuned to "sacrifice in terms of the collective action" which leads to the "most profound human tragedy".
>The tragic man affirms even the harshest suffering
"Sacrifices his inferior self on the altar of the higher idea" even sounds like Nietzsche concept of übermensch.
As for the accusation that I
>complain all [I] want that Hitler and whole of far right misread Nietzsche's Will to Power
, this wasn't my goal, and the fact you went on misinterpreting my words – whereas someone with a virgin mind with respect to these matters would have seen the obvious parallels I pointed out, and nothing more - shows how bound you are to adversariality, as you fail to realize there is heavy irony in blaming the outcome of Nazism, on top of marxist ideology, which did worse and collapsed onto itself. But I guess marxism is but an avatar of Dionysos:
>Dionysos cut into pieces is a promise of Life: it will be forever born anew and rise afresh from destruction
As Girard once said,
>The peoples of the world do not invent their gods. They deify [vilify] their victims.
>It is not difference that dominates the world, but the obliteration of difference by mimetic reciprocity, which itself, being truly universal, shows the relativism of perpetual difference to be an illusion.
Aditionnally,
δῐᾰ́βολος: slanderous; libellous
שָׂטָן (śāṭān): Satan, adversary, opponent
κᾰτηγορέω: to speak against, especially before judges, to accuse, to denounce publicly. from κᾰτᾰ- (kata-, “against”) + ἀγορεύω (agoreúō, “to speak in assembly”).
https://arxiv.org/pdf/0806.4164
> this wasn't my goal, and the fact you went on misinterpreting my words
What words? I posted a quote by George Lukacs to draw attention to relationship between Nietzsche and the rise of Nazism and Fascism. You responded with two false quotes from Lukacs in an attempt to draw parallels between Lukacs and Nietzsche. I would think that affirmation of sacrifice for the greater good is not really that profound a topic to draw parallels on
What words? I posted a quote by George Lukacs to draw attention to relationship between Nietzsche and the rise of Nazism and Fascism. You responded with two false quotes from Lukacs in an attempt to draw parallels between Lukacs and Nietzsche. I would think that affirmation of sacrifice for the greater good is not really that profound a topic to draw parallels on
post theme: https://files.catbox.moe/g7farj.mp3
Bayer starts with quoting various chronicles on atrocities committed on the Jewish population at the time of the Hungarian Council Republic in 1919, which he described as a “rat revolt” to show “how the Bolsheviks, majority-led by Jews, were dealing with people of their kind.” Subsequently, he asks, “How did these animals deal with non-Jews?” In this context, he recounts a story that has emerged again and again since the 1990s. At the end of the First World War, Lukács as a peoples’ commissar took part or even ordered the execution of seven or eight deserters while defending the Hungarian frontier against Romanian troops. The truthfulness of this anecdote has often been doubted, most recently and in detail by András Lengyel, a Hungarian scholar on the history of literature. There are no witnesses to the execution, nor graves, nor documents that would testify the funerals. The trial in this matter, which took place in 1919 after the failure of the Council Republic, condemned the allegedly executing red armist merely on the basis of the fact, that the executions might have taken place according to the usual practice. What is spicy about this episode is, that Lukács talks about the event in the autobiographical interview volume Lived thinking and says that he ordered the execution to restore morality. If the executions were carried out, their purpose was to defend the Hungarian frontier against the Western-backed Romanian troops. So questionable the practice of the execution of deserters is, the soldiers were familiar with it from the Austro-Hungarian Army in the First World War. If the execution had been ordered by Horthy or one of his officers, it would be considered a justifiable measure out of patriotic motives by those, who now claim, Lukács was a mass murderer.
Bayer not only uses this episode to insinuate double standards to Lukács’ defenders, who at the same time condemn the antisemite Hóman, but also deliberately creates a parallel between the Bolsheviks “majority-led by Jews” in 1919 and the defenders of Lukács today: “This is an announcement: enough with the intellectual terror, and with the fact, that ‘Lukácsists’ have been deciding who is in the pantheon of intellectual life for a good half century and who is not. And quite generally, it’s enough with you.”
source: https://transform-network.net/blog/article/the-destruction-o...
Bayer starts with quoting various chronicles on atrocities committed on the Jewish population at the time of the Hungarian Council Republic in 1919, which he described as a “rat revolt” to show “how the Bolsheviks, majority-led by Jews, were dealing with people of their kind.” Subsequently, he asks, “How did these animals deal with non-Jews?” In this context, he recounts a story that has emerged again and again since the 1990s. At the end of the First World War, Lukács as a peoples’ commissar took part or even ordered the execution of seven or eight deserters while defending the Hungarian frontier against Romanian troops. The truthfulness of this anecdote has often been doubted, most recently and in detail by András Lengyel, a Hungarian scholar on the history of literature. There are no witnesses to the execution, nor graves, nor documents that would testify the funerals. The trial in this matter, which took place in 1919 after the failure of the Council Republic, condemned the allegedly executing red armist merely on the basis of the fact, that the executions might have taken place according to the usual practice. What is spicy about this episode is, that Lukács talks about the event in the autobiographical interview volume Lived thinking and says that he ordered the execution to restore morality. If the executions were carried out, their purpose was to defend the Hungarian frontier against the Western-backed Romanian troops. So questionable the practice of the execution of deserters is, the soldiers were familiar with it from the Austro-Hungarian Army in the First World War. If the execution had been ordered by Horthy or one of his officers, it would be considered a justifiable measure out of patriotic motives by those, who now claim, Lukács was a mass murderer.
Bayer not only uses this episode to insinuate double standards to Lukács’ defenders, who at the same time condemn the antisemite Hóman, but also deliberately creates a parallel between the Bolsheviks “majority-led by Jews” in 1919 and the defenders of Lukács today: “This is an announcement: enough with the intellectual terror, and with the fact, that ‘Lukácsists’ have been deciding who is in the pantheon of intellectual life for a good half century and who is not. And quite generally, it’s enough with you.”
source: https://transform-network.net/blog/article/the-destruction-o...
Whattabunchofwords
Small nitpick
> It took hold of human consciousness 3,000 years ago and changed it, with the written word representing thought itself.
Writing is at least about 5500 years old.
> It took hold of human consciousness 3,000 years ago and changed it, with the written word representing thought itself.
Writing is at least about 5500 years old.
Sounds like they count from approximately the origin of the first “alphabet” (including vowels), while writing itself is much much older.
Btw, I recommend anyone who hasn’t looked at it before to read up a bit on the history of writing. It shocked me a bit that writing has only been independently invented 4 times in known human history (Egypt, Middle East, China, Mesoamerica), with all other writing systems being either inspired or derived from nearby systems.
The English/Latin alphabet, for example, is a distant descendant of the Phoenician abjad, which itself was ultimately derived from Egyptian Hieroglyphs. Some traces are left today, like the letter “A” looking a bit like an up-side down bulls head with horns… because it actually descends from the hieroglyph for bull.
Interestingly, Arab, Hebrew, and Indic scripts are all derived from the same Phoenician ancestor, despite how different they all look today…
Btw, I recommend anyone who hasn’t looked at it before to read up a bit on the history of writing. It shocked me a bit that writing has only been independently invented 4 times in known human history (Egypt, Middle East, China, Mesoamerica), with all other writing systems being either inspired or derived from nearby systems.
The English/Latin alphabet, for example, is a distant descendant of the Phoenician abjad, which itself was ultimately derived from Egyptian Hieroglyphs. Some traces are left today, like the letter “A” looking a bit like an up-side down bulls head with horns… because it actually descends from the hieroglyph for bull.
Interestingly, Arab, Hebrew, and Indic scripts are all derived from the same Phoenician ancestor, despite how different they all look today…
> Interestingly, Arab, Hebrew, and Indic scripts are all derived from the same Phoenician ancestor, despite how different they all look today…
Same with Thai or... Mongolian - a not so distant cousin of Aramaic!
The fun thing about Mongolian is that to notice its similarity to Aramaic, you'll need to tilt your head by 90 degrees.
Compare this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongolian_script#/media/File:M...
With this: https://www.avesta.org/fonts/index.html
Now look at the first picture again and tilt your head.
I’m a bit embarrassed to admit that, although I studied Middle Persian and Avestan (both of which rely on a variant of Aramaic), it took me almost 15 years to notice that. Now, it’s impossible to unsee.
Same with Thai or... Mongolian - a not so distant cousin of Aramaic!
The fun thing about Mongolian is that to notice its similarity to Aramaic, you'll need to tilt your head by 90 degrees.
Compare this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mongolian_script#/media/File:M...
With this: https://www.avesta.org/fonts/index.html
Now look at the first picture again and tilt your head.
I’m a bit embarrassed to admit that, although I studied Middle Persian and Avestan (both of which rely on a variant of Aramaic), it took me almost 15 years to notice that. Now, it’s impossible to unsee.
Yes, however Sumer were unique in hitting upon the idea of glyphs representing sounds, rather than ideograms, which seem to develop fairly frequently and independently. It did take the better part of 1500 years for them to make that breakthrough, but the result was enormous, and allowed the storage and transmission of information with much greater efficiency and nuance.
> It shocked me a bit that writing has only been independently invented 4 times in known human history
In the middle east alone there are several ancestral writing systems that can't be traced to a single origin.
In the middle east alone there are several ancestral writing systems that can't be traced to a single origin.
Source and examples?
Note the focus on "independently" invented, and that I said "inspired or derived from nearby systems". There are many examples of writing systems that were made "from scratch" but only after contact with other civilizations that were already writing - e.g. the Korean Hangeul was designed from scratch, but only after millenia of Chinese literacy in Korea; and the Cherokee syllabary was designed from scratch, but only after centuries of contact with Western colonizers including access to their existing writing tools. If this is the kind of process you meant you meant with "multiple ancestral alphabets", I completely agree. But those were not "independent" inventions of "writing" as a concept. The idea of denoting ideas/sounds on paper is much harder to invent than the specific symbols mapped to each idea/sound.
My understanding is that the consensus in the literature is that all writing systems in the Middle East were either derived from an existing writing system, or created from scratch after prolonged contact with neighboring civilizations that could already write, where these historical lines can be drawn all the way back to Hieroglyphs and Cuneiform. I believe there is little evidence to suggest multiple inventions of writing as a concept by isolated groups in the region.
As for major writing systems that are still in use today across Europe, North Africa, the Middle East, and much of Asia, there's even less variety: I believe most of them are ultimately descended from Phoenician.
Note the focus on "independently" invented, and that I said "inspired or derived from nearby systems". There are many examples of writing systems that were made "from scratch" but only after contact with other civilizations that were already writing - e.g. the Korean Hangeul was designed from scratch, but only after millenia of Chinese literacy in Korea; and the Cherokee syllabary was designed from scratch, but only after centuries of contact with Western colonizers including access to their existing writing tools. If this is the kind of process you meant you meant with "multiple ancestral alphabets", I completely agree. But those were not "independent" inventions of "writing" as a concept. The idea of denoting ideas/sounds on paper is much harder to invent than the specific symbols mapped to each idea/sound.
My understanding is that the consensus in the literature is that all writing systems in the Middle East were either derived from an existing writing system, or created from scratch after prolonged contact with neighboring civilizations that could already write, where these historical lines can be drawn all the way back to Hieroglyphs and Cuneiform. I believe there is little evidence to suggest multiple inventions of writing as a concept by isolated groups in the region.
As for major writing systems that are still in use today across Europe, North Africa, the Middle East, and much of Asia, there's even less variety: I believe most of them are ultimately descended from Phoenician.
Thank you, this is fascinating! Do you have any recommended reading?
Unfortunately, I don’t recall exactly which sources I read on this, it was many years ago. I just recall that it started as one of those “wild link chases” on Wikipedia and ended up deep in some downloaded textbook PDFs :)
But I do recall enjoying diagrams such as this illustrating how different modern alphabets are related via historical counterparts (there are similar diagrams showing how Hebrew and Arabic emerges from Phoenician, as well as comparisons to runes): https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brahmi_script#/media/File%3A...
I also rather enjoyed reading about the history from Hieroglyphs, to Hieratic, to Phoenician (as well as Phoenician history in general). But unfortunately, don’t recall where. Start with Wikipedia :)
But I do recall enjoying diagrams such as this illustrating how different modern alphabets are related via historical counterparts (there are similar diagrams showing how Hebrew and Arabic emerges from Phoenician, as well as comparisons to runes): https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brahmi_script#/media/File%3A...
I also rather enjoyed reading about the history from Hieroglyphs, to Hieratic, to Phoenician (as well as Phoenician history in general). But unfortunately, don’t recall where. Start with Wikipedia :)
Thanks! I used to have an old dictionary that traced the evolution of the letters, it was quite cool. There is a book 'Textual Scholarship' by Greetham that goes deep on the more modern letterforms like Uncial. I haven't cracked that in a while.
I would've loved to see more concrete examples of the evolution of Nietzsche's writings and ideas pre- and post-typewriter adoption, and maybe what does that mean for Nietzsche's legacy as a whole.