Communication -- What It Is, and Who Uses It?

Communication -- What it is, and who uses it? • • • • • • • If I were asked to give an example of one thing in the Universe which is a prime example of the word "ubiquitous," it would be "communication." For our purposes, communication can be defined as the transfer of information by a signal -- a pattern of organized energy. Everything communicates--animate and inanimate objects alike. You have but to stare into space on a clear night to receive messages sent thousands of years ago from some far away inanimate object--perhaps a distant sun. It may be just a twinkle of light to you and me. But in its pattern of electro-magnetic energy, for those who can read it, is enough information to fill a book. It tells us about the distance of the star from earth, it's direction and speed of movement, it's temperature, it's chemical consistency, it's speed of rotation, and more. Our own sun, among other things, occasionally experiences severe magnetic storms. Both in-animate and animate objects communicate. • This information is communicated to earth within eight minutes. Earth may respond in ways that cause interference in radio communications and/or the appearance of a visual display in the sky, called the Aurora Borealis or (Northern Lights). • • • • When we go to our favorite antique shop to look at objects nearly 100 years old, we may pass on the way, hillside rocks that are over a million years old. If we had the technology to listen to them, we could hear them telling us their age. In the animate domain, plants find communication essential for survival. Plants respond to communications from both the non living (e.g., water, and sunlight, etc.), and the living worlds (e.g., other plants and insects). In regards to the communications of insects and other higher phylogenetic species, psycholinguists have classified their messages along two parameters: the type of signal and the type of message. There are two types of signals: graded & combinative. • • There are two types of signals: graded and combinative. Graded signals are energy patterns that change along some continuum, for example from soft to loud. If you change the degree of the stimulus, you change the message. • • • Imagine speaking at the top of your voice versus a whisper. People would react differently to each instance. Pitch, tension, and color are other examples of signals that can vary from more to less on a graded continuum. Combinative signals are energy patterns that occur in sequence. If you change the order of the sequence, you change the meaning of the message. Certainly, speech is a prime example of a combinative signal. There are three types of messages: Nominal, Expressive and Predicative. • There are three types of messages: Nominal, Expressive (sometimes called Emotional) and Predicative, (sometimes called Propositional). Nominal messages are carried by signals called signs. • • • • Nominal messages are relatively instinctive and controlled by internal body processes. If my stomach keeps rumbling, for example, it may signify to a listener that I am hungry, even if I say I?m not. The rumbling sound is a signal that we will call a sign. This is analogous to the bell in Pavlov's famous dog experiment. You may remember that he rang a bell every time just before the dog was fed. Soon the bell alone signified food and caused the dog to salivate. • (Please, however, don't relate this type of sign to the word "sign" used in referring to Sign Language.) A stomach rumbling is a nominal sign indicating that someone is probably hungry. • • • • Communications using signals which are signs, such as my stomach rumbling, may be important but they are NOT examples of language, as we will be defining it later. A stomach rumble is a nominal sign because it is an instinctive response arising from internal body processes. I have no control over it. It is graded in the sense that the more loudly or frequently it rumbles, the hungrier I appear to be to someone who hears it. Incidentally, if you are not familiar with rumbling stomachs, you should rent the old movie, "The African Queen. There is an interesting scene at the beginning of the movie which exemplifies this point.