linguistic relativism

Looking at more of the ideas explored in Adam Gopnik's piece:
Jay Doubleyou: how much really gets lost in translation?

... there is something called 'linguistic relativism':
that language determines thought
Linguistic relativity - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sapir–Whorf hypothesis


Does language shape how we think? Linguistic relativity & linguistic determinism. - YouTube

But there's a different view:

Japanese has a term that covers both green and blue. Russian has separate terms for dark and light blue. Does this mean that Russians perceive these colors differently from Japanese people? Does language control and limit the way we think? 

This short, opinionated book addresses the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, which argues that the language we speak shapes the way we perceive the world. Linguist John McWhorter argues that while this idea is mesmerizing, it is plainly wrong. It is language that reflects culture and worldview, not the other way around. The fact that a language has only one word for eat, drink, and smoke doesn't mean its speakers don't process the difference between food and beverage, and those who use the same word for blue and green perceive those two colors just as vividly as others do. 

The Language Hoax: John H. McWhorter - Oxford University Press

Adam Gopnik explores these ideas in his piece - and takes us to George Orwell, who was no fan of how politicians would manipulate language:
Jay Doubleyou: eschew obfuscation

Curiously, McWhorter only briefly dismisses the author who continues to give linguistic relativism its greatest cachet among literate people: George Orwell, whose essay “Politics and the English Language” (1946) made the claim that the debasement of thought cannot be separated from the debasement of language. Criticizing Orwell is as offensive to most humanists as criticizing Aquinas is to Catholics, but the essay gives mere obfuscation a cognitive power it never had. Orwell rightly detested double-talk, cheap euphemism, and deliberate obscurity—the language of “strategic hamlets” and “enhanced interrogation,” and all the other phrases that are used to muddy up meaning. But euphemism is a moral problem, not a cognitive one. When Dick Cheney calls torture “enhanced interrogation,” it doesn’t make us understand torture in a different way; it’s just a means for those who know they’re doing something wrong to find a phrase that doesn’t immediately acknowledge the wrongdoing. If the strong form of linguistic relativism were true, then not having the correct phrase or being forced to use a weird one would change our perception of what’s taking place. There’s no evidence that this happens. Whatever name Cheney’s men gave torture, they knew what it was. A grotesque euphemism is offensive exactly because we recognize perfectly well the mismatch between the word and its referent. It’s an instrument of evasion, like a speeding getaway car, not an instrument of unconsciousness, like a blackjack.

Word Magic - The New Yorker

See also:
Jay Doubleyou: propaganda, public relations and manufacturing consent
Jay Doubleyou: plain guide to english
Jay Doubleyou: turn off your tv
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