To name something-to separate Tit from the rest of existence and bestow a label on it is a foundational act. It is the beginning of understanding and control. In Genesis, the first thing God did after splitting light from darkness was to call the light "day" and the darkness "night." After Adam was created and let loose in the Garden of Eden, his original job was human label-maker. God brought him creatures "to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name."
If Adam was like most people, he probably set about attaching names to "natural kinds"-groupings seemingly dictated by inherent features of the natural world. Referring to a group of animals as "pigs," he would have assumed that the critters so designated all shared properties that differentiated them from every other non-pig animal. Psychologists say that we intuitively treat categorical distinctions-whether among fruits, emotions, or ethnic groups-as if (in Plato's famous metaphor) they carved nature at its joints.
Denne historien er fra May 13, 2024-utgaven av The New Yorker.
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Denne historien er fra May 13, 2024-utgaven av The New Yorker.
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ART OF STONE
\"The Brutalist.\"
MOMMA MIA
Audra McDonald triumphs in \"Gypsy\" on Broadway.
INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS
\"Black Doves,\" on Netflix.
NATURE STUDIES
Kyle Abraham's “Dear Lord, Make Me Beautiful.”
WHAT GOOD IS MORALITY?
Ask not just where it came from but what it does for us
THE SPOTIFY SYNDROME
What is the world's largest music-streaming platform really costing us?
THE LEPER - LEE CHANGDONG
. . . to survive, to hang on, waiting for the new world to dawn, what can you do but become a leper nobody in the world would deign to touch? - From \"Windy Evening,\" by Kim Seong-dong.
YOU WON'T GET FREE OF IT
Alice Munro's partner sexually abused her daughter. The harm ran through the work and the family.
TALK SENSE
How much sway does our language have over our thinking?
TO THE DETECTIVE INVESTIGATING MY MURDER
Dear Detective, I'm not dead, but a lot of people can't stand me. What I mean is that breathing is not an activity they want me to keep doing. What I mean is, they want to knock me off. My days are numbered.