Are private languages ever possible?

Question

Wittgenstein said no, because (crudely) to have a language you need to be communicating and if more than one person understands your language, it's not private.

Even a so-called secret language, in e.g. a diary, is just a bunch of cryptic symbols. Language only begins in communication.

What do you think?

Answer 1

Possible, now of course you said possible... it is and I think why is because I've noticed that sometimes chilldren make up intensely imaginative sounds and actions in play that don't correlate with "society norms"... it's like saying is language personal and adaptive. it can be.

However, wittgenstein does make sense. you must communicate (travel between two parts) in order for it to be considered a language... otherwise it may just be considered gibberish.

But to answer your question I do believe that it may be possible to have a personal language... langauges aren't only verbal they can encompass a whole slew of different actions as well.

take care...

Answer 2

I don't agree with Wittgenstein.

Wether or not you communicate with others doesn't matter.

What would you call those cryptic symbols?

I would call it a language.

I think as long as it would be possible to use it as a way to communicate with others, it's a language.

Answer 3

Nice to see someone on here asking a decent question!  

I've always had a problem with this private language thing, and it stems from my views on agency.  I would agree that a private language is impossible, but not for the reasons old crinkly forehead favored (or perhaps in addition to them?).

I would say that a private language is impossible not (only?) for the linguistic reasons, but for the privacy ones!  

Let's see, we are crudely defining language as communicative symbols right?  One assumption being that communication requires a minimum of two agents?  This comes, I assume from something to do with content and meaning...On the one hand, it seems to me that meaning could be imbued in symbols by intention alone, but that's not the point I'm trying to get at here...

The point I'm trying to get at is something like this: there is no privacy!  If this is correct, in the sense I mean it (wink), then of course the answer to the question becomes negative/meaningless.  Only if you view the agent, the Language-Creator, as a coherent, consistent, persistent Ego, some solitary, sedentary, solipsistic "I" of some sort, is it even POSSIBLE to have a private language.  

What about this...To communicate, meaning must be imported into symbols, and extracted correctly.  What if a scientist invented a notation system which helped him write things down in his particular laboratory conditions, but never taught anyone else the "meaning" of his symbols.  He takes all his notes in a purely "private" language.  During the course of making these notes, he stumbles upon a great scientific discovery, but does not realize its import at the time.  20 years later, after he has forgotten the content of the discovery, but he still remembers the language, he is re-reading his notes and this time he does realize the importance!  Where would this content come from if not from the language?  

Sort of what I'm saying is, are we really taking into consideration the time element, the "four-dimensionality" of human existence?  Is it private from the same person, viewing it at a different time?

What about a multiple personality patient or a schizophrenic, can they make a language?  From whom is that private?

Anyway, thanks for asking, hope this drivel means something to someone other than me!

Answer 4

Wittgenstein is right for the most obvious of reasons: a language has to carry some meaning.  If a person creates his or her own meaning from nothingness (those "cryptic symbols" you mention, though symbols is not the right term because symbols have meaning), then they are engaged in a tautological, and therefore, fundamentally meaningless pursuit.  After all, those graphemes they are using as representative devices are predicated on a knowledge of another set of linguistic values (their mother tongue, for example).  No human starts a language from scratch, from birth, and does so wholly privately.

Answer 5

wittgenstein was right. it wouldnt be possible. if a human being were completely alone or raised by wolves he would not have a language in which to express his thoughts or feelings.

and as you said symbols realy cant be considered a language. the yare just symbols. a person cannot create a complex intricate system of words to communicate only to himself. it just wouldnt make sense without an other person to communicate with.

Answer 6

i feel yes everyone has a private language that they use when communicating with themselves it is unwritten and unspoken and used in the thought process and unexplainable to anyone else