Watch your mouth

“If thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.” — George Orwell

Scientists are making amazing strides in Artificial Intelligence, but what we really could use is more of the real thing. There seems to be plenty of the artificial stuff around, to the point where it’s become a polite euphemism for stupid: e.g., “Let us just say, ah, that Frank has a highly-developed artificial intelligence.”

We probably should put more time into improving real brains, those tofu skull-stuffers that have the very tricky task of initiating rational thought and guiding interactions with computers, the environment and each other while simultaneously operating the colon.

Brains are delicate and randomly assembled, beginning in the womb and continuing at least until the senior prom. They require constant attention and feeding in order to grow and function properly. Given today’s stressed education system (don’t even start with the Common Core/cursive writing stuff) and the time it takes to manage our nests of electronic devices that multiply like zombie rats, we’re lucky our brains learn to tie our shoes.

If cable news is any indication, many brains today are just not up to the task of figuring things out. Even scarier, many of them are not up to the task at the same time. Too many people who shouldn’t are letting their brains run their lives.

Take America’s ubiquitous mass shootings, for example. Each starts with a brain knitting together thoughts out of random scraps stored in dense tangles of neurons bathed in assorted chemicals, some from local bars, wineries and tasting rooms. Neuroscientists call this process “thinking.” Brains think constantly. Left unsupervised, they’ve been known to suddenly activate muscles that move the body parts necessary to punch a nearby face, or point a gun at Cecil the Lion and pull the trigger.

Human brain-operating code is written with environmental stimuli – spoken or written language, video, symbols, etc. Through brain-to-brain get-togethers (sometimes after-hours, after lots of beer), violent language and imagery that has been absorbed by one brain can eventually infect an entire culture, becoming as much a part of it as tattoos, or “awesome!”

If we note the often-subtle references to violence in everyday language we can appreciate how that could happen. Some examples:

• Child makes homework error. Dad says, “Take another shot at it.”
• We “set our sights” on goals, and “aim” high.
• Sports headline: “Dodgers Slay/Beat/Stomp/Annihilate/Crush Giants.”
• Verbal disagreements are “fights.”
• We buy “killer” apps and “shoes to die for.”
• A movie critique is a “hatchet-job;” co-workers are “back-stabbing.”
• Candidates “blast holes” in opposing arguments and “blow them out of the water.”
• Businesses “fire” employees, “stick it” to competitors, “cut the legs out from under them” and “bury” them.
• Surprising discoveries are “explosive!” and “blow us away.”

Violent language is the sina qua non of a culture in which even the imagery of love-making is routinely weaponized into a snarling “Go f**k yourself!”

And every so often, the flammable neuro-chemical language stored in the cluttered garage of somebody’s skull is sparked by a random thought, word or deed. The spark races through the web of neurons, down an arm and into a hand that jerks a gun in another’s face, and pulls the trigger.

Marinated since childhood in violent language and symbolism, perhaps people who do such things were just talked into it.