The Mystery of Language

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McCarthy: Language is lateralized heavily. It's on one side of the brain and it split brain patients, you can show that they're perceiving stuff in a way that isn't non-linguistic. He says there is a process here to which we have no access. McCarthy just admits that this is something that like it's not even clear how we could get an answer. So he says, it might even solve math without using numbers.

The Summer of Cormac McCarthy continues – this time we dive into his one piece of non-fiction, the short essay “The Kekulé Problem.” How does our unconscious mind solve problems that conscious deliberation can’t crack? Why does it often work elliptically, in code, rather than giving us the answer directly in language? Is McCarthy right that the unconscious doesn’t trust language because it’s such a newcomer to the human brain?

Plus we select the finalists for our listener selected episode – thanks to our beloved patrons for all their terrific suggestions!

"The Kekulé Problem" by Cormac McCarthy

Pinker & Bloom 1990

Dijksterhuis & Strick 2016