hi - try this -

Our language divides our world and our experience in terms of subjects doing things to objects. - But what if this is not what is actually happening .. (maybe merely one way of describing it, one point of view).

In "The Way of Zen" Watts desribes how many old languages were made up of pictures. The ancient Chinese is probably the best known. Watts describes the picture of a stone hitting the water and the water rippling.

He explains how we think it is obvious : the stone hitting the water causes the ripples. But, to the Chinese mind it was obvious and needed no explanation - that yes: without the stone there would have been no ripples - but just as obvious that; without the ripples there would have been no stone!

Do nouns do things to objects ...? Is it all so clear cut?

We think something - i.e. we use our grammatical division of the world at least once every five seconds ... so around at least ten thousand times a day. We would normally expect such things to be highly hypnotic, with all the side effects of brainwashing.

If our grammatical division of the world does not exist in reality, or exists to some lesser extent - we would conclude that people were, to some extent, deluding themselves into feeling more isolated than they need be and also more lost ....

With the natural consequence of having to worry more than necessary, about building a counter delusion to cover up their impression (which has by now become a feeling) of being insecure.

crazy world ! :-)

Robin