Today, in a session with some really smart health care people, we talked about the power of words. Of course, we've talked about that here, as well. Some of the things we talked about were: how MDs and nurses have different definitions of "training;" how physicians think they own the term "doctor." And so on.

However, interestingly, the group presenting for the day cited Whorf and Sapir as experts in linguistics and concluded from their work that cultures are defined by their languages. We have discussed that here many times.

I was going to leave it alone. However, tonight we all got an email from one of the participants about an excellent article in the NY Times; it may have even been posted here before.

I was wondering, if a rich debate on this ensues, what might you recommend? Are there any good Language Log entries on this, for example?

Are there any good Language Log entries on this, for example?

Many. Just go to the site and search on Whorf, Sapir, or one of their defenders in the news, and you'll find a whole bunch of posts.

I like this one. Also read Liberman's comments in this debate.

I am hoping the gentleman who sent that article out to everyone will become a member here. He said he wants to. I thought it was courageous of him to send that article out to the whole group. Wish it would have been I!