
" Rules of Language http://pinker.wjh.harvard.edu/articles/papers/Pinker%20Rules%20of%20Language.pdf," Science (August 2, 1991)
The Status Of Linguistics As A Science (1929), p. 69 <!-- 1958 edition -->
Context: Human beings do not live in the objective world alone, nor alone in the world of social activity as ordinarily understood, but are very much at the mercy of the particular language which has become the medium of expression for their society. It is quite an illusion to imagine that one adjusts to reality essentially without the use of language and that language is merely an incidental means of solving specific problems of communication or reflection. The fact of the matter is that the "real world" is to a large extent unconsciously built upon the language habits of the group. No two languages are ever sufficiently similar to be considered as representing the same social reality. The worlds in which different societies live are distinct worlds, not merely the same world with different labels attached … We see and hear and otherwise experience very largely as we do because the language habits of our community predispose certain choices of interpretation.
" Rules of Language http://pinker.wjh.harvard.edu/articles/papers/Pinker%20Rules%20of%20Language.pdf," Science (August 2, 1991)
“Man was formed for society and is neither capable of living alone, nor has the courage to do it.”
Commentaries on the Laws of England (1765–1769)
Source: Introduction, Section II: Of the Nature of Laws in General
“We do not die. Each human being is alone in the world.”
The Inferno (1917), Ch. XIV
Context: We do not die. Each human being is alone in the world. It seems absurd, contradictory to say this, and yet it is so. But there are many human beings like me. No, we cannot say that. In saying that, we set ourselves outside the truth in a kind of abstraction. All we can say is: I am alone.
And that is why we do not die.
[Swami Tapasyananda, Swami Nikhilananda, Sri Sarada Devi, the Holy Mother; Life and Conversations, 361]
Journals VII 1A 363
1840s, The Journals of Søren Kierkegaard, 1840s
Context: Deep within every human being there still lives the anxiety over the possibility of being alone in the world, forgotten by God, overlooked among the millions and millions in this enormous household. One keeps this anxiety at a distance by looking at the many round about who are related to him as kin and friends, but the anxiety is still there, nevertheless, and one hardly dares think of how he would feel if all this were taken away.
“Socialism cannot conquer nor redeem the world if it ceases to believe upon itself alone.”
No Compromise – No Political Trading (1899)
1920s, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1922)
Context: This remark provides the key to the problem, how much truth there is in solipsism. For what the solipsist means is quite correct; only it cannot be said, but makes itself manifest. The world is my world: this is manifest in the fact that the limits of language (of that language which alone I understand) mean the limits of my world. (5.62)