E-Prime is English without the verb "to be." I read a quote somewhere by someone that it is an effective way of teaching the scientific way of thinking, removing the ability to make god-like declarations about the nature of reality. Albert Ellis suggested that it is useful for therapy.
You know, it actually helps for self-reflection. Many times in thinking we are confused about where the emphasis ought to be. Is the fault with me? Ought I not to blame myself? How should I feel? E-Prime has a way of obviating the problem by acting as a compass where you only need to follow the needle and see where you end up.
For example, instead of thinking "I am sorry," in E-Prime I ended up thinking "I want the problem to stop." This is a revealing conclusion, because wanting the problem to stop does not mean that I am doing anything to stop it.
Today I was reflecting on another mistake, and E-Prime led me to "I acknowledge that I failed to meet expectations in an egregious manner, and now that I put it that way, I realize that I have a lot of work to do before I intuitively understand the gravity of my error." This is considerably more useful than the "sorry" that came naturally, and importantly, it helps me clearly understand my state of mind- I didn't say "I feel terrible about it," instead I said "maybe I should feel terrible about it, but I need to put in some effort before that can happen."
This complexity is easily masked in "I am sorry," which can include anything from "I regret the choice" to "I recognize that I must offer an apology for social harmony" to "I feel horrible about this." It seems more about belonging to a category than anything specific.
Fun: reading Wikipedia, the creator, D. David Bourland Jr, studied under Korzybski. The same Alfred Korzybski who coined 'the map is not the territory'.
Wiki's short list of people who Korzybski influenced in the sidebar is somewhat surreal. Robert Heinlein, Alan Watts, Robert Anton Wilson...seems like one of those people worth revisiting, to get a fresh take on a source of modern knowledge.
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Notes -
E-Prime is English without the verb "to be." I read a quote somewhere by someone that it is an effective way of teaching the scientific way of thinking, removing the ability to make god-like declarations about the nature of reality. Albert Ellis suggested that it is useful for therapy.
You know, it actually helps for self-reflection. Many times in thinking we are confused about where the emphasis ought to be. Is the fault with me? Ought I not to blame myself? How should I feel? E-Prime has a way of obviating the problem by acting as a compass where you only need to follow the needle and see where you end up.
For example, instead of thinking "I am sorry," in E-Prime I ended up thinking "I want the problem to stop." This is a revealing conclusion, because wanting the problem to stop does not mean that I am doing anything to stop it.
Today I was reflecting on another mistake, and E-Prime led me to "I acknowledge that I failed to meet expectations in an egregious manner, and now that I put it that way, I realize that I have a lot of work to do before I intuitively understand the gravity of my error." This is considerably more useful than the "sorry" that came naturally, and importantly, it helps me clearly understand my state of mind- I didn't say "I feel terrible about it," instead I said "maybe I should feel terrible about it, but I need to put in some effort before that can happen."
This complexity is easily masked in "I am sorry," which can include anything from "I regret the choice" to "I recognize that I must offer an apology for social harmony" to "I feel horrible about this." It seems more about belonging to a category than anything specific.
Fun: reading Wikipedia, the creator, D. David Bourland Jr, studied under Korzybski. The same Alfred Korzybski who coined 'the map is not the territory'.
Wiki's short list of people who Korzybski influenced in the sidebar is somewhat surreal. Robert Heinlein, Alan Watts, Robert Anton Wilson...seems like one of those people worth revisiting, to get a fresh take on a source of modern knowledge.
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