The formal logic of “request-response” in learning English: the advantages of programmers

I always say that the most talented linguists are programmers. This is due to their way of thinking, or, if you want, with some professional deformation.

For the disclosure of the topic I will give a few life stories. When there was a shortage in the USSR, and my husband was a little boy, his parents somewhere got sausage and served on the table for the holiday. The guests left, the boy looked at the sausage remaining on the table, cut into neat circles, and asked if she needed more. “Take it!” - the parents allowed. Well, he took it, went to the yard, and began using sausage to teach neighboring cats to walk on their hind legs. Mum and dad saw and were outraged by squandering a scarce product. And the boy was perplexed, and even offended. After all, he didn’t sneak off quietly, but honestly asked if there was a need for more sausage ...

Needless to say, this boy, when he grew up, became a programmer.

By the mature age of such funny stories, the IT specialist has accumulated a lot. For example, once I asked my husband to buy a chicken. Larger and whiter in color for the bird to be. He proudly brought home a huge white duck. I asked if he really even for the price (the duck is much more expensive) did not think about whether he was buying the bird? The answer to me was: “Well, you didn’t say anything about the price. She said the bird is bigger and whiter. I chose the largest and most white plucked bird from the entire range! I completed the task. ”I breathed a sigh of relief, thanking heaven for myself that there was no turkey in the store that day. In general, the dinner was a duck.

Well, and a lot of other situations in which a person unprepared may suspect hard trolling and even get offended. Walking along the delightful south beach, I dreamily say: “Eh, you want something tasty ...” He looked around and thoughtfully asked: “Do you want narva fruits of cactus?”

I pouted, caustically asking if it had not accidentally occurred to me to take me to a cozy cafe with cakes, for example. The husband replied that he did not see the cafe in the district, but the fruits of the prickly pear, which he noticed in the thickets of cactus, are very tasty, and they can satisfy my request. Is logical.

Offended? Hug and forgive? Have a laugh

This feature of professional thinking, sometimes provoking curiosities in everyday life, IT professionals can put themselves in the service in the difficult task of learning English.

The way of thinking illustrated above (without being a psychologist, I would risk conditionally characterizing it as a formal-logical one),

a) resonates with some principles of the human subconscious;

b) resonates as well as possible with some aspects of the grammatical logic of English.

Features of the subconscious perception of the request

Psychology believes that the human subconscious understands everything literally and does not have a sense of humor. Like a computer with which an IT person “communicates” more time than with people. She overheard a metaphor from one practicing psychologist: “The subconscious is a giant who has no eyes, no sense of humor, and who understands everything literally. And consciousness is the sighted midget that sits on the giant's neck and controls it. ”

Which team is read by the subconscious giant when the Lilliput consciousness says: “I need to learn English”? Subconscious accepts REQUEST: “learn English”. The ingenuous “giant” begins to work diligently on the execution of the command, giving out the RESPONSE: learning process. You will learn that in English there is a gerund, there is a verb to be, there is an active voice, there is a passive voice, there are types of tense forms, there is a complex complement and subjunctive mood, there is an actual division, there are syntagmas, etc.

Did you study language? Yes. “Giant” completed the task - you honestly learned the language. Did you master English in practice? Hardly. The subconscious did not receive a request for mastering.

What is the difference between learning and mastering?

Learning is analysis, the dismemberment of the whole into parts. Mastery is synthesis, the assembly of parts into a whole. Approaches, frankly, the opposite. The methods of learning and practical mastering are different.

If the ultimate goal is to learn to use the language as a tool, then the task should be formulated literally: “I need to master English.” There will be less frustration.

What is the request, and response

As mentioned above, English has a certain formalism. For example, the question in question cannot be answered in English in any way. You can answer only in the form in which it is given. Thus, the question “Have you eaten the cake?” Can only be answered in the same grammatical form with have: “Yes, I have / No, I haven't.” There is no “do” or “am”. Similarly, “Did you eat the cake?” Correctly answer “Yes, I did / No, I didn't.”, And no “had” or “was”. What is the question, is the answer.

It is often confusing for Russian-speaking people when in English, in order to resolve something, it is necessary to answer in the negative, and in order to prohibit, it is positive. For example:

• Do you mind my smoking? - Yes, I do. - (You are banned from smoking in your presence.)
• Do you mind my smoking? - No, I don't. - (You were allowed to smoke.)

After all, the natural instinct of the Russian-speaking consciousness - allowing, to answer "yes", and prohibiting, - "no." Why is English the opposite?

Formal logic. Answering the question in English, we respond not so much to the real situation as to the grammar of the sentence we hear. And in grammar we have a question: “Do you mind?” - “Do you mind?”. Accordingly, answering “Yes, I do.” - the interlocutor, responding to grammatical logic, asserts “Yes, I object”, that is, prohibits, but does not allow the action at all, as would be logical for situational logic. What is the question, is the answer.

A similar clash of situational and grammatical logic provokes requests like “Could you ...?” Do not be surprised if, in response to your:

• Could you pass me the salt, please?
  Englishman will answer:
• Yes, I could.

... and calmly continue his meal, without giving you salt. You asked him if he could pass the salt. He replied that he could. You didn’t ask him to pass it on to you: “Would you ...?” English speakers often make jokes like that. Perhaps the origins of the famous English humor lie just at the junction of grammatical and situational logic ... Just like the humor of programmers, isn’t it?

Thus, starting to learn English, it makes sense to revise the wording of the request. After all, when we come, for example, to a driving school, we say: “I need to learn how to drive a car,” and not “I need to study a car.”

Moreover, working with a teacher, a student interacts with his cognitive system. The teacher also has a subconscious, working, like all people, on the principle of “request-response”. If a teacher is not so experienced as to “translate” a student's request into the language of his real needs, the teacher’s subconscious mind may also perceive the student’s request as a request for learning, rather than mastering. And the teacher will respond with enthusiasm and satisfy the request, but the information proposed for the study will not be the realization of the student’s true need.

“Fear your desires” (C)? Are you looking for a telepathic teacher who can translate your requests into the language of your real needs? Correctly form 'request'? Necessary to emphasize. With a competent approach to business, the best people who learn English should be programmers, owing to the peculiarities of their world view, and because of the peculiarities of the English language as such. The key to success is the right approach.