problem of language and meaning theme
Featured is a practical problem that arises when people who communicate differently, i.e. who use very different languages, have to interact.
24 total · 8 major · 16 minor
| Story | Level | Motivation |
|---|---|---|
| movie: I Robot (2004) | major | A point of the story is that the positronic brain VIKI misinterpreted the Three Laws of Robotics as they were given to her by humans, and tried to subjugate humanity as a result - something that no human would have intended or wanted. |
| movie: Solaris (1972) | major | The Solaris world ocean appeared to be trying to communicate with the humans on the space station in orbit around it. |
| movie: Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home (1986) | major | The space probe communicated in the language of humpback whales. |
| movie: Starman (1984) | major | A variety of comical misunderstandings occurred during the course of Starman trying to learn English. In general, he struggled with communicating with people using human languages. |
| movie: The Day of the Dolphin (1973) | major | Jake and Maggie taught dolphins to speak English, but the dolphins' use of the language was sufficiently idiosyncratic that it sometimes needed to be interpreted by Jake to be clearly understood by others. |
| shortstory: The Gostak and the Doshes (1930) | major | The protagonist struggled to understand the meaning of the nonsense phrase "The gostak distims the doshes." (paraphrased in the title) which stirred up so many into a patriotic frenzy. |
| tz1959e3x24 | major | The cookbook presented a peculiar problem of language and meaning. |
| voy7x22 | major | The Ventu communicated without a formal language as we understand it. |
| ds91x01/02 | minor | Benjamin trying to communicate with the wormhole aliens about the nature of time and episodic memory |
| ds92x10 | minor | Skrreea spoke an incomprehensible language for a time |