Positive Thinking

Sapir had a profound influence on Whorf's thinking. Sapir's earliest writings had espoused views of the relation between thought and language stemming from the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilhelm_von_Humboldt" title="Wilhelm von Humboldt">Humboldtian</a> tradition he acquired through <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_Boas" title="Franz Boas">Franz Boas</a>, which saw language as the historical embodiment of volksgeist, or ethnic worldview. But Sapir had since become influenced by a current of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logical_positivism" title="Logical positivism">logical positivism</a>, such as that of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bertrand_Russel" title="Bertrand Russel" class="mw-redirect">Bertrand Russel</a> and the early <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ludwig_Wittgenstein" title="Ludwig Wittgenstein">Ludwig Wittgenstein</a>, particularly through <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C.K.Ogden" title="C. K. Ogden" class="mw-redirect">C. K. Ogden</a> and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I.A.Richards" title="I. A. Richards">I. A. Richards</a>' "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Meaning_of_Meaning" title="The Meaning of Meaning">The Meaning of Meaning</a>". This had caused him to adopt a view of natural language as potentially obscuring, rather than facilitating, the ability of the human mind to perceive and describe the world as it really is. In this view, proper perception could only be accomplished through <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formal_logic" title="Formal logic" class="mw-redirect">formal logics</a>. During his stay at Yale, Whorf acquired this current of thought partly from Sapir and partly through his own readings of Russell and Ogden and Richards.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Lee_Whorf#cite_note-JosephBlavatsky-6">[6]</a> As Whorf became more influenced by positivist science he also distanced himself from some approaches to language and meaning that he saw as lacking in rigour and insight. One of these was Polish Philosopher <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_Korzybski" title="Alfred Korzybski">Alfred Korzybski</a>'s <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_semantics" title="General semantics">General semantics</a>, which was espoused in the US by <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stuart_Chase" title="Stuart Chase">Stuart Chase</a>. Chase admired Whorf's work and frequently sought out a reluctant Whorf, who considered Chase to be "utterly incompetent by training and background to handle such a subject.". Ironically, Chase would later write the foreword for Carroll's collection of Whorf's writings.<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benjamin_Lee_Whorf#cite_note-18">[17]</a>

Positive Thinking

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