## Metadata - Author: [[Andrea Marcolongo]] - Full Title: The Ingenious Language - Category: #books ## Highlights - Greek verbal aspect may be one of the most glorious legacies of Proto-Indo-European, one of the first (now vanished and therefore hypothetical) languages spoken on earth. The languages that came after did nothing but squander the intellectual and linguistic stores of Proto-Indo-European in the name of economizing. The economy principle—that’s exactly how linguists refer to the simplification and trivialization of language. ([Location 174](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B07P9TPRS3&location=174)) - Over thousands of years, as societies transformed, populations moved, and nomads became shepherds who later became city-dwellers, you needed to express yourself quickly, make yourself understood, and understand. Paradoxically, as the world grew more complex, a simpler language was called for. Which is exactly what happens when reality becomes hard to express. Look at our current mode of communication: emoticons are our modern pictograms, no one knows how to use the phone, and we are forgetting how to speak. ([Location 178](https://readwise.io/to_kindle?action=open&asin=B07P9TPRS3&location=178))