In your
next conversation if you watch closely you’ll realize that communication
or the entire habit of transferring the thoughts, ideas, and emotions
from one person to another is in itself weird. Some methods of
communication are just a bit wilder and weirder than others.
1.
Pucker up
Just because the only use whistling
currently has is to exasperate the person working in the next cubicle
doesn’t mean it was always a source of annoyance. Long ago in places
where the terrain makes walking difficult whistled languages closed the
communication gap. Much like spoken speech this type of communication
had expressions and a “vocabulary” based on the language commonly used
in the area, and could easily convey a complex message over a long
distance. You can find out more about whistled language here.
2.
Smoke Signals
This is one of the oldest forms of
communications. In old western movies the typical picture we have is
the Native American using this unique form of getting a message across,
but the truth is ancient people from all over the world have used this
method. Soldiers guarding the great wall in ancient China used smoke
signals to alert one another to the approach of an enemy. Greeks
devised a very complicated system involving an entire alphabet of smoke
signals used around 150 BC. The Greeks used torches while the Native
Americans used dried grasses tied together in a bundle. While most
people in recent times think of smoke signals as being bound to a
specific location where a large fire has been built these methods of
carrying small combustible, but long burning materials meant the signals
could be sent at anytime from anywhere. In fact, some tribes of Native
Americans used this mobility as part of the signal itself. For
example, signals from midway up a hill could indicate safety, while
signals from the top meant danger.
3.
Sing it!
Yodeling seems like a silly past time to
many in the west, but its initial purpose was communicating over long
distances and across deep expanses. In yodeling the voice register is
switched sharply and can be easily heard over long distances. This made
communication possible between mountain peaks or across wide expanses.
It is believed the practice of yodeling was developed in the Swiss
Alps, but it is also found in such places as Central Africa. Now if you
wanna learn to yodel, do it here!
4.
Just beat it
It was a staple of many old radio shows
and movies like Tarzan. Explorers fearfully making their way through a
jungle would hear the drums pick up tempo and volume, and they knew they
were in deep trouble. Far from being a source of terror the drums in
the jungles of Africa or Asia were really more the equivalent of the
local news. In fact, drums were a simply method of communications
across distances since tempo and volume could be used much the same way
as Morse code.
5.
Just draw me a picture
It was not as immediate a form of
communication as whistling or yodeling, but the earliest of this type of
writings were believed to have been used since pre-historic times to
tell stories, warn of danger, claim territories, and even to mark mass
grave sites. The pictures were usually crude and created to look like a
physical object. These symbols were employed at first to represent
physical items, but later developed into ideograms, which could
represent ideas. From early cave drawings to the detailed artistry of
Chinese calligraphy this type of writing has developed into a complex
and beautiful art form still practiced in some cultures.
6.
I know what you’re thinking
People have always watched each other
closely looking to see if they could detect a lie. Gamblers search each
other’s movements or ticks for a ‘tell’ or a habit that indicates when
someone is bluffing or holding high cards. Something as small as a
raised eyebrow or a lip twitch could mean that someone might be trying
to lie or it could mean they simple have an itch.
Body language
involves the common indicators we give subconsciously whether we are
happy, sad, worried, guilty, trying to hide something or any of a
thousand emotions in between. Studying these indicators has only been a
science since the 1950’s, and what scientists have discovered is now
used by law enforcement and the military to spot terrorists. This
language is slowly being demystified, which may make you worry how
you’ll keep that full house to yourself when everyone knows what you’re
thinking.
7.
When dot, dot, dot means HELP!
Just after midnight on the 14th of April 1912 the RMS Titanic
hit an iceberg. The ship was designed by the most experienced engineers
of that time to be unsinkable nevertheless the captain was told there
was no hope. The ship would sink into the icy water carrying its 2,223
passengers and crew to their deaths, unless quick action was taken.
Captain Edward J. Smith was on his retirement cruise. He’d be with
White Star Line, which owned the Titanic a long time, and he knew there
were not enough lifeboats for even half the passengers much less the
crew. Drowning was not the worst fate possible since in the icy water
no one could last more than 15 or 30 minutes. Among those passengers
were the rich and famous of the time including millionaire John Jacob
Astor IV and his pregnant wife Madeleine, Benjamin Guggenheim, the
journalist William Thomas Stead, the Countess of Rothes, and silent film
actress Dorothy Gibson among many other notable names, and some of them
the Captain knew had attended their last party. After commanding as
many passengers placed in the lifeboats as possible Captain Smith made
his way to the wireless operator Jack Phillips and Harold Bride in
ship’s wireless station. He ordered them to send out the emergency
distress call. The distress call used up to this point was known as CQD
an international distress signal that reads as “ -.-. –.- -..” which
is a rather long signal to send out quickly. In desperation the
wireless operators began sending out the new signal S O S which at just
three characters “. . .” was much shorter. As weird as it sounds the
lives of the passengers of that ship that night depended as much on the
wireless operators and the language of dots and dashes as they did what
space was available in the lifeboats.
The code was invented by Guglielmo
Marconi in 1897. CQ in this language was meant to indentify messages of
interest to all stations and D was to indicate distress. That night
Jack Phillips was the first to use the shorter S O S, but it was all for
little good. Only the crew of the Carpathia 58 miles out answered the
call and was so slowed by icebergs in their path they couldn’t reach the
Titanic for almost two hours. By that time the loss of life was
considerable. Still, the new signal caught on to the point that even
now when the use of the wireless is minimal ships in distress still call
out an SOS when they are in trouble. Learn morse code and phonetic alphabets here.
8.
Sky talking
Skywriting started almost as soon as
airplanes became popular. The trick is to use a pressurized container
containing low viscosity oil, which is then injected into the hot
exhaust manifold. This vaporizes into a white plumy trail behind the
plane. While new techniques can make the smoke last a little longer the
trail evaporates quickly so if you decide to use this method to ask for
your love’s hand in marriage you better make sure your intended is
looking skyward at the proper time, or she will be wondering what ‘arr
e’ means.
9.
If u r reading this… hagd
Texting
is a weird phenomena when you consider all the technology that
progressed into people having small cell phones to carry around and how
odd it is that instead of talking into them many chose to write
messages. These messages are short, almost incomprehensible to anyone
not familiar with the code, but they are becoming a favored mode of
communication in part because of privacy, they afford the user. So
popular is texting on cell phones that entire novels have been written
using this method.
10.
Talking to the Stars
The question of how mankind can find
other life in the Universe is almost as quickly followed by the question
of how to communicate across the fantastic distances in space.
Yodeling just won’t cut it this time. The length of time radio signals
travels means that any signal detected would come from the distant past.
There are some projects being conducted looking for radio signals, but
another suggestion is using laser signals to draw attention to Earth’s
status as a hot spot of intelligent life. As the plots of many science
fiction movies have advanced there is no promise of how friendly any
other life forms might be once they get our message.
If you look up at the stars you might
wonder if anyone is really out there. You might also wonder if they
have found as many strange ways to communicate with each other as we
have.
No comments:
Post a Comment