🧠 The Hidden Power of Words
Why Russian and English speakers don’t see the same blue, and what it reveals about how language reshapes the brain
In Jewish mysticism, known as Kabbalah, there is the idea that the world itself was created through words. God said “Let there be light” and light came into being. Language, in this view, has the power to create or to destroy entire worlds. As a fiction writer this idea resonates deeply with me, since every story I create feels very much like building a universe.
But neuroscience offers its own echo of this ancient belief. Modern experiments show that words do not just describe the world or help us communicate. Our brains actually perceive the world differently depending on the words and the language available to us.
One of the experiments that first made me fall in love with neuroscience asked how having a word for something can change the way we see it. Take the color blue. In English there is just one word, but in Russian there are two: goluboy for light blue and siniy for dark blue.
Participants had to decide which of two squares matched a target color. Russian speakers were faster whenever the two choices crossed the goluboy–siniy boundary, while English speakers showed no such advantage. The presence of two words in Russian literally made the visual difference easier to detect.
And it is not just behavior. Scientists have even found this effect in brain signals. In one study, researchers measured brain activity with EEG while Greek and English speakers passively looked at light and dark shades of blue and green. In Greek, like in Russian, there are two different words for blue: ghalazio for light blue and ble for dark blue. The results showed that Greek speakers’ brains reacted differently to these shades within only 100 milliseconds of seeing them, long before they were even aware of it. In other words, the language people speak literally changes how their brains respond.
I do not know if you are as impressed as I was, but my mind exploded when I first learned about this. The most basic sensory perception is not the same for all humans. It shifts depending on the language we speak. Beyond the physical properties that determine what color reaches the eye, the way any culture chooses to define and label that color changes how the brain itself processes it. And people say writers do not change the world?
Linguistic Relativity - the idea that the structure and vocabulary of a language influence how its speakers think, perceive, and remember the world.
Another striking example of how language shapes thought comes from grammatical gender. While English nouns do not have gender, in many other languages they do. Most of the time the choice of gender seems arbitrary, and sometimes different languages even assign opposite genders to the very same object. For instance, the word for “sun” is feminine in German (die Sonne) but masculine in Spanish (el sol), while the word for “moon” is masculine in German (der Mond) but feminine in Spanish (la luna). These differences may look like quirks of grammar, but they can still shape perception through the stereotypes people hold about what is considered feminine or masculine. The gender assumptions we carry are of course an issue in themselves, but that is precisely why it is important to be aware of their presence and their influence.
In German the word for “bridge” (Brücke) is feminine, while in Spanish the word (puente) is masculine. You might expect this difference to be a meaningless detail, yet when asked to describe a bridge, German speakers were more likely to call it beautiful, elegant, or fragile, while Spanish speakers tended to use words like strong, sturdy, or long. The same structure of steel and stone carried a different aura depending on the language used to frame it.
This finding shows that words do more than name the world. They direct our attention to different qualities and associations, sometimes so subtly we barely notice. A bridge is still a bridge, but whether it feels graceful or powerful depends in part on the language spoken about it.
As a writer I am tempted to say that this means language can change reality entirely, which is why you might want to consider hiring me if you ever plan to take over the world. But as someone who is also working in science, I have to admit the truth is a bit more complicated. Over the years the evidence has shown that language certainly has a powerful influence on how we experience reality, yet it is a relative one. Just as with the Russian example, you can divide the color blue into two categories and your brain will notice the distinction more sharply, but no matter what I call it, I cannot make someone’s eyes and brain perceive the physical color green as red. And it would be just as hard to convince someone that stroking a hedgehog is silky smooth, even if I insisted on calling hedgehogs “soft as silk.”
But perhaps when Jewish mysticism spoke of language creating worlds, it did not mean creation only in the sense of making something out of nothing, but also in the sense of shifting the angle from which we see. Words tilt reality, highlighting some details and softening others, until what we notice, remember, and even feel becomes inseparable from the language that frames it. In that sense, every word is both a description and a quiet act of creation, remaking the world again and again in our minds.
P.S.
I am always on the lookout for good examples of words that exist only in a particular language and shape the way people perceive the world, so if you have one, I would love to read it in the comments!
And sharing this piece, or any of the others, with someone who might enjoy it can make a real difference. I put a lot of care into writing each post, and I am deeply grateful every time they find their way to new readers and subscribers.
There is no word in Hebrew for accountability.(אחריות is responsibility.)
That may explain certain behaviors, particularly in politicians.