h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

The folks in Northern Ireland speak the same language but can't communicate. The problem is not a lack of common language but an overpowering tribal gene that does the opposite of the babel fish; when one person says something to another, even in their shared tongue, the other hears someting else. We need a common identity.

Being american, i dont really know what i am talking about concerning this.... but... isnt Northern Ireland kinda both British and Irish? could that be the problem?

Exactly my point. The tribal instinct is so powerful that each individual person sees himself as part of the in group and everyone else as an outsider. It's a matter of training; there is no actual difference. A little while ago someone compared the DNA from an ancient British skeleton to see how it differred from the people living in Britain today. There have been a number of invasions since the old guy was buried, the most prominent being the Anglo Saxon, so the scientists expected a change in bloodlines. Not so. The Anglo Saxons brought their CULTURE, not so much their genes as memes. We speak Anglish (sic) but genetically, almost nothing has changed. I am a fourth generation Canadian yet, in my own country, I'm considered an anglo by those who speak french and a european by the aboriginals. Why can't I just be Human?

okay... i am kinda tired here... its late where i am... so just a cupla things...

back to the basics... don't we speak to someone when we want or need something? so the incentive to speak the language that that person understands is very high in that situation. But if we don't want or need anything from them, then we do not have any incentive to talk to them.

and, of course, by not communicating with someone for a while we wind up becoming alienated from them because of strangeness and/or differentness... even if it is in just the way we think. Here in the States, a white person from NY City who goes to the deep south and tries to communicate with a white person there is just as alienated as you up there in canada with your french and your aborigines.

k... thats about all i can think of for now