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Are the language elements in Snow Crash supported by science?



After reading Snow Crash, I have to wonder if any of the premise or main/supporting plot points are backed by any science, or even plausible based on our current understanding.


For example:



The whole idea of a metavirus, the metavirus coming from outside of earth, the nam-shub, being able to program humans with with a primitive base language, a biological virus being implemented as code, hackers being susceptible because of certain pathways...etc.



Little seems to actually be based on science, even at the time it was written. Was it just speculation to further the plot or is there something to it?



Answer



No, not by any current science nor science at the time. Most of Snow Crash is made up of very interesting pseudo-science or promising (in 1992) proto-science.


As to the idea of a human "base language" - the search for a "universal language" has been a common theme of myths, occult groups, pseudoscience, and pre-analytic philosophy since time immemorial. The reality is that it is a completely open question in modern, fact-based linguistics as to whether there is even a single genesis of language in humans. Let alone something as detailed and universally applicable as what's present in Snow Crash. Most modern linguists and psychologists also believe that language evolved continuously from non-language, i.e. there wasn't a primate who "could not" speak, and then her child who "could" - rather that communication grew gradually more complex over generations.


When Snow Crash was written, the field of memetics was popular. Depending on who and when you ask, memetics is either an excellent explanation of cultural transfer, a reasonable model of cultural transfer not tied strongly to reality, or a useless field that, at its best, provides a more complicated explanation for things we could already explain. "Memetics" survives today primarily as a way to alert someone they're going to be looking at cute cat pictures; one thing about a protoscience, is that very few successfully play out into real sciences.



The bare idea that language acts can influence people's views and actions is of course true, but by no measure can that statement, at that level, be called science.


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