How we develop language greatly affects our thinking process, but it doesn’t change the way we think before we have language. This is how we create impressions based on external stimuli and memories from our feelings, even without language or memories stored in words. Before we form any language, our minds see these impressions and link them to the reality around us. The mind generates its own ideas and feelings, giving rise to consciousness and the ability to have original thoughts.
First Thoughts is the starting point of the Wordless Image
Using words to tap into imagination shows us that we need to look beyond word definitions and explore what imagination truly is. Before this, we should examine what happens before we use words. Language is not the source of imagination. It’s essential to understand what occurs before we recognize words to access imagination.
- Imagination Before Words
Long before we have words, we are active. Think about an infant’s mind in the absence of language; as it plays, you’ll uncover many incredible things. A toy block can easily transform into a car in their imagination, and they discover movement and how fast things fall, even without being able to explain these observations with language.
Psychology faces a challenge: studying the part of our imagination that functions without words. Research suggests we might think in some way before we express it symbolically. In fact, "unsymbolized thought" could emerge as the mind prepares for inner speech or predictive action, but it doesn’t progress to actual words.
Pre-verbal imagination is not about symbols; it’s about experiences. It involves the images we see repeatedly in our minds. Images of shapes and movements are created and, for kinesthetic learners, feelings are tied to movement. These learners often visualize performing an action before they actually do it. They can enjoy rhythm without language and without understanding its meaning. Imagination revolves around experiences in the world and how they connect to what we gain in life, rather than simply pretending that real things are real. The feeling of warmth from a fire seems much more genuine than words describing the term 'hot'.
- The Ancient Origins of Our Imagination
Our imagination has been with us since we were a younger species, playing a vital role in our evolution and survival. Even if our ancestors didn't use complex grammar, many animals show that pre-verbal thought processes were active. Research even suggests that language developed from the need for complex social interactions, allowing for the sharing of intent, cognitive ability, and practical communication, rather than just abstract grammatical rules. Much later, as our minds and environments progressed, language became central to our ability to share information.
The pre-verbal part of our imagination flows like a continuous stream, dependent on feeling. Language, on the other hand, functions like a computer—segmented and reliant on words, rules, and grammar. This makes it difficult for words to express dreams, hunches, or moments of insight, which happen instantly and do not fit easily into the rigid structure of language.
- Language: The Great Enabler, but also The Great Prison, of Imagination.
When we acquire language, it helps us but can also confine us. Our primal imagination becomes shaped into fixed, predefined boxes with assigned meanings. Language allows thoughts to form and reinforces them, yet it also limits our imaginative potential.
In theories like the Language of Thought Hypothesis, which sees thought as occurring in an internal symbolic language ("mentalese"), and in linguistic relativity theories, it is clear that while some cognitive tasks such as perception and imagination can happen without language, language is crucial for organizing memory, categorizing concepts, and abstract thinking.
Language aids in structuring our thoughts and helps us tell stories we haven’t witnessed firsthand. Wittgenstein famously said, "the limits of my language mean the limits of my world"; he likely meant that forms of thinking, like perception and imagination, occur outside any language we understand, but are later transformed by language. This profound statement relates to concepts of cognition, representation, consciousness, and imagination. We understand that thinking can happen without words, and sometimes we find ourselves thinking about things for which we lack the language.
Overall, language and thought are closely linked, though they are distinct phenomena. The potential for thought can expand beyond symbolic language, shaping how we interpret and communicate experiences.
We are navigating the vast ocean of our imagination, where a world of language can unfold. This happens quickly; we don’t have a moment to waste as our minds can travel in any direction. It would be a mistake not to explore if we want to take charge of our creativity.
References
Rescorla, M. (2019). The Language of Thought Hypothesis (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy). Stanford.edu. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/language-thought/
Wieser, D. (2025). The Abstraction of Thinking: Wittgenstein’s Critique of Abstraction in On Certainty. Philarchive.org. https://philarchive.org/rec/WIETAO-6
Gregory, D. (2018). Commentary: The Nature of Unsymbolized Thinking. Frontiers in Psychology, 9. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.00216
Tomasello, M. (2025). The evolutionary psychology of syntax. Mind & Language. https://doi.org/10.1111/mila.12562
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