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Comment by thaumasiotes | Hacker News Reader

> It takes a lot of work and consistency. Say that with me - consistency. Show up every day. If you don't, you will fail. That's one of those terrible truths about learning, and it is especially true about learning a language.

William Buckley was lost for more than 30 years among Australian aborigines. By the time he heard of whites in the vicinity, he was unable to speak to them, having forgotten how to produce English.

But, assuming you believe his memoirs, when they spoke to him, he regained his English within a day.

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I can see that happening. For example he could've been mentally stuck in a "Australian aborigine" language mode, and experienced some sort of "cat got his tongue" situation where he temporarily couldn't even think or summon english to speak with. So until they started interacting and he was able to wake up those neural pathways then it would come back. So he probably somewhat felt like he was re-learning the language at an accelerated pace since he already had the neural wiring for english.

Do you know of, or can recommend, any studies on this "waking up the neural pathways" effect? I'm wondering what is happening here, surely it's more than simply firing those pathways as I'd imagine that to happen within seconds as opposed to the day or so it took him to recover. Thanks

IANAN but I think "waking up neural pathways" can be understood to mean making new synaptic connections, a process that is not instant and could potentially take a day if the existing connections were intact.

Often requiring sleep too I believe, with specific brain activity that simply doesn't occur while awake.

My English (my first and only natural language) definitely takes a while to recover from a single day spent programming, so I can definitely see that happening.

> experienced some sort of "cat got his tongue" situation where he temporarily couldn't even think or summon english to speak with.

Something like that happens to me sometimes. I get stuck for a word in Norwegian and suddenly find that I can't summon the English word either (English is my mother tongue but I have been living and working in Norway since '86).

I am now capable of being tongue-tied in two languages simultaneously!

But of course it all comes back to me quickly once I switch back to speaking only English.

> I get stuck for a word in Norwegian and suddenly find that I can't summon the English word either (English is my mother tongue but I have been living and working in Norway since '86).

Side note: this is one of many points sufficient to disprove the popular idea that words are the medium of thought. Thought is not linguistic.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Buckley_(convict)

For anyone else who wasn't familiar with this story.

From the Wikipedia article: " ... his significant first meeting with a group of Wathaurong women, [occurred] several months after his escape [in 1803]. Buckley had taken a spear used to mark a grave for use as a walking stick. The women befriended him after recognising the spear as belonging to a relative who had recently died and invited him back to their camp. Believed to be the returned spirit of the former tribesman, he was joyfully welcomed and adopted by the group. ... Buckley also recounted information about warfare among Aboriginal people. According to Buckley he was a central part of life among the Australian hunter-gatherers. He had often witnessed wars, raids, and blood-feuds. This information was uniquely important ... "

The Wikipedia article links to John Morgan's interesting account of William Buckley's life, written in 1852: https://archive.org/details/lifeandadventur00morggoog/page/n...

I learned French, German and Italian to a good level at school and then by working there in my early 20s. Some decades later, I don't speak them that often but sometimes at work with customers. I am still pretty good in all 3, and a day or two in country polishes off the rust, e.g. on holiday, though of course not back to my highest level.

I later tried to learn Spanish - (similar to French/Italian) but couldn't get it to the same level - easy come, easy go. Long term interest in Aikido lead my to attempting Japanese - but again it's never stuck. At university took a course in Russian - made good progress for a year and then left it - all gone!

So for me it's a combination: - learning to a sufficient level, - with consistent effort at the time (some level of immersion) - it is easier when brain is younger!

I have lived abroad for about 20 years now, when I am back home it is always a painful exercise to remember some Portuguese slang and street expressions.

Naturally after a couple of days I am back home.

It isn't worse, because thanks to Internet I am able to keep in touch with my native tongue still.

So yeah, I do believe his memoirs.

“But, assuming you believe his memoirs, when they spoke to him, he regained his English within a day.”

I think this works if the language is your native language or if you have immersed yourself. I used to be ok with French but after a few years of not using it there is not much left.

You’d be amazed how fast it comes back. I hadn’t used French in over a decade last time I went to France. In the taxi to our hotel I could barely string two words together. Ten days later in the one to the airport I was having a real conversation, if with terrible grammar and poor vocabulary.

When I was coming back to Denmark I did some reading on academic studies related to relearning languages, one study I found said that if someone has spoken a language for 8 years (or the first 8 years of their life as it was focused on childhood language being relearned in adulthood) then they will never lose that language - unfortunately I spoke Danish the first 6 years of my life and when I came back I started to remember German which occupied the part of my mind focused on non-English language.

And his son went on to become a preëminent conservative intellectual and author!

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