Your name is really just a collection of sounds that you’ve learned to recognise as you.

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Kal Locksley

@kal · November 9, 2026 · 1 min read

Just as every word is just a sound we’ve agreed to give meaning to. No different to the twittering of birds, or the barks of monkeys and baboons.

Then we invented little squiggles and shapes, called them letters, and arranged them so that somehow hold entire conversations.

Writing is basically a silent recording of sounds, waiting for someone to bring them back to life by reading them, either out loud or inside their head.

And somehow, out of all those made-up sounds and squiggles, one particular combination makes you turn your head when someone calls it. Or makes you smile. Or makes you feel loved.

Isn’t that a little bit magical?

2 responses

Raynayday · 1d

I think that it is a little magical.
Remember, fourteen hundred years ago the Icelandic, Norse, Geats and all the Scandinivian peoples could neither read nor write. Couldn’t understand the squiggles’ And so they told stories around fires (in such wintry land’s) and recited tales of great heroes and wonderful lives led.

Alex · 20h

When training our pets to understand their name and commands, I am sure they do not understand our language per se, like we do, but the sounds associated with an action.

We associate sounds with actions, identities and emotions.

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