È possibile imparare una lingua ingerendo una pillola?

Stando all’articolo dell’Huffington Post circa l’idea di Nicholas Negroponte di imparare una lingua semplicemente ingerendo una pillola, essa non sembrerebbe poi così inverosimile.

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Notizia

The idea may sound like a sci-fi movie plot point, but one well-known tech visionary believes we could one day learn a language simply by swallowing a pill.

In a recent video podcast for TedTalks, MIT Media Lab founder Nicholas Negroponte revisits some of the tech-related predictions he’s made over the past three decades. In the final minute of his talk, Negroponte addresses what may be his most intriguing prediction yet. “We have been doing a lot of consuming of information through our eyes. That may be a very inefficient channel. My prediction is that we are going to ingest information,” he says in the video. “You’re going to swallow a pill and know English. You’re going to swallow a pill and know Shakespeare.”

How exactly would we absorb this new knowledge from the pill? While he’s short on the details, Negroponte said that the pill he has envisioned would follow the bloodstream to the brain, where it would deposit pieces of information in the right places.

Too hard to swallow?

Negroponte said that his prediction is not “quite as far-fetched” as you may think. After all, he said, he has discussed the idea with MIT colleagues including a neuroscientist and expert in biomechatronics (the science behind integrating electronics with biological organisms). Unrelated research, revealed earlier this year, suggested that there may be a drug capable of helping people develop perfect vocal pitch.

But don’t expect a language wonder drug to hit pharmacies anytime soon. Negroponte opines that this prediction is unlikely to come true for about 30 years.

Vocabolario

Sci-fi – abbreviazione di science fiction: fantascienza

Plot – trama di un film, di un libro, ecc.

Visionary – visionario, idealista, precursore

Swallow – ingoiare, ingerire

Pill – pillola, pastiglia

Revisit – rivisitare, rivedere

Prediction – previsione, pronostico

Decade – decennio

Intriguing – intrigante, affascinante

Inefficient – contrario di efficient, cioè inutile,  vano

Ingest –ingerire

Absorb – assorbire, assimilare

Short on – a corto di qualcosa

Envision – immaginarsi, figurarsi, concepire

Bloodstream – flusso del sangue

Deposit – depositare, collocare

Hard to swallow – modo di dire: difficile da mandar giù (lett.: difficile da ingerire)

Far-fetched – improbabile, inverosimile

Reveal – rivelare, mostrare, indicare

Pitch – tono, intensità di un suono

Opinione

E tu cosa ne pensi? Ti piacerebbe poter apprendere una lingua semplicemente mandando giù una pillola?
Che lingua vorresti imparare?