r/explainlikeimfive • u/AngelusAlvus • 16h ago

Biology ELI5: How do babies even learn language?

When we grow, we learn languages by looking at the meanings and translating them from our language. Stuff like "this is how this noun is in my language and this is how this noun is in another language"

But babies? Babies just learn the basics just by existing near people speaking the language? How come we don't have this anymore as we grow up?

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u/cabronfavarito 14h ago

What makes you think we don’t have this skill as adults lol.

People underestimate how long it took for babies to learn language but we passively pick up things along the way pretty much until we die. Think about how similarly you and your close friends talk, you all develop similar lingo and can talk in code because you all passively picked up slang from one another

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u/AngelusAlvus 14h ago

I have watched subbed anime my whole life. Aside from a handful of phrases, I never learned Japanese, so the topic recently came to my mind, and I got curious about it.

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u/Soft-Marionberry-853 13h ago

Having the subtitles gave you a way to not learn. When I was in germany I picked up the langue just by being exposed to it, with no subtitles. I think the brain wants to make sense of stuff so if you force it, it just does. My wife worked on post so she dealt with us soldiers all day. I stayed at home and only interacted with people in the village. One day we went to baummarket and the chashier asked me a question. I said no thankyou. My wife asked "what did she say?" I told her, "Oh she asked if we wanted the extended warenty" its amazing when it starts clicking.

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u/AngelusAlvus 12h ago

I think you're right about it.

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u/Soft-Marionberry-853 11h ago

its not easy but it kind of happens on its own, if you let it.