Is thinking just talking silently to yourself? Philosophers still disagree
Much of what passes through your head feels like an inner voice, and some theories claim that is all thinking is. But daydreams seem to run without words, and the answer matters: if thought requires language, a sharp line divides humans from animals. If it does not, other creatures may think too.
In everyday usage thought means conscious mental activity that does not depend on what the senses are reporting right now: weighing an idea, judging a claim, recalling or imagining. On that view memory and imagination count, but perception does not. Narrower definitions keep only judging, inferring, problem-solving and deliberating, while the broadest, found in Descartes' description of the mind as a thinking thing and in cognitive science, treat thought as almost anything the mind does. The English word descends from Old English þoht, from a verb meaning to conceive in the mind.
Plato pictured thinking as the soul conversing with itself about eternal forms such as beauty or unity, which exist beyond the physical world. The challenge is telling beauty itself apart from merely beautiful things. Aristotle kept universals in the world: thinking of trees means the mind takes on tree-ness, abstracted from experience. Conceptualism, a close cousin, says thinking is calling concepts to mind. Critics point out that neither view easily captures logical structure; thinking that it will rain or snow requires more than summoning rain and snow.
Inner speech theories hold that thinking is silent language, and that we know our own thoughts by overhearing the monologue. Supporting evidence includes tiny movements in the speech muscles during thought, though these seem to help rather than be required. Some versions posit a private mental language, sometimes called Mentalese. Other schools see thought as chains of associated ideas, as dispositions to behave intelligently, or, most recently, as information processing akin to a computer.
Philosophy and psychology also sort thinking into kinds. Judgement affirms or denies something; reasoning draws conclusions from evidence; deliberation weighs options before choosing. Unconscious thought is sometimes invoked when a solution arrives without effort. A long-standing contrast sets cool, rational thinking against feeling, which involves direct emotional engagement.
Source: Thought
