What if the way we write shaped the way we think? Not just what we think about, but the very structure of our cognition?
In linguistics, there is a hypothesis that the structure of a language affects its speakers' worldview and cognition. This idea, known as linguistic relativity, suggests that the language we speak influences how we perceive reality itself.
Consider a writing system that is non-linear. Instead of words arranged in sequence, meaning emerges from a circular form, with modifiers and context radiating outward from a central concept. Time becomes irrelevant in such a system.
The heptapods in the film Arrival communicate through such a system. Their written language, called Heptapod B, consists of complex circular symbols that convey entire sentences or ideas at once. There is no beginning or end to their sentences.
As Louise Banks learns to read and write in Heptapod B, her perception of time begins to shift. She starts experiencing her life non-linearly, remembering moments from her future with the same clarity as her past.
This transformation illustrates the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis taken to its extreme. If our language shapes our thoughts, then learning a language with a fundamentally different structure could reshape our entire cognitive framework.
Perhaps the glyphs you see transforming on this page are a small demonstration of this principle. As they shift from alien circles to familiar words, consider how the mode of representation changes your experience of the content.
We are creatures of linear time, bound by cause and effect, by before and after. Our languages reflect this constraint. But what might we become if we could truly learn to think in circles?
The heptapods offer their language as a gift, calling it a weapon. In their understanding, there is no difference. A tool that reshapes perception is the most powerful force imaginable.
Consider how mathematics changed human thought. Before symbolic notation, complex reasoning was nearly impossible. The symbols themselves became a new way of seeing, enabling discoveries that words alone could never reach.
What if writing could do the same for time? What if a sentence could contain its own past and future, visible all at once? The heptapods write this way, and perhaps think this way too.
Louise's journey is not about learning vocabulary or grammar. It is about rewiring the architecture of her mind. Each logogram she masters brings her closer to a fundamentally alien way of being.
Memory and premonition become indistinguishable. The grief she feels for her daughter exists alongside the joy of her birth. All moments are equally present, equally real, equally now.
The boundary between language and thought is more permeable than we assume. Every time we learn a new way to express something, we learn a new way to see it.
Perhaps that is the true arrival the film speaks of. Not the coming of the heptapods, but the arrival of a new consciousness. A mind finally freed from the tyranny of sequence.
We cannot unknow what we have learned. Once you see time as the heptapods see it, there is no going back. The question is whether you would choose to, even if you could.