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Re:What Sort of Exercise Can Make You Smarter? by amichail on Wednesday September 16, 2009 @09:43AM (#825764)
Bilingualism has a major disadvantage:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=648393

Re:What Sort of Exercise Can Make You Smarter? by tel on Wednesday September 16, 2009 @10:12AM (#825820)
Not quite. I would argue the total opposite in fact.

The cited study postulates in the discussion that Tip of Tongue events come from simple reduced frequency of use in any given word stemming from a much larger lexicon. There's no evidence at all suggest that there's actually a neurological disadvantage to bilingualism.

Also, it seems pretty counterintuitive to think that practice in an entirely new cognitive arena, something like a new language, could do anything but improve your ability to process language. If there's a paper out there I'd love to read it.

Re:What Sort of Exercise Can Make You Smarter? by biohacker42 on Wednesday September 16, 2009 @10:04AM (#825799)
I wouldn't call that major
Re:What Sort of Exercise Can Make You Smarter? by amichail on Wednesday September 16, 2009 @10:12AM (#825817)
English is the only language that matters in today's world. The more fluent you are in it, the more successful you are likely to be.
Re:What Sort of Exercise Can Make You Smarter? by timwiseman on Wednesday September 16, 2009 @12:49PM (#826221)
Hardly. I think it can arguably said that in the Western Hemisphere and certain parts of the Eastern Hemispher knowing English is in general more valuable than knowing any other single language.

That hardly makes it the only one that matters. I personally have derived enormous benefits from studying Latin. There have been several times I have wished I spoke Spanish and a few times I had wished I could speak Japanese, Pashtun, Arabic, and Dari.

Knowing more languages is definitely a good thing.

Re:What Sort of Exercise Can Make You Smarter? by utnick on Wednesday September 16, 2009 @10:21AM (#825832)
Try to get a job or start a business in mainland europe without knowing another eu language besides english.

Knowing multiple languages is extremely valuable.

Re:What Sort of Exercise Can Make You Smarter? by tamas on Wednesday September 16, 2009 @10:27AM (#825845)
It is hard to get a job in mainland Europe without knowing English (as a developer). While the "another eu language" varies from country to country, the demand for English is constant.
Re:What Sort of Exercise Can Make You Smarter? by biohacker42 on Wednesday September 16, 2009 @12:35PM (#826174)
No, the demand for language X + English is constant.
Re:What Sort of Exercise Can Make You Smarter? by tedunangst on Wednesday September 16, 2009 @06:12PM (#826936)
I know several people who have done exactly that without much trouble at all.