Everyone emotes in emoji

Everyone uses emoji in their communications now, right? Maybe not. I suspect that a lot more people know about simple emoticons (smilies) than know what you’re suggesting when you post the eggplant (aubergine) emoji. Moreover, despite proclamations that emoji are somehow the modern version of hieroglyphics, they’re really not.

For a start, I’m not even sure that the Ancient Egyptians had aubergines…although they were cultivated in southern and eastern Asia in prehistory and the first recipe for them appeared in a document around 544 CE. But, more importantly, try saying the following phrase unravelled from ancient hieroglyphics with nothing but emoji and trapping each nuance and losing none of the subtlety and philosophy of the phrase:

Do not be proud because you are wise! Consult with the ignorant as with the learned!