In order to talk productively about serious things, we evolved the ability to Take Words Seriously.

“The woods are full of wolves.”

However, once you take words seriously, you become vulnerable to being swayed purely by words. Hence, the boy who cried wolf.

But that’s just the most obvious and one of the least complex ways we take words seriously.

Consider how many words you are brought up being taught are deeply meaningful and important that conflict with the use of those same words by others.

Consider things like “manners”

Things get really fraught when we use the same word to refer to a mixture of abstract things and physical facts.

“Back in the day yo as we learned
A man was not considered to be
Considered to be fully grown
Has he not gonna beyond the hills
Has he not crossed the 7 seas”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Command_neuron One of the interesting things about neurology and behavior is that complex actions can be tied to very specific triggers.

We've expanded our cognitive machinery to include words, and single words can trigger complex networks of association.