GENIUS FORUMS

It seems reasonable to believe that modern language doesn't contain the syntax or semantics necessary to capture all the nuances of life. Fully describing a flavor or color to someone who hasn't experienced it, is rather difficult, if not impossible.

We can't convey experiences 100% authentically using just words. Theres a difference between describing sex, and actually fucking. Between thinking about pain, and actually experiencing it. Ideas and principles are also types of experiences, we experience thoughts and meanings in abstract ways, and then try to organize them and shape them using language.

Our ability to express meaning is not only limited by language, but also our own mental powers of manipulating the words we remember in order to express to others, and ourselves, coherent ideas.

So wouldn't this suggest that language is in the same category as empiricism when it comes to fundamental principles? Although useful tentatively and practically for various matters, communicating, theorizing, making belief systems, etc... it isn't the right tool to use when trying to cognize or convey principles of absolute nature.

I think the argument that there is a lack of ability to communicate experiences with 100% accuracy is untenable on the grounds that we cannot know with 100% accuracy what another thinks or feels in a given experience because we are not privy to their experience, or the exact workings of their mind. This clearly illustrates the ultimate solitude in which we each exist alone. We are not even privy to the experiences we undergo if we are blinded by the emotional attachments of the ego- there is always an unknown element against which the experience is defined. A sage knows of this unknown element, and having removed the blockage of ego, he is privy to the core experience of existence which is the common denominator of all sentient existence: solitude.

One may come to a meeting of minds with words, this mutual understanding is termed 'concept,' and words can perfectly transmit this experience because it is abstract and thus wholly mental- without the trappings of the fuzzy cloud of emotions. Thus only a sage can recognize a sage because each has a meeting of the minds with the other regarding the concept of Truth. We only ever have thoughts to think with. People who claim to think in pictures are but glimpsing the fleshed out subconscious, but in order to arrive at any conclusions words are relied upon in the reasoning process. One simply does not reason using pictures.

It always amazes me how the untransmittable fuzzy cloud of emotions is held as superior to reasoned thought, which invariably includes words.

One can only ever convey thoughts through words, even emotions are conveyed under the blanket of an abstraction, such as pride, anger, and love. One only ever experiences the mind, all else enters our experience through the filter of the mind. Words are themselves abstractions, mental tools used to reason and convey thoughts about things.

This by no means denigrates the status of words, nor the importance of words in communication. They are integral to reason, the only path to Truth. How does one convey feelings? Perhaps physically, with a hug, a kiss or a high-five. When these fail, the failsafe- words- are employed. Words that only ever transmit thoughts about things, that only ever transmit the content of mind. When the sludge of emotions enter the mind unalloyed with thought, they merely confuse, cloud and fog the fine-tuned workings of mind. As far as I'm concerned, I want nothing to do with the sludge of emotions. Find this out for yourself and you won't concern yourself with conveying experience with 100% accuracy.

Bryan McGilly wrote: This by no means denigrates the status of words, nor the importance of words in communication. They are integral to reason, the only path to Truth. How does one convey feelings? Perhaps physically, with a hug, a kiss or a high-five. When these fail, the failsafe- words- are employed. Words that only ever transmit thoughts about things, that only ever transmit the content of mind. When the sludge of emotions enter the mind unalloyed with thought, they merely confuse, cloud and fog the fine-tuned workings of mind. As far as I'm concerned, I want nothing to do with the sludge of emotions. Find this out for yourself and you won't concern yourself with conveying experience with 100% accuracy.

This doesn't really address the topic...

One of the uses of language is for communication. When the thoughts that formulate communication are befuddled by emotion, the application of language is limited.

What do you think?

On some other board a fella posted the notion that philosophy is only an ongoing discussion as to how we should talk about things. Whereas I don't agree fully with that view, I find it to be one of the best one sentence descriptions of philosophy I've ever heard. Another good one is Wittgenstein's "philosophy is all those primitive propositions which are assumed without proof by the physical sciences." I really am of the opinion that the truth of matters is ludicrously obvious when we clear our mind of language, and that the existence of philosophy owes itself to the fact that this clarity is complicated by phantoms cast before our eyes by abstract methods of thinking.

What happens when you try and picture a banana in your head.

I can't do it very well. It appears for a split second, then disappears. It does not appear in any full manner. It is quite vague. Imagining somelike like walking into my building at work are the same. First comes the concept of something specific that I recall, like the front doors, then comes the fleeting vague image around that, but then I have to think and look around just like using eyesight and more fleeting images will appears as a result.

I think many people say they can see the images clearly, but if that is fairly normal is certainly isn't the case with me.


Dreams are similar for me. All the conceptual packets seem kind of broken, limited. I hardly notice that the qualia images are not vivid, only with concentration comes the detail, but they can be vivid emotionally.

hades wrote:It seems reasonable to believe that modern language doesn't contain the syntax or semantics necessary to capture all the nuances of life. Fully describing a flavor or color to someone who hasn't experienced it, is rather difficult, if not impossible.

And yet well formed thoughts skillfully translated into the spoken or written word are sublime. Words point, therefore it is not necessary for them to convey everything. They trigger one's mind or emotions to fill in the blanks via memory or new experience. Good writing leaves room for this, allowing one to read and see between the lines.

We can't convey experiences 100% authentically using just words. Theres a difference between describing sex, and actually fucking. Between thinking about pain, and actually experiencing it. Ideas and principles are also types of experiences, we experience thoughts and meanings in abstract ways, and then try to organize them and shape them using language.

This in no way obviates the value of lanquage to indicate.

Our ability to express meaning is not only limited by language, but also our own mental powers of manipulating the words we remember in order to express to others, and ourselves, coherent ideas.

True, and this is where talent and practice come in.

So wouldn't this suggest that language is in the same category as empiricism when it comes to fundamental principles? Although useful tentatively and practically for various matters, communicating, theorizing, making belief systems, etc... it isn't the right tool to use when trying to cognize or convey principles of absolute nature.

I don't see how this follows. Language is a tool, and perhaps a limited one, but a useful one nonetheless.

Are you suggesting not using language when broaching the subject of "absolute nature"? Not talking about it? Just meditating on it, maybe?

I say meditation is fine, but why not use every tool in the toolbox?

I agree with the fact that language should only point to an area in our mind when conveying an experience, because the experiences are individual. It's actually one of the cases when the parts reunited are less then the whole invidually generated.
It also came to me when arguing between the differences between watching a horror movie and reading a horror book. In the first case you find all five senses traped in someone's representation of what should be scary. When reading a book, on the contrary, you are shown to a structure. It's your job to haunt it, an by this, make it personal.

Jamesh wrote:What happens when you try and picture a banana in your head.

I can't do it very well. It appears for a split second, then disappears. It does not appear in any full manner. It is quite vague. Imagining somelike like walking into my building at work are the same. First comes the concept of something specific that I recall, like the front doors, then comes the fleeting vague image around that, but then I have to think and look around just like using eyesight and more fleeting images will appears as a result.

I think many people say they can see the images clearly, but if that is fairly normal is certainly isn't the case with me.


Dreams are similar for me. All the conceptual packets seem kind of broken, limited. I hardly notice that the qualia images are not vivid, only with concentration comes the detail, but they can be vivid emotionally.

Perhaps, when you meditate, you should meditate on a banana. It takes practice, but being able to hold an image clearly in your head is possible.

Dreams only provide the amount of realistic impressions needed to trick the sleeping person into thinking they are awake. If you required that everything have a logical connection, your dreams would have more of a storyline. This suggests to me that in your waking time, you only look at things piecemal and not see how your own responses should be logically connected. For example, you might consider that one poster should be banned for posting too much, then be bothered when someone does not answer your posts. Dreams are loose associations with the waking world. If your waking thinking is disjointed, your sleeping thinking will be even more disjointed.

Carl G wrote:

hades wrote:It seems reasonable to believe that modern language doesn't contain the syntax or semantics necessary to capture all the nuances of life. Fully describing a flavor or color to someone who hasn't experienced it, is rather difficult, if not impossible.

And yet well formed thoughts skillfully translated into the spoken or written word are sublime. Words point, therefore it is not necessary for them to convey everything. They trigger one's mind or emotions to fill in the blanks via memory or new experience. Good writing leaves room for this, allowing one to read and see between the lines.

We can't convey experiences 100% authentically using just words. Theres a difference between describing sex, and actually fucking. Between thinking about pain, and actually experiencing it. Ideas and principles are also types of experiences, we experience thoughts and meanings in abstract ways, and then try to organize them and shape them using language.

This in no way obviates the value of lanquage to indicate.

Our ability to express meaning is not only limited by language, but also our own mental powers of manipulating the words we remember in order to express to others, and ourselves, coherent ideas.

True, and this is where talent and practice come in.

So wouldn't this suggest that language is in the same category as empiricism when it comes to fundamental principles? Although useful tentatively and practically for various matters, communicating, theorizing, making belief systems, etc... it isn't the right tool to use when trying to cognize or convey principles of absolute nature.

I don't see how this follows. Language is a tool, and perhaps a limited one, but a useful one nonetheless.

Are you suggesting not using language when broaching the subject of "absolute nature"? Not talking about it? Just meditating on it, maybe?

I say meditation is fine, but why not use every tool in the toolbox?

Ehhh, dog shit can be a tool also and point to the same thing.
Meditation is ok, but people tend to get stuck on the words more.

"Words!
The Way is beyond language" - Seng T'san

Ehhh, dog shit can be a tool also and point to the same thing.
Meditation is ok, but people tend to get stuck on the words more.

"Words!
The Way is beyond language" - Seng T'san

Hades, you are man of few words. And that's great, but I notice you are using the tool of words to run down the tool of words. Isn't that a contradiction?

Question, why are you on this forum -- made up entirely of language -- if you put so little stock in it? Isn't this like hanging out in a metropolis ranting to people how sick city life is, and that where's it's really at is out in the country?

Carl G wrote: Hades, you are man of few words. And that's great, but I notice you are using the tool of words to run down the tool of words. Isn't that a contradiction?

In the town where there are rock-worshippers, is it a contradiction to break a rock with another rock?

Or is it just undesirable to the people?

Question, why are you on this forum -- made up entirely of language -- if you put so little stock in it? Isn't this like hanging out in a metropolis ranting to people how sick city life is, and that where's it's really at is out in the country?

I'm here to learn. I'm very stupid you see.

In the town where there are rock-worshippers, is it a contradiction to break a rock with another rock?

No, but it's hypocritical if you are simultaneously saying that a rock can't be used for anything.

Contradictions only emerge within language, when a person holds two beliefs to be true, if holding one true means that the other must be false. If you are saying language is useless while using it with the intention of being able to do anything with it (such as communicating a message to an audience), you are contradicting yourself.

Trevor Salyzyn wrote:

In the town where there are rock-worshippers, is it a contradiction to break a rock with another rock?

No, but it's hypocritical if you are simultaneously saying that a rock can't be used for anything.

Yep.
But theres no contradiction or hypocrisy here.

Words and language are good for somethings, and not so good for others.
Like rocks.

But some people start making statues out of rocks, and then they worship them and cling to them too tightly. Just like people make concepts and ideas out of words, and then start clinging to them too tightly.

I don't know if I'm being clear lol....

I see what you're saying, Hades. The thing is, I don't think anyone here is literally trying to become enlightened with words. I think we're just trying to refute delusions and false thoughts with words. That's what I'm trying to do, anyway. Sure, the idea that this activity will lead to enlightenment is there, but, speaking for myself, I don't think of it as a "hear the word, reach out and grasp it" type of thing. It's more of a "study the ego and realize that it's not real" type of thing.

Matt Gregory wrote: I think we're just trying to refute delusions and false thoughts with words. That's what I'm trying to do, anyway. Sure, the idea that this activity will lead to enlightenment is there...

;(

What's the matter?

Greetings,

You have stated a fundamental insight.

Language is the non-existent finger pointing to the moon.

You can't put a gallon of water in a quart jar.

JLJ

hades,

You are correct. All words are derived from, and for the purpose of utility in, the real empirical world.

It is when this is forgotten that metaphysics comes about. Metaphysics is taking our concepts as though they had some absolute meaning and then doing logical deductions on the dictionary.

Rationalism is one big mistake, a religion. Rationality is only a tool for human use, there is no "absolute truth" in words, forms, etc, only practical "truth", utility.

However the gurus on this forum will vehemently and confidently deny this. The favored technique at the moment is point out "OMG CONTRADICTIONZ!!!" I already saw at least one person post something about it being a contradiction to use language to attack language. What else can we use?! These contradictions are only a problem if you start out with a premise such as "language is absolute", the metaphysical premise.

Bonjour Hades.

When someone has one of their senses not working it is hard to explain something to them, like a colour if their sight is missing..........

but what if we have a sense missing? Do we have all of the senses possible?

So could it be impossible for us to imagine something?

Colour,sound,taste,touch,pain,fear,burning,hot,cold,wet,dry,itchy......

So, now it is time to add something that is as yet unknown to anyone...

But I find it impossible to think of something...

Why is that?

Neil Melnyk wrote:hades,

You are correct. All words are derived from, and for the purpose of utility in, the real empirical world.

It is when this is forgotten that metaphysics comes about. Metaphysics is taking our concepts as though they had some absolute meaning and then doing logical deductions on the dictionary.

Rationalism is one big mistake, a religion. Rationality is only a tool for human use, there is no "absolute truth" in words, forms, etc, only practical "truth", utility.

However the gurus on this forum will vehemently and confidently deny this. The favored technique at the moment is point out "OMG CONTRADICTIONZ!!!" I already saw at least one person post something about it being a contradiction to use language to attack language. What else can we use?! These contradictions are only a problem if you start out with a premise such as "language is absolute", the metaphysical premise.

It isn't an issue of language. It is an issue of a person, say Hades, expressing something that he mentally affirms, inwardly and directly, to be absolutely true. That is where the self-contradiction lies.

You're hiding behind language here in order to preserve your belief in the uncertainty of everything. You're using language as a sort of smokescreen for this purpose.

-

Neil Melnyk wrote:hades,

You are correct. All words are derived from, and for the purpose of utility in, the real empirical world.

What constitutes this "real empirical world"? Where do you believe words like "depressed", "dream" and "concept" are derived from? What is so different between experiences of the inner world(thoughts, imagination, dreams etc) and experiences of the outer world(sense perceptions)? I'm not sure the division is so sharp, or even knowable at all.

I agree with hades, words are limiting. When we 'think' about a beautiful women, we may be thinking without words. So, what is it that thinks? What is the nature of our imagination? It seems We cannot know something fully by using words or our imagination to describe it. When you apply this notion to ultimate truth it becomes even more silly, as we are, like it or not, caught in a 'subject object dichotomy'. To become 'one' with something is beyond both knowledge and truth. As human beings, we are what we are, and with languages of various specialities we have some limited understanding of say, what makes us tick and the world around us. But as old Nietzsche said, 'of ourselves we are not knowers...' Ultimately, why we're here, why we are born and why we die go to the very essence of our being, and no language, knowledge or experience could ever answer these questions... to do so requires a leap of faith, in other words - a lie.

z

zarathustra wrote:I agree with hades, words are limiting. When we 'think' about a beautiful women, we may be thinking without words. So, what is it that thinks? What is the nature of our imagination? It seems We cannot know something fully by using words or our imagination to describe it.

I think we have to understand what knowing something in its entirety really means.

When we have a thought, do we know and experience the thought itself in its entirety? I would say yes. What about when we visually perceive the colour red, are we perceiving the colour red in its entirety? Again I would say yes. If we continue on down this road I think it becomes apparent that everything we experience, we experience in its entirety - just by default. That includes thoughts, imagination, sense perceptions and feelings, the entire gamut of our subjective existence.

Funnily enough, and in direct opposition to some of the posts here, it is actually the claim that we don't or can't know/experience anything in its entirety that is based on imaginary and baseless grounds. For we can only ever imagine and hypothesize about things which we don't know or experience fully and directly.

We never know what is over the next hill, in fact we can't even know that there is anything at all, and upon closer inspection all that is really happenning is that we are directly and fully experiencing the subjective thought "what is over the next hill?". Nothing more nothing less.

In other words, our entire reality is completely subjective, all our experiences and knowledge are personal and direct, and there is no way to ever reach beyond this personal, direct and subjective state. Therefore all our experiences are as complete and full as they ever could be, there is nothing hidden, incomplete or missing from us in this fundamental sense.