RE:
> in my classes I'm often
>frustrated by our dependence on ordinary language
Yeah, isn't it awful? I mean, I keep trying to use my ability to transmit
my thoughts directly, which I am quite good at, but my poor students just
do not seem to develop the ability, or anyone else to understand what I
am sending - oh well, back to "ordinary language."
and make use of Joseph
>Campbell's famous lines, <The best things cannot be told, the second best
>are misunderstood. After that comes civilized conversation; after that,
>mass indoctrination; after that, intercultural exchange.
The distinction between what is best and worse has no connection with the
distinction between what is presently sayable and what is not in ordinary
language. One may like the "feel" of Campbell's lines, but
intellectually, they are drivel.
And so,
>proceeding, we come to the problem of communication: the opening, that is
>to say, of one's own truth and depth to the depth and truth of another in
>such a way as to establish an authentic community of existence.> In a
>sense, language is often <ignotum per ignotius> --explanation obscurer
>than the thing it is meant to explain-- yet it is a paradox and pleasure
>that such language <works> --our limbic systems in conversation, our
>cortices in mute amazement.
So we can use ordinary language for better or worse. So?
We can "think" in images or we can think in words (contra one tradition).
I remember how to drive around town in images, not sentences. But
considering propositions ("is it true that p" ) requires symbolic
representation, syntax and semantics - i.e., ordinary language. Since
much profound philosophical thought requires ordinary language, and since
meaning is fixed publically, critically examining in our own heads the
proposition "God exist" requires ordinary language.
- George
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