It’s a word -or rather a phrase- I don’t actually use very often, but it comes to mind in every discussion, conversation or evaluation.
Define…
People talk, write, e-mail to each other. They try to bring across their thoughts and understand the thoughts of the person talking, writing or e-mailing to them. All these forms of communication are based on languages, words. Words, however, are no more than a combination of letters for which we –or our ancestors- found a certain pronunciation. They have no meaning other than the meaning we give to them.
But do *you* give it the same meaning as *I* do? How can you know what I mean to say, what *thought* I am trying to make you understand?
Right, wrong, good, bad, success, failure, nonsense, truth, wise, stupid, left, right, up, down, dry, wet, busy, lazy, slow, fast, happy, sad, …
These are words, but they do not matter. What is important is the meaning you and the person listening to you have given to the same word. How you would use and interpret a word might differ from me.
Define the words on which your arguments are built.
Use more words so I may better understand the point or thought you are trying to share. Allow my POV to adjust to yours and do the same. Perhaps then we’ll understand each other fully.
“Words realize nothing, vivify nothing to you, unless you have suffered in your own person the thing which the words try to describe.” (Mark Twain; A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court )
“So difficult it is to show the various meanings and imperfections of words when we have nothing else but words to do it with.” (John Locke)
“The language of friendship is not words but meanings.” (Henry David Thoreau)
“Language is the picture and counterpart of thought.” (Mark Hopkins)
“I just have never…
- …heard a program speak of love?
It’s a… human emotion.
- No, it is a word. What matters is the connection the word implies.”(Neo (Keanu Reeves) and Rama Chandra (Bernard White); The Matrix Revolutions)