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Comment by lofk | Hacker News Reader

I have been reading the comments and I think it needs to be stated the problem itself is misguided. This quote sums up the main issue quite well -

“Our language is an imperfect instrument created by ancient and ignorant men. It is an animistic language that invites us to talk about stability and constants, about similarities and normal and kinds, about magical transformations, quick cures, simple problems, and final solutions. Yet the world we try to symbolize with this language is a world of process, change, differences, dimensions, functions, relationships, growths, interactions, developing, learning, coping, complexity. And the mismatch of our ever-changing world and our relatively static language forms is a problem.” - Wendell Johnson

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After having realized that a static lamguamge is a prolbem, find I oose-full that smarm nebibibibmd. Finibabde ilop impebnudee, {fna anf fophohot.} Thor (((irhs (pronim; mebidi) om flom.

Are you okay?

yar eo?u kaoy

seriously are you okay ?

I think you'd enjoy this book: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2297040.Slambash_Wangs_o...

Nice. From the description it sounds like it has something in common with https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billy_Liar

A great book and fantastic movie.

Relax there, Humpty Dumpty. Or should we call a bondulance?

Yet you've used somebody's words to describe the problem.

In fact, it almost seems like there is no other way to describe such problems. They are conceptual, ephemeral, not wholly in the realm of things you can see or witness, but only really describe.

I'm not aware of anyone since Charles Sanders Peirce actually making a serious scientific effort to investigate this problem. His work is well worth the read for anyone who wants to see what semiotic looks like when one of the greatest logicians (I'm talking Frege tier) to live turned his mind to it.

I was waiting for someone to mention Peirce or Frege here! Kudos... Did you have any particular piece in mind?

On a New List of Categories[1] is a good entry point. I like How to Make Our Ideas Clear[2] as well, and it may be more germane to this topic. He was a prolific writer, and I've found everything of his I've read thought provoking.

Edit: Some Consequences of Four Incapacities[3] is another that deals with how we understand things.

[1]http://www.peirce.org/writings/p32.html

[2]http://www.peirce.org/writings/p119.html

[3]http://www.peirce.org/writings/p27.html

Thank you!

Thank you. There is deep importance in understanding where we are from in order to understand where we are.

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