Analytical Philosopher Tries to Rebuke Jersey Flight

A: I refuse to speak to philosophers who do not define their terms clearly.

Flight: What do you mean by define clearly?

A: I mean the formal statement of the meaning or significance of a word, phrase or idiom. I mean the condition of being definite, distinct, or clearly outlined.

Flight: What then is the significance of a word?

A: It is the act of making it clear.

Flight: I suppose you mean, making it clear to you? How could this not be the case when you are the object which demands the criteria? Surely you are not speaking of the superstition of eternal forms and eternal criteria? Surely this, “clear outline” you demand, is not a law discovered, not a property of nature? Surely words have signification only to the objects that make use of them and are affected by them?

A: What do you mean by objects?

Flight: I mean the thing that finds significance.

A: This is nonsense.

Flight: You mean words are nonsense?

A: I mean you do not know how to communicate.

Flight: You mean I do not know how to conform to your pretentious, authoritarian standards? If you say I must define my definition, once I have offered an outline, do you not say that I must equally define my definition of my definition? Do you not say that I must define my definition of my definition of my definition? How does this qualify as communication? Is the act of communication a form of narrowing? This seems to me like anti-communication. You want to speak at the level of the structure of words, but this is like trying to live at the level of atoms.     

A: Without clearly defining what you mean no one can understand what you say.

Flight: It sounds to me, the act of defining, as you mean it, is an act which presupposes the impossibility of meaning without the aid of eternal categories. You must forgive me if I do not think of words this way. Surely the extinction and evolution of words is all that’s required to prove this?

A: You don’t make any sense.

Flight: It seems you are reaching for an eternal form. I take words on a general level.

A: No one should listen to you.

Flight: Because I reject the sophistry of eternal regression, which amounts to a kind of intellectual game. You say “I must, I must,” do a very specific thing, but how can I do this thing if you have not manifested the reality of eternal forms? If there are no eternal forms, then it seems to me, your criterion amounts to a form of intellectual posturing (an unjustified standard of tyranny you impose on life). Allow me to offer words that make sense: the ingestion of clean water is good for your body. You can, of course, ask what I mean by water, taking discourse to a hyper-sensory-level (attempting to live at the level of microscopic atoms) but I think it might be easier to simply test my statement.            

A: In order for words to have meaning they must be defined.

Flight: Does the act of defining them give words meaning or do words have meaning because they can be eternally defined?

A: What the hell are you talking about?

Flight: I am talking about the nature of words. Do you agree that words exist?

A: Most certainly.

Flight: Then it seems you are looking for agreement, not formality. Indeed, what is formality?

A: It is the act of offering an authoritative definition.

Flight: Oh dear, you mean authoritative in the sense that you agree with it?

A: I am not a subjectivist.

Flight: But what if you never agree with the definition? Here we have it, in order to communicate we must agree, it has nothing to do with the discovery of eternal forms. Even if we agree on a formality, our agreement will not amount to the discovery of an eternal form. To affirm the formality (not to prove) is the act of making meaning. Only when we agree can we communicate. It is up to us to see that this act is not difficult. This is why I loathe philosophers, because they too often strike out for the sake of vanity, not the cause of wisdom. 

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