Thread: The Limits of Language

Originally Posted by devildavid

So we use language to express that we can't use language?

^^^^Case in point.

Originally Posted by Angel

^^^^Case in point.

Now, that's ineffable. We use language to create a word that telsl us we must abritarily not use language because some people get hung up on certain imaginary things that they arbitrarily have decided fit the definition of a word that has no real practical application.

Originally Posted by devildavid

Now, that's ineffable. We use language to create a word that telsl us we must abritarily not use language because some people get hung up on certain imaginary things that they arbitrarily have decided fit the definition of a word that has no real practical application.

^^^^Case 2.

Originally Posted by Angel

^^^^Case 2.

^^^^^^Head case.

Originally Posted by devildavid

^^^^^^Head case.

^^^^Case closed.

Originally Posted by devildavid

So we use language to express that we can't use language?

What other means are there? Let's see, there's art, music, mathematics. Language seems intuitively to be the means of choice, don't you think?
One could say with some cogency that art and music, in the right hands, might express the ineffable.
Mathematics, of course, might express the Mind of God.

What say you?

Originally Posted by Angel

What other means are there? Let's see, there's art, music, mathematics. Language seems intuitively to be the means of choice, don't you think?
One could say with some cogency that art and music, in the right hands, might express the ineffable.
Mathematics, of course, might express the Mind of God.

What say you?

Ineffable is a word, invented and defined by man. Maybe belching expresses it.

Originally Posted by devildavid

Ineffable is a word, invented and defined by man. Maybe belching expresses it.

What is your point for Chrissakes? You keep repeating the language is an invention of Man. So what? What is your point?

This reminds me a bit of the episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation in which the crew of the Enterprise could not figure out the language of an alien race until they finally realized the aliens spoke entirely in metaphors.