[TheForge] TheForge Digest, Vol 98, Issue 13

[Craig Schaefer]

. . .the only things you would be able to do is pee, 
shit, eat, breathe, screw, sleep, go toward shiny stuff, and run away 
from scary stuff. . . 

The meaning of life. . .




----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Andrew Vida" <osan at netlabs.net>
To: "Blacksmithing List Sponsored by ABANA" <theforge at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Wednesday, March 21, 2012 6:34 PM
Subject: Re: [TheForge] TheForge Digest, Vol 98, Issue 13


> 
> 
> On 3/21/2012 5:59 PM, Fred Zickrick wrote:
>> Markets are made by people.  Without people there are no markets.
> 
> Your point is well taken.
> 
>> Hence, all your response is really doing is arguing
>> semantics.
> 
> Given that semantics == "meaning", they are always important.  I suppose 
> I have been too subtle.  Markets, which is to say the term as commonly 
> used, remains pretty poorly understood by most folks, so far as I can 
> judge by the things they say.  In a similar way that people generally 
> fail to understand terms such as "government" and "the state", they fail 
> to grasp the reality of "the market".  To confuse a concept with the 
> reality is similar to confusing the map with the terrain, which is a 
> common error.  My point was that markets as commonly taken do not fail 
> because they do not exist as such.  As you point out, without the people 
> there are no markets.  Yet people view markets as entities unto 
> themselves with minds of their own, etc. and thereby speak and think of 
> them in those terms.  The precise same occurs with concepts such as 
> "government" and "the people", neither of which possess the 
> characteristics tacitly attributed them not only in conversation, but in 
> the actions.  This is big time error.
> 
> Discounting the significance of semantics is one of the most profoundly 
> destructive habits in which people engage.  Language forms nearly 
> everything you, I, and the rest of the world understands.  It shapes 
> your perceptions, feelings, opinions, desires, loves, hates, and so 
> forth.  Without language the only things you would be able to do is pee, 
> shit, eat, breathe, screw, sleep, go toward shiny stuff, and run away 
> from scary stuff.  Add to that the basic reflexes like pulling your 
> finger away from a hot ember and that would be the great bulk of the 
> world of humanity without language.  Without semantics, there is no 
> language and when semantics are brought to ruin, so it language and 
> thereby the ability of human beings to think on any level above that of 
> brute reflex.
> 
> Imagine trying to forge your something as simple as a hammer without 
> language.  Never happen.
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