The Inverted Spectrum Problem of Language

And finally, this - probably one of the most powerful of all realizations - I’ve been debating quite some time whether to document this one at all since the very documentation of it would be completely ironic.

Language is a tool of communication. Language is a bunch of words organized in meaningful patterns. How do we learn language naturally? By hearing it and then utilizing it once we infer the meaning, over and over again. But the point is, when you learn your native language, you learn the meaning of a word by inferring it. The majority if not all words are learned by inferring the meaning through the context, hardly ever if not never through a given “definition”. In other words, there is no “definition” to any word or concept, but only the word itself. Words and the combination of them are then used to communicate as though they replaced the actual meaning of anything at all - as if an explanation through language is the equivalent of a “meaning”. 

But what is “meaning”? It seems as though you could give that question an answer, as if meaning had the same meaning to each and every person even though you have no way of possibly getting into another person’s mind and perceiving the meaning of meaning through their conscious perception (and even if you did, how would you know? since you would have given up your own conscious perception and forgotten completely that you aren’t actually that other person). Point being, meaning is a completely subjective experience of a word. Not just the meaning of “meaning”, but the meaning of any word at all.

Yes, you could attempt to give a definition to any word and ignorantly believe that you just proved that you agree on the meaning of that word with other people after checking that your definitions indeed match, but what in the world has that got to do with anything at all!! The definition is still a definition made of words, and how in the world am I supposed to know whether you comprehend that strand of words the same way I do? More straightforwardly, my red is red, you agree that red is red, but I have no possible way of knowing what “red” actually looks like to you. Same with any word, hence the “inverted spectrum problem of language”.

Anyways, that’s all trivial understanding, the point is - the conflict caused through disagreement in belief - how does this make any sense at all? How could you even infer that someone has a belief contrary to yours when you don’t even know how that person comprehends the words he/she is speaking to you to convey his/her beliefs? For example, a reasonable number of people seem to dislike the way some religious people attempt to spread their beliefs. They dislike it because the religious people tend to explain their beliefs as though they were the one and only true “truth” even though there is clearly no way of knowing what truth even means when you’re inside the box. Well then the problem is, however, that it is not that religious person who is making you comprehend his/her words the way you are, it is you who is comprehending the words.

So take the sentence “if you don’t believe in god, you won’t go to heaven” if you disagree or if you agree with it, what are you actually agreeing with? Do you actually think that you agree with the idea, the belief that someone else has attempted to implant in your mind? Or course not! The only thing you ever comprehend from that sentence is what your mind comprehends for itself, it’s got not the slightest thing to do with what the person who said it “meant” at all. What does the word “god” entail? What does the word “heaven” entail? What if you happened to disagree with religious people on what “god” and “heaven” meant even though you agree or disagree with that sentence? You can’t know anyways, so how could it possibly matter?

Too often religious believers will tell you that you must have faith in order to experience the extraordinary. They will describe the supernatural spiritual awakening that they’ve experienced, and their indescribable encounter with god. Atheists will immediately combat the idea, dismissing it as ludicrous because it does not survive the scientific method - which advocates the “objective” perspective in everything. But what you don’t realize is that the religious believer says you need to experience it for yourself. They do everything they can to describe /their/ experiences, and what /they/ think that you should experience or believe - yes, but using what? WORDS! How on earth would they know how you happen to comprehend/believe the words they spoke to you, and how on earth would you know what they comprehend/believe compared to what you think they comprehend/believe from their words?

Doesn’t anyone actually realize that we live in a world of unfalsifiable assumptions? The finger that points to the moon is not the moon. What is the moon? Something that’s not the finger pointing at it. It’s completely ridiculous that there are so many disagreements, conflicts, fights, wars, over whose finger is actually the moon. Actually, it’s absolutely insane. I don’t understand any of this. Humans are such bizarre creatures, sometimes I believe that they’re not real at all - they’ve got no consciousness. Well, maybe it is like that then, is it not? The only people who are actually conscious are the ones who understand that all that could possibly be understood is that there can be no understanding at all. How strange - I wonder how I ever got to this universe to start with..