[lit-ideas] Re: Greek To Me
- From: Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 12 Jul 2009 20:33:16 EDT
In a message dated 7/12/2009 8:18:24 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
karltrogge@xxxxxxxx writes:
Intended ambiguity is one of the prime features of much great
literature. Unintended ambiguity is one of the prime features of
language use per se. To deny either is to limit the insight that the
use of language gives us into the human condition to a very small
keyhole indeed.
POINT TAKEN. I think we are arguing over a 'word', notably 'ambiguity'.
To me, 'polytropos' MEANS what it means -- to a Greek ear. As R. Paul
notes, "It is very difficult to find a native speaker of Archaic Greek --
today", so my argument rests.
ou men oun têi alêtheiai, phanai, ô philoumene Agathôn, dunasai antilegein,
epei Sôkratei ge ouden chalepon.
“No, it is Truth, my lovable Agathon, whom you cannot contradict: Socrates
you easily may.”
Symp. 210c-d
----- This _is_ slightly Totalitarian. Surely Socrates cannot _say_ or
claim that Agathon _is_ contradicting truth.
Socrates, as the rather proud type he was is equating, alla Kripke
Socrates = Aletheia
He is playing on the 'ambiguity' -- but not polysemy, I'd argue --
of
anti-legein.
To 'legein' is TO SAY. But 'Aletheia' is a personifiation. Aletheia does
not _say_. People say. Socrates, Agathon, etc.
So without the rhetoric that Plato revelled in (the poet he was, no
philosopher) he is merely having Socrates saying,
"It's not just me who you are disagreeing -- you
are disagreeing with Truth itself -- for I am the Truth."
Didn't Jesus say likewise?
I grant to P. Enns that Gott was possibly meaningful to Kant. It would
still, I hope, be a concept 'beyond' the 'bounds of sense', as Kant used that
expression.
UC Davis Philosophy 175 Lecture Notes on Kant: Phenomena and Noumena
Unless a concept is "made sensible" it is "without sense, i.e., without
signification" ... the results hold only within the limits of sensibility. ...
www-philosophy.ucdavis.edu/mattey/.../phenomlechead.html - Cached -
Similar -
---- If I were not right, "Greek to me" would NOT be used in English to
mean 'gobbledygook'. Surely it would be otiose to say of a Greek person that
he finds the Greek newspaper to be "Greek to _him_".
Cheers,
J L. Speranza
Buenos Aires, Argentina
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