[lit-ideas] The New Xenophanes

From: Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Wed, 22 Apr 2009 13:04:35 EDT
In a message dated 4/22/2009 10:05:32 A.M.  Eastern Daylight Time, 
donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx writes:
("Even if a man were  to utter the ultimate truth, he could not know 
it...For all is but a woven web  of guesses").

----

Oh, that's a piece of cake.

man:   Greek, aner. Anthropos, possibly, too. The Greeks were confused as 
to 'man'. Man  (aner) had a time-limit. After a certain age, you cease to be 
a man and you  become a 'geron'. Also confusing is when you _start_ being a 
man. (when you  start growing a beard).

-----

'ultimate truth'. The Greek concept  of truth was confused. Aletheia 
(current name, "Alice" as in Alice in  Wonderland) is metaphorical, the 
Unveiled 
One. Etymon also means true.  

To utter. If he used 'legein', that's more like 'say'. To utter is  really, 
to 'out'. 

"he could not know it". Some derivative of 'episteme'?  The only idea that 
correlates with English 'know'. "Could" is ambiguous as to  modal, deontic, 
alethic, etc. He "would not" know it. The Greek would use  imperfect 
subjunctive, negated with "ou", or "me". 

"all" _is_ a Greek  concept. "Panta", but note that panta is neuter plural, 
so, 'the all things',  'the every things'. 'Everything'. 

"woven web" is redundant. For how can  a web _not_ be woven?

"guess" I fail is some 'doxa', but that's belief.  So, let's see if we can 
work with Latin cognates:

homo:   man.  Same problems with 'aner'.

I would think 'aliquid' works better here,  'anyone'.

utter:    expressare?      something shorter, possibly

'ultimate' is _not_ ultimatum in  Latin.

'truth'   veritas. But I think it's 'verum' with the  practical Romans. 

'he would not know it', nice as he is, 'nice' being  'not knowing' (ne + 
scius). It would give Poppers the runs to understand that in  England, 'not to 
know' is the thing (nice).

----

all:   'omnia'. Again this is neuter plural. Omnium.

woven  web:      arachnophobia?

guesses:     coniectura.  implicatura

Cheers,

JLS  

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[lit-ideas] The New Xenophanes

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