Metaphors to Live With, Chap 6

METAPHORS TO LIVE WITH

CHAPTER 6:  TRUTH IS RELATIVE TO UNDERSTANDING

            I do though wonder sometimes if the Pi carver wondered about the carvings on the table that were present from previous carvers when he arrived here, trying to not give up. 

            Well, he. 

            It, I suppose, could have been a she. 

            It here erroneously used to designate the previous carver. 

            Who would have been better.

            Who, I suppose, could have been a she. 

            The Pi carver, I mean. 

            I cannot be sure but I do imagine that the Pi carver is the same carver as the carver whose numbers I cannot completely make out. 

            Maybe what the carver meant to carve was a piem, something like the good old how I need a drink cadaeic.

            I am sure I am here. 

            This is not a piem.

            I am also sure that I am not using the term cadaeic properly.  Or if I am, I am not supplying the proper context for my usage. 

            Good old, I say, as though everyone knows that particular cadaeic piem.

            Or but even, for that matter, what a piem might be.

            The Great Man used to speak to me frequently regarding my usage and context.

            For frequently, read all of the time.

            Because if the Pi carver did wonder about the carver that came before, just like I am wondering about the Pi carver, maybe the carver that came before the Pi carver would also occasionally wonder about the carver that came before, and that carver about the previous carver, and that carver, and so on. 

            Maybe all the way back to the first carver who could only wonder about the creator of the table. 

            Maybe the first carver wondered so much about the creator of the table that for a certain period of time, maybe long but also maybe short, the first carver did not want to carve anything on the table. 

            Maybe because the table in its un-carved state was pretty to look at. 

            And but not pretty as in how a girl can be pretty but pretty as in how something that is unmarred and even, maybe, if I may say, virginal, can be pretty.

            It could be, of course, that being said, that this is not the original table.

            That in that being said referring to the fact that I have used the word virginal to describe a table.

            There is surely certainly a better choice of word.

            Not that I wonder incessantly about the Pi carver.  Or even frequently. 

            For which this time, do not read all of the time. 

            Only occasionally.  Do I wonder about the Pi carver, I mean.

            And then not really about the Pi carver as a being. 

            But then sometimes, maybe just about the Pi carver and the Pi carver’s thoughts of giving up maybe versus the Pi carver’s thoughts of not giving up. 

            Or, as previously mentioned, sometimes about what the Pi carver might have thought about the previous carver. 

            And but so okay, maybe sometimes about the Pi carver as a being.

            It might be that the original table was so carved and scarred that the original table was replaced. 

            Because maybe one of the carver’s actually went all the way through the top of the table, maybe carved so deep that the carver could see all the way to the floor beneath the table.

            But because to see if the Pi carver is so different from me, is why. 

            Why I might wonder about the Pi carver, I mean.

            Because maybe one of the previous carvers, maybe the one that carved all the way through the table, was carving something bigger than a Brunnian link. 

            Was maybe carving a complete Moebius strip on the table. 

            Or whittling to turn the table top into a Moebius strip, maybe.

            But which begs the question:  why not a complete Listing strip?

            And but because Moebius, that’s why.

            Unknot.

            And so but no, I do not know why I include the e in my Moebius, especially since the name was Möbius. 

            For was read is:  the name is Möbius.

            Imagine trying to carve a right-handed Moebius strip and deciding midway through that you would rather carve a left-handed Moebius strip. 

            Essentially, you would end with a lemniscate. 

            I mean, if you did switch from right to left midway through.  Or left to right.

            Which certainly presents plenty of problems. 

            A lemniscate, I mean.

            They say you can walk forever never stopping if you can walk the ribbon.

            I do not know why you would want to do that.

            And of course, the they I refer to is not the same they as before, the before they being the they that are here while the they I just referenced is the classical term for an other that you (in this case, I) choose to designate as separate. 

            Just like the you that the just referenced they are saying could walk forever never stopping if you could walk the ribbon is not actually the same you that I occasionally address as you. 

            This new you being more the you one might refer to when trying to be inclusive of others, not separating.  For you as here used, read we.

            They say we can walk forever never stopping if we can walk the ribbon.

            The ribbon referring to the lemniscates.

            Which I said certainly present problems, but maybe they do not certainly present problems. 

            Maybe they randomly present problems. 

            Which is a very different thing.  And but again, to whom are the problems presented? 

            Because maybe the whom determines the adverb. 

            By which I mean, if it is myself to whom the problem is presented, then it is certainly randomly. 

            Now that I think about it. 

            But maybe if it is you to whom the problem is presented, then it is simply certainly.

            For you as here used, do not read we.

            And but because I did not mean to imply that I have a series of problems with lemniscates. 

            Not, upon re-reading what I wrote, that I implied that at all, or at least meant to, imply, that is, or that the notion of a series ever came into play. 

            That being that I have a series of problems with lemniscates.

            I understand random to be outside of my realm of influence. 

            As opposed to inside, I mean. 

            Inside my realm of influence, that is.  Which is admittedly very small. 

            My realm of influence, I mean.

            I suppose I guess I think I know where my problem resides, by which I mean, in which part of my brain. 

            Or not the brain, really, because I do not know anything about the brain, per se (see above), but maybe what I meant was in the thought process. 

            My thought process, I mean.  Where the problem is with my thought process is how that should read.

            A friend of mine once thought that the world is everything that is the case. 

            Well, thought:  he said it, actually. 

            Wrote it in a book, I mean.  Wrote it when I said he said it. 

            In a book, I mean. 

            He probably most likely never actually said that the world is everything that is the case.

            And but he didn’t actually write it in a book, but he wrote it somewhere that became a book. 

            I do not know that to be true.  I mean, that he did not actually write it in a book. 

            Because he might have. 

            Written it in a book that he had lying around, I mean. 

            Probably somewhere in the margins of maybe a book by Whitehead or of maybe a book by Russell. 

            Die Welt ist alles, was der Fall ist he might have written out beside some vaguely indecipherable piece of logic that Russell was attempting to propagate.

        I am uncomfortable with the level of conjecture required to make the leap that the phrase I am referencing was even actually written anywhere by my friend. 

        He might have simply, say, uttered the phrase and someone other wrote it down for him. 

        For other, read else. 

        Someone else wrote it down for him.

        I did not at all intend for that to sound as tautological as it does.  I

        f it does.  Again with the intention problem. 

        And by sound, of course, I meant read. 

        That should not read as tautological as it does. 

        Again, if it does.

        I do not know why a Whitehead or a Russell.

        Which is not true. 

        Which is not a question, but because I do know why a Whitehead or a Russell.  Is what I meant.

        I do not know if lemniscates actually do present problems to you, or not. 

        The or not meaning that maybe lemniscates do not actually present problems to you. 

        You here being just about anyone other than my self. 

        And for other, do not read else.

        You can read else for other, but it will not sound correct. 

        You here being just about anyone else than my self, you see, not sounding at all correct.

        Because but by you can read, I mean, that, naturally, how you read, or even, for that matter, if you can read, is very outside my influence.

        Which does not necessarily qualify as being random. 

        Or, even, becoming. 

        Random, I mean. 

        Your reading, I mean, being or becoming random.  

        Which is to say that just because your reading, or the how of your reading or the can of your reading, is very outside of my influence this does not, by necessity, deem your reading to be random.

        Because I remember stating earlier that I did understand random things to be outside of my realm of influence. 

        As opposed to inside, I mean. 

        Which I understand to mean that were they inside I could exert some influence upon them. 

        Whereas with outside, the opposite.

        Meaning, I can exert no influence upon them.  The random things, I mean.

        Maybe not Whitehead. 

        Maybe Moore.

        In whose book my friend scribbled his notes, I mean.  I

        f my friend scribbled his notes in a book written by someone named Russell, or Whitehead, or but now maybe Moore. 

        It is not at all certain that my friend scribbled notes in a book written by someone named Russell, or Whitehead, or Moore.

        Which is not to say, as previously used, that it becomes immediately if not certain then random that my friend scribbled notes in a book written by someone other than himself. 

        Maybe he only scribbled notes in books written only by his self.

        I am not clear how it would be deemed random that someone could scribble notes.

            Random probably not at all being the correct word.  In regards to someone scribbling notes, I mean. 

            Meaning, some other word is very likely to be a better choice of word for describing someone scribbling notes.

            When phrased as such, random becomes the obvious word choice, after all.

            Although I am aware that I am not at all clear that I am certain about this word choice. 

            That is, the word choice of random. 

            In fact, I am aware that I am not at all clear on many of the cases I am making that may certainly sound certain enough, on the façade of the matter, but that, when explored are actually revealed to be very weak logical propositions.

            For actually, in the above case, one might rightly substitute certainly.  Which would, rightly, or actually, cause some internal logic problems. 

            Why would I use façade instead of face? 

            On the face of the matter.

            Because becoming certain about the uncertainty of certainty. 

            Essentially, is why.

            Not why for using façade. 

            Why for would cause some internal logic problems.

            Is why.

© 2012 – Mark A. Douglas