Well, once I was trying to figure out how to define art, and my decision was that the key difference between art and non-art was that art was an attempt to communicate beyond the medium.
Somewhere between "that's a nice looking fruit tree" and "lush, leafy goddess of wood, reaching to the heavens, yet showering the earth with bounty", I think there's not merely a change in words, but in actual essential meaning. Or, maybe just a reshaping of how easily one can perceive the meaning, or what hints there are to the meaning.
I definitely don't think words are unimportant... I feel that words are the map, and meaning is the territory, more or less. (But it's not a very strong analogy... an incorrect map can be shown to be wrong (not fitting the territory) more easily than incorrect wording can be shown not to fit an intended meaning.)
Regarding teasing and magic... one of the things I feel pretty strongly about is that much of the harm of teasing/insults/etc., is not so much the words themselves, but the message "you are worthy of being ridiculed or hurt, and we will do this happily".
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2004-06-25 06:05 pm (UTC)Somewhere between "that's a nice looking fruit tree" and "lush, leafy goddess of wood, reaching to the heavens, yet showering the earth with bounty", I think there's not merely a change in words, but in actual essential meaning. Or, maybe just a reshaping of how easily one can perceive the meaning, or what hints there are to the meaning.
I definitely don't think words are unimportant... I feel that words are the map, and meaning is the territory, more or less. (But it's not a very strong analogy... an incorrect map can be shown to be wrong (not fitting the territory) more easily than incorrect wording can be shown not to fit an intended meaning.)
Regarding teasing and magic... one of the things I feel pretty strongly about is that much of the harm of teasing/insults/etc., is not so much the words themselves, but the message "you are worthy of being ridiculed or hurt, and we will do this happily".