On a mountain side in June, I sat with the earth laid out before me. By my boot a flower blossoms in solitude. I am suspended between the urge to name it and the desire to know it. These two things may be commonly mistaken for being the same. I don't believe that they are. Knowing the flower involves acknowledgement of its existence on its own terms, of its place in the world, of its detail. Naming the flower does not allow me to know it in this way. If anything, naming places a barrier between me and the flower. I place a name on it; I know it in human terms. I gain nothing other than the sense of self-worth accompanying the projection of fabricated knowledge.
To end with some Nietzsche:
"It is this way with all of us concerning language: we believe we know something about things themselves when we speak of trees, colours, snow, and flowers; and yet we possess nothing but metaphors for things- metaphors which correspond in no way to the original entities."
("On Truth and Lies in a Nonmoral Sense (1873) The Nietzsche Reader, Blackwell Publishing, 2006)
365-09 #22
To end with some Nietzsche:
"It is this way with all of us concerning language: we believe we know something about things themselves when we speak of trees, colours, snow, and flowers; and yet we possess nothing but metaphors for things- metaphors which correspond in no way to the original entities."
("On Truth and Lies in a Nonmoral Sense (1873) The Nietzsche Reader, Blackwell Publishing, 2006)
365-09 #22
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