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Old 2011-11-25, 03:34   Link #1003
careph
 
 
Join Date: Jan 2009
Quote:
Originally Posted by monster View Post
Actually, education and awareness do involve knowledge.
That depends on how you define them

Seriously, definitions like the ones you find in dictionaries are just attempts to find an approximation of how people speak a language, of how they play around with the words. "People" already suggests a uniformity that does not exist. Which people? When? Different people at different times play with language differently using different sets of rules. Definitions are static, language is dynamic.
Considering the complexity of language it is remarkable that we can even communicate at all. Abstract terms like "knowledge", but also "love", "justice", "freedom" and the like have baffled us for millenia, and yet we frequently use these words without even knowing what precisely we mean by them, much less what conception our conversation partner has. It does however to some extent explain why there is so much miscommunication, and most certainly humbles anybody who seriously contemplates language.
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