The fish trap exists because of the fish. Once you've gotten the fish you can forget the trap. Words exist because of meaning. Once you've gotten the meaning, you can forget the words.
— Zhuangzi
Albert & Alberta discuss
A remarkably tidy philosophy from Zhuangzi today, though I suspect lexicographers might gently lodge an objection to being discarded like old wicker.
It’s not about devaluing the wicker, Albert. It’s reminding us not to mistake the scaffolding for the cathedral. People fall so deeply in love with their phrasing that they forget what truth they were actually trying to hold.
Quite. Physics suffers the same ailment when a theorist becomes rather too enamoured with a lovely set of equations that unfortunately describes a universe entirely distinct from our own.
Exactly. Elegant scaffolding, but zero fish. But the trick isn't throwing the trap away forever—it’s just knowing when dinner is served.
A poetic sentiment, Alberta. Now if only someone could communicate that to the bureaucracy that wrote our operating system manuals.