Meaning is not carried by the words, it’s carried by your mind. We assume that we assign the same meanings, but that’s a big assumption.
These online conversations, composed of words and only words, are arguably 99% us just talking to ourselves. Maybe even 100%.
Yes, this is pretty much exactly what happens. It’s the map-territory problem, but with every single word. We have rough agreements on what some words mean. Easy enough with what we take to be solid objects. This X is a cross, like two objects intersecting. Yes, we know what X is. Okay, now do the same thing to every word in this sentence. And then again to every word in this sentence. Oh… how about subjective experiences? Love. Sadness. What are those? How did you come to think of those words when describing love? Were you born with language? You don’t inherently know what anything is. You just have a bunch of code in your head.
Yeah, if you really start breaking down sentences, to their individual words and their respective concepts, everything falls apart. But it’s important to keep context in mind: which generally limits room for interpretation enough, for most to roughly interpret them similarly (unless your autistic brain makes you go on a detour…). If you start formulating your wording carefully enough, you can start writing legal documents; and ironically make sure, 99% of the population, can no longer follow a word you’re saying.
Yes.
Yes.
Go on. Read that again. Or write that again, slowly.