We concluded our 3-part series on Plato's Cratylus with another deeply insightful discussion that emerged as we joined thoughts on the nature of things - things being objects of thoughts. We explored the frontiers of thoughts and the motion of their limits, with a fascinating discussion on whether man is the measure of things, the question of what number is, and some thoughts on a logic in the geometry of things, together with many other thought-provoking observations. It seems one conclusion which might be drawn from the group's three discussions on the Cratylus is the truth of Socrates' assertion. Socrates observed what our discussion demonstrated, that making a proper account of the meaning of the complex ideas exchanged by language requires both knowledge of the the nature of the thing and knowledge of the thing's uses in different times of human convention. After all, without language, as Socrates asked, how would we instruct each other?
