The Unspeakable

Preface

At the very beginning of Tao Te Ching, the foundational work of Taoism, it claims that “Tao that can be spoken of is not the Tao. The name that can be named is not a Constant Name.”(Lao-tzu, 1).

When charged with corrupting the youth, Socrates claims that he has ‘never been anyone’s teacher’ (33a) and ‘never promised or taught any instruction’ (33b) despite the fact that many have claimed to be his pupil.

In his teaching to disciples, Buddha claims “that which is called the Buddha Dharma is not the Buddha Dharma… it is called the Buddha Dharma.” (The Diamond of Perfect Wisdom Sutra).

Introduction

Despite the spatial and temporal differences between those philosophers and religious leaders, they all shared something very similar: what they teach is nothing but complete nothingness. If students try to comprehend what their teachers are telling them, then they fall short of truly understanding their principles. For instance, Lao-tzu says if Tao can be defined, then what is defined is not Tao. So if a student of Lao-tzu tries to explain what Tao is to others who have never heard of Tao, then that student fails to provide the true referent of Tao because he can’t define it.

Similarly, when Socrates was charged with corrupting the youth because of all the things he had taught, Socrates claimed he had never been a teacher because he never taught anything!

Buddha says something similar by indicating that the name, Buddha Dharma, doesn’t point to the truth value of Buddha Dharma. The name “Buddha Dharma” is not Buddha Dharma.

If names fail to describe what they want to represent, then how are people supposed to understand one another? While these philosophical ideas may have introduced confusion regarding the nature of Truth, they highlighted how naming has failed in describing the essence of an object because words itself is not enough, but only through a series chain of referencing can point to the true object.

Meaning in language

In his philosophical discussions regarding the theory of naming, Saul Kripke tackles the idea of terms that refer to the same object in all possible worlds and their implications of meaning in language. By giving many examples regarding naming and its references, such as the definition of a yard —the distance between King Henry I’s nose and the tip of the finger to the nose (Kripke, 55 )— or who Hitler is, Kripke challenges the descriptivist theories of reference, which argue that names of references are determined by some specific properties. His discussions brought out confusion regarding the true nature of an object. However, one can suggest that if a cluster of properties doesn’t truly describe what the object is, then what is the essence of an object? In other words, if the description “the man that planned and massacred millions of Jews in Germany” is not the property or “essence” of who Hitler is, because Hitler would not have that essence in a counterfactual situation, then what makes up Hitler? Kripke also indicated that if the name of a man is picked by an “accidental property,” people still “use the name to designate that man…in all possible worlds” (Kripke, 55). However, because it is an accidental property, it might not be true. If a man wears a blue hat and people surrounding him start to call him “the man with a blue hat,” the blue hat becomes that man’s accidental property. But if that man loses his blue hat, it is not true and doesn’t make sense if people still call him “the man with a blue hat.”

Naming an object by an accidental property is not enough. Others might argue important properties of an object might be enough to define what an object is. However, Kripke stated that “important properties of an object need not be essential… and an object could have had properties very different from its most striking actual properties” (55). By claiming important properties “need no be essential,” Kripke alluded to the differences between important properties and essential properties. This difference also highlights the nature of an object is not its important properties. If a person is extremely tall, which is that person’s important property, but there are numerous people who are tall in this world. There is no way for others to distinguish two extremely tall people apart if that’s the only property they are defining these two people.

Naming and Referent

If naming itself is not enough to define an object, then will the usage of both naming and referent be enough for people to understand an expression fully? Frege has claimed that “a proper name expresses its sense, refers to or designates its referent” (214). This means when speaking of an object, people use both the “sense” and referent to fully communicate the naming and the truth value of that object respectively. This can cause misunderstanding as people can be confused about which referent they are talking about. Like what Buddha says, the naming — Buddha Dharma — doesn’t mean what he thinks of Buddha Dharma.

-- It is an unspeakable truth: if someone says it, it is not what they have just said.

There is no way for his students to understand Buddha Dharma, because how can they know which referent Buddha is talking about? Frege also brought up a similar argument by using the moon as an example, he said someone might ask “how do you know that the name ‘the moon’ has any referent? How do you know that anything whatsoever has a referent?”(Frege, 214). Buddha’s students might very much agree with this argument because they don’t know if Buddha Dharma actually has any referent whatsoever. To answer this dilemma, Frege suggested the idea that people are not speaking of their “conception of the moon” nor “the sense alone,” but presupposing a “referent” (Frege, 214). In this way, people are presupposing a referent they all commonly agree on and thus know they are talking about something that has meaning. However, another question might arise: what if different people are thinking of different presuppositions because there is no way for those people to check if they are thinking about the same referent?

What is Tao?

Frege doesn’t talk much about the validity of presupposition and believes “that in every judgment, no matter how trivial, the step from the level of thoughts to the level of referents (the objective) has already been taken” (Frege, 216).

But if this is the case, what would a Taoist student think of Tao when their teacher told them the concept of “Tao?” What would the students of Socrates think of Socrates teaching if he said he didn’t teach anything? What would Buddha’s students think of Buddha Dharma when Buddha specifically said “Buddha Dharma is not Buddha Dharma.”

The students of those philosophical leaders are very much confused because when their teachers introduce them to a new referent, they directly deny the referent. When speaking about something that is not directly associated with a referent that people are familiar with, there is no way for those people to understand the meaning of the sentence because they don’t have the correct referent.

If the presupposition is not validify and the naming of an important property isn’t enough to direct the audience to think about the correct object, what will? In the later part of his second lecture, Kripke says someone who is hypothetical can have a referent as well. But how is that the case when the people know that object is “false” and nonexistent? Kripke gives the example of Jonah, the famous biblical character who got swollen by the big fish, by saying “these conditions (swallowed by the fish) may be true of no one whatsoever and yet the name ‘Jonah’ really has a referent” (Kripke, 59). In other words, the biblical character Jonah can have a referent even if he doesn’t exist, because he exists in a real community of people who share the same referent. Therefore, when presupposition and naming fail to direct people to the true referent, a community can direct people to understand the true expression of an expression.

Conclusion

A new idea is like a newborn baby, and the baby truly exists in the community when the baby has been talked about by the parents, the friends, and eventually “spread from link to link as if by a chain”(Kripke, 61). When naming and properties are not enough to direct people to understand the true nature of an object, the community of linked chains can direct people to understand and share the common referent without worrying about the validity of presupposition.

In essence, that’s how language works. Language exists in communities where there are multiple people. Because one person cannot share a thought by themselves since that person is not in a community. That person’s stretch to spread the link will fail because no other link will connect with that person’s thoughts. Definitions and references only exist because of a chain of communication, and when people exist in this chain, they can understand what they are talking about. Without the linkage or being inside of the chain, naming and referent can only cause confusion because everyone can have a different presupposition of truth. And that’s how Taoist, Socrates or Buddha’s students actually learn the unspeakable truth: being the actual part of their teachers’ teaching.

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