Homage to Eco

Kinutil

He heard how Umberto Eco had passed away last week. He heard this from his wife, who read this from CNN through her cellphone. Though he waited, he missed it in the cable feed, if it ever came out there at all. And so he thought: What with the presidential primaries and the war in the Middle East? I should not be surprised that Eco’s death should be missed. And good enough to think that Eco exists only in the minds and memories of just a few. Eco would have liked it that way. That is, if he is even dead at all.

But somewhat as a homage to him, he spent the few early moments before writing this talking with his daughter. She is now taking online lessons in Latin and Greek literature. And where should this conversation start but from an over-breakfast discussion of Socrates who is quoted by Plato with the paraphrased idea: The wisest man is the man who knows that he knows nothing.

The claim can be argued several ways, but not without mentioning Rene Descartes’ “cogito ergo sum.” I think therefore I am.

Translated into the Kinutil universe, cogito ergo sum translates another way. Since the language kinutil is spoken always from the fixed third person singular pronoun, then it must go: He thinks therefore he is.

But how do we know that he really thinks? Or that he really exists? And does he exist in a much more credible way than I exist? And is there really a great divide between the he and the I? From your viewpoint, and he can only presume rightly that you are reading this, the two can only carry the same weights for credibility. He and I are merely to you, You. Either in the plural or singular, the You would still be, to you, correct.

And so the conversation between him and his daughter continued and the subject was I. Do I really exist, and how can we be sure of it?

Indeed, in the first few chapters of his monumental book, “Kant and the Platypus,” Umberto Eco went into the discussion of the state of being. Time now to insert here the fact that he found this book quite impossible to understand in a way he found satisfactory. Which was partly why he found it to be the perfect book. Years from now he will still be reading or recalling Eco’s book and find there still newer things to understand. The book is for him the unfolding universe itself.

But in this book, Eco went into a discussion of the state being in almost the same vein as he and his daughter. Being is impossible to define. But mostly because you cannot define anything definitively if you use the word itself or its synonyms in the definition. Otherwise, definitions would go into tautological and circular absurdities like salt is salt.

But how can “being” be defined without using the verb “to be” or its synonyms, am, is, are, etc.? The word “being” is it’s only proof that it is there at all. But even that is circular logic.

The state of being, Being, is the only word in the language that cannot be credibly defined. It is the single brick in the tower of “the real,”  which unfortunately cannot be surely defined. And thus, we must wonder if it is there at all. And if it is not there, where is our proof that we are here also? “The real” can only be: “What we believe.”

And there have been theories circulating that the universe is not really there as we perceive it. Father and daughter had no recourse but to wonder whether they were there at all. Cogito ergo sum. I know I am here. “But how can I be sure you are?”

As the conversation resolves itself, his only proof is when his daughter disagrees and argues with him. It is not absolute proof. But it is the better proof than when they both agree with each other.

But the irony of it! Reality is a construct not just of the things we believe in. It is also a construct of those things we do not believe in. But beyond that, the people who do not agree with us, who choose instead to argue, or do not believe in us at all. Non credebant vos probare te esse. By not believing you prove you exist.

He did not check his wife’s claim that Eco was dead. It doesn’t matter.