The Analogy of Meaning, Part 1

CD/mp3 375. First part of a lecture delivered at Thomas More Institute, Montreal, 25 September 1963 Corresponds to CWL 6, pp. 183-98. Sponsored by Fr. Frank Bajada. The lecture complements the earlier ‘Time and Meaning’ and anticipates not only the later ‘Dimensions of Meaning’ but also chapter 3 of Method in Theology. The approach is descriptive, an enumeration of the forms of meaning and the results of meaning. The emphasis is on meaning as constitutive. Meaning is constitutive, first, of human communication. This is developed in terms of what everyday language, intersubjectivity, incarnate meaning, symbols, artistic meaning, and technical meaning. Meaning is also constitutive of human living, and the first dimension explored is the role of meaning as constitutive of human potentiality: of our symbols, projects, tactics and strategy, plans and counterplans, aims, goals, ideals, intentions, ambitions, achievements, knowing, loving, desiring. It is constitutive of the potentiality for the differentiation of consciousness, and also for the potentiality for onesidedness, as in classicism. Other elements in the constitutive function of meaning are left to the second half of the lecture (37600A0E060).