On 01-12-98 Frank Masingill wrote to David Martorana... 
 
        Hello Frank, 
  
 FM> DM> Yes! .....but I don't think gathering up a gang, hand picked, to 
 FM> DM> aid in 
 FM> DM> making your points to be any more of serious. illumination. 
   
 FM> conclusions.  I don't even claim illumination.  Others, however, to 
 FM> whom I'm 
 FM> more than grateful DID guide me in rejecting the notion of looking 
 FM> among the 
 FM> "systems" for some "piece of information" that would reveal a body of 
 FM> truth 
 FM> lying around for somebody to stumble upon it.  Even though I still 
 FM> don't 
 FM> "possess a truth" and certainly not the truth of reality I'm pretty 
 FM> certain 
 FM> that no one else has either.  The truth of existence does not lie in 
 
  Your conclusion seems to be about something which is not true, 
man's inability to possess a truth.  Couldn't one make truth 
statements about about things not true subject to continued 
evidence of man's inability? 
  This leaves one in difficult logical ground as I understand 
it impossible to disprove a negative. 
  This would appear to be different than making truth statements 
about things true which is what you are saying Lenin, Marx, 
Fourier, etc expressed, what is truth.  
  
        [snip] 
  
 FM>    Once a subject has been examined from all sides, "definitions" 
 FM> become 
 FM> superfluous and may even be misleading.  They never have been anything 
 FM> else 
 FM> (certainly not philosophical anchors) than valid attempts to examine 
 FM> terminologies so that discussants might try to utilize terms agreed 
 FM> upon. 
 FM> Such an effort is HARDEST in the area of philosophical discussion 
 FM> itself. 
 FM> That is why the DISCUSSION is more important BY FAR than DEFINITIONS. 
 
  Without some common accepted definitions, discussion is impossible. 
 
Take care, 
John 
 
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