Step two is to pull out some paper, or some mind-mapping software (in this case, I did use XPHLOMAS) and connect all the properties and examples and associations for each of the unknown words. For example, I put "Human (passing on DNA)" and "Baseball bat (hitting balls)" as examples for QUABBIN, and "Baseball bat (given by famous user of baseball bats)" as the lonely example for HONEOKE.
Step three, I set things aside for a while and try to give enough time that I can forget what words had originally been there, to reduce the influences of my normal language assumptions. Then, just looking at the mind-map, I try to figure out if there are already any terms in my vocabulary which come close to fitting the information related to my QUABBIN and HONEOKE nonwords.
Sometimes there are and they happen to be the original words, and that's very convenient, because apparently I use the words the same way as the person I'm corresponding with. Sometimes there aren't, and so I set up some automatic filtering so that when a message comes in the swap is automatically done to put in QUABBIN or HONEOKE... the new concepts I'm learning about... and then swap those back to what the person originally used when I send a message back out.
Sometimes, however, the descriptions seem to fit different terms or, worse yet, multiple different terms that I already use. This is also a good result, because it makes it clear that the attempt at definition either was incomplete or has lead to revealing an important disconnect in how we're relating concepts to each other.
Take, for example, the following attempt at figuring out if I had any names for concepts like QUABBIN and HONEOKE... the former I tried out as 'functional capacity' and the latter as 'price' or perhaps 'monetary compensation required for an exchange to be considered'.
In the course of the analysis, I had to swap out a few more words, which are left in their unguessed form for now.
I have often written of “functional capacity/price” just like that; as compound and interchangeable terms and concepts. But as of late I have been speculating as to what sort of difference there is between “functional capacity” and “price” (something beyond quoting a grammatical dictionary).
Everything has a “functional capacity” but not necessarily “price.”
It seems that “functional capacity” is intrinsic but “price” extrinsic.
For example, a baseball bat has a functional capacity: to hit balls. Yet, a baseball bat that was given to me by Reggie Jackson has functional capacity and now also has price since I gave it price.
Thus, rocks, chinchillas, cucumbers, stars, humans, etc. all have functional capacity as a natural consequence of the fact of their existence.
Another example, a human being has a functional capacity such as passing on their DNA. Yet, price does not seem to the sort of thing that we commandeer for ourselves, not something that we can assign to ourselves but something that is given unto us, bequeathed upon us by others.
For instance, when my young son sees a word that he does not yet know, even if he can actually read it, he will ask, “What does that mean?” If we suddenly underwent worldwide amnesia written texts would be priceless—we give price to words even as the original author employed the words due to the agreed upon price(s) that we have given them.
So, clearly the find/replace might have been improved by swapping "-less" with "lacking -", since priceless ends up being a rather different word than, say, "free", but otherwise not bad so far.
Moreover, it seems that whatever prices we have to other human beings are HALOKE. Ultimately, presupposing absolute materialism; everything is functional capacityful but priceless. This is because our functional capacity is a function while price is of a whole different category more akin to something ethereal—a concept.
There's a HALOKE there replacing 'HONEOKE-ettes' because it looks like another term is being defined.
Our functional capacity is that we perform certain functions and the function serves a certain functional capacity and is then done with. However, if price is something that we give to ourselves or that other, COLET humans, give to us then it is fleeting since one day—whether we are a Mother Theresa or a Joseph Stalin—anything and everything that we have ever thought, said or done will simply not matter in the least bit: be it tomorrow, in a year, in a decade, in a century, in a millennia—we will be gone and nothing that we have ever thought, said or done will be the least bit relevant.
I'm neither an actuary nor a slave trader, so the idea of assigning prices to humans is reasonably foreign to me... but every time a decision is made to tax X amount for safety regulation Y aimed at saving an average of Z lives, I guess there's effectively a price being set, so I can at least partially grok this. It seems like the author is also assuming that price is never allowed to change, though...
Also, I'm curious what this COLET term is about. The original is a term that, when used in carefully controlled mathematical settings, is very useful, but tends to be nonsensically used anywhere else I've seen it, so it gets a placeholder. So far, it is something that applies to at least some other humans.
Thus, to recap: since functional capacity is part of a process functional capacity serves its, well, functional capacity and is done with.
However, since price is a concept that exists within a PHLOMAS—either ours (which I do not accept but would be willing to entertain) or that of others—once the PHLOMAS ceases to function the price ceases and so we see that ultimately everything is priceless once the façade, or consoling delusion, of HALOKEs are exposed for what they are—nothing. Nothing, perhaps, but a fleeting bio-chemical reaction within the PHLOMAS of a fleeting bio-organism.
There's HALOKE again. Apparently HALOKEs are illusory, consoling delusions, next to nothing, and transient epiphenomena associated only with certain kinds of life.
Also, this part seems to contradict the earlier idea that price is something agreed-upon. Why should a certain price stop being agreed upon just because one of the agreeing parties kicks the bucket and their PHLOMAS (whatever that is) presumably ceased to function? Generally, there's other people out there to carry on the agreement. Sure, if there's only one person in the world left who thinks something has a certain price, then if they die, that price vanishes with them... but since price is supposed to be something agreed-upon, once you're down to one person it's not really a price anymore, is it?
Apparently, this leads to the idea that nothing actually has any price, so it's apparent that either the author and I are living in very different worlds, or (more likely) HONEOKE didn't get explained clearly enough. But, just for fun, let's see where the rest of this goes...
If we were not conscious we would merely be, pretty much what we are on a materialistic/naturalistic view, bio-organisms who are one day moving about and the next worm food—worms who are merely bio-organisms who are one day moving about and the next food for something else.
As an aside: I can only wonder why we long for, seek for, strive for, live for, die for, price.
That's a big question. Even if you ask the littler and more specific question of the same things about 'price of oil', it is still a big question!
Let us presuppose that price does truly exist.
What is price?
It is a concept.
What is a concept?
A concept is an PHLOLET.
Where does an PHLOLET exist?
An PHLOLET exist in a PHLOMAS.
Which raises the questions of "What is a PHLOMAS" and "What is a PHLOLET". It seems clear that a PHLOMAS is some kind of container for PHLOLETs, and that PHLOLETs are some collection of abstract patterns which includes concepts, but that's about it so far.
Is price non-COLET or COLET?
If it is COLET then it is not truly price (though it could be functional capacity), so it is non-COLET.
Ok, so COLET applies to some other humans and possibly HONEOKE/price. At least, the question of whether COLET applies to price is supposed to be a meaningful one.
Aside from the problem that COLET and non-COLET are currently in need of clarification, I'm concerned that here in the conclusions/argument section is a brand-new assertion about price/HONEOKE - that there is a 'true price' which is non-COLET, and that COLET prices are 'not true price'. It's not cool to go redefining terms in the middle of an argument.
Does price change or is it unchangeable?
If it changes then it is not price (“change” here price from price to something else and not just a change within the original price in which case it is still price).
Again, another redefinition mid-argument. Plus a re-affirmation of either living in different worlds or insufficient up-front definition. Also, something about the sentence just reads... weird. I suspect that this is not only a mid-stride redefinition, but also a case of using the incompletely defined term itself in the process of redefining it. Don't get me wrong, I adore properly constructed recursive definitions! I just don't appreciate improperly constructed ones.
Thus, price is an non-COLET and unchanging PHLOLET that exists in a PHLOMAS.
What sort of PHLOMAS contains an non-COLET and unchanging PHLOLET?
A PHLOMAS that is non-COLET and unchanging.
What sort of being possesses an non-COLET and unchanging PHLOMAS
Ah-ha! Apparently a PHLOMAS (a PHLOLET container) is something that can be possessed, and they come in different varieties. And, moreover, there are some kind of discriminatory ownership restirctions - only some sorts of beings can possesses a PHLOMAS that is unable to change and isn't COLET.
Moreover, COLETness is something that can apparently apply or not apply to a PHLOMAS.
An non-COLET and unchanging being.
Since COLET is not yet defined, this doesn't convey much about what kind of being can own certain kinds of PHLOMAS, but it does at least indicate that some beings can be COLET (certain other humans) while it's also sensical for a being to be non-COLET (at least, it may be sensical for beings incapable of change... which doesn't sound like any beings at all, so perhaps this is a clever way of saying 'no beings can own a non-COLET and unchangeable PHLOMAS')
Therefore, while everything and everyone has a functional capacity only the non-COLET and unchanging being can give us price.
Before even worrying about COLETness, I note that the human being certainly doesn't fit the bill for 'the unchanging being', nor does the broader notion of the living being. The newly dead being (insofar is you can call anything non-living a being) is still going to be decomposing, but possibly this works for the sufficiently-long-ago-dead being. No more physical changes, and you might stretch a bit and say the dead being can be said to exist (be a being) in the memory of the living being. If enough time has passed, that amounts to either 'forgotten'... which I'll discount as a form of being-in-memory... or 'ossified to a static but memorable footnote that is reliably passed down through the generations'.
I don't know how COLET/non-COLET further narrows this down, but it looks like the final conclusion is that 'true' price is something that is only assigned by the memory-beings that remain of significant historical figures.
Or, in other words, I don't think I had enough information to figure out what was actually supposed to be conveyed by HONEOKE.
On the other hand, QUABBIN seemed to pose no difficulties, so it looks like I may have got that one right.
Incidentally, the original that I'm trying to understand can be found over at AiDs
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