r-wagner

Meaning is thus the product of relation, and the meaningful properties of a definition are no less results of relating than those of any other expressive construct. And yet meaning would always be completely relative if it were not for the mediation of convention - the illusion that some associations of a symbolic element are 'primary' and self-evident. If meaning is based on relations, then the good, solid feeling of 'absolute' denotation (upon which so many linguistic epistemologies are founded) is an illusion grounded in nonrelation, or tautology.