Although I have better things to do, because I’m reading this on a Friday I am trying to avoid them, so I’ve decided to be contrary and nit-picky just for the sake of the mental exercise.

Nit Pick: The challenge regarding the definition of the word chair and its relation to bean bag chairs and stools is faulty because of the word “chair.”

Definitions:
Stool – at least in the intentions of the author, (I doubt he meant bowel movements,) is a seat for an individual that has neither back or arms. Stools can be on a pedestal or on legs, they can be high or low. You can stand or kneel on them, sit on them or prop your feet up on them. A “Bar Stool” with arms and a back is named incorrectly. It is not a stool.

Bean Bag Chair – Well, these are just silly in light of what a chair really is.

Chair – Comes from the Latin word Cathedra, which was the location of a throne of a bishop of a diocese. Originally all very large and impressive church buildings weren’t known as cathedrals, only the principal church of a diocese, the one containing the throne of the bishop was a cathedra.

There is a perception that authority and power come with a pretty cool place to sit. Kings and queens, (and Bishops) come and go, but the throne will sit in the same place for many generations, and the idea of someone inheriting a throne, or usurping a throne implies that they now have the power and authority that comes with the big shiny chair. This is why you get your head cut off if they find you relaxing in the kings favorite place to rest his behind. Technically it doesn’t mean anything if you’re sitting on the throne, but what it implies is something else.

A “chair” is the literal or figurative location from which the authority within a given social structure is exercised… which is why calling a Bean Bag Chair a Chair is silly. We see this all the time too. If you buy a dining room set, the two seats that go at the heads of the table will likely be slightly larger. If you walk into a room where a committee meets, the only chair in there is the one the head of the committee sits in… the rest are just seats.

Of course, modern usage of the word “chair” has created a collective agreement that all of the seats around the table are chairs now. Folding chairs, lawn chairs, reclining chairs and directors chairs are all readily recognizable and each bring a visual notion to mind. And this is what the rest of the article is about. How can words be defined using other words if the collective understanding of what the word, or the words defining it aren’t static? Time, knowledge, perspective and education will constantly change how we interpret what we experience.

The problem has more to do with the way we process and translate words into information that our brains can work with. We don’t think in terms of written language. If I say the word “mouse” you won’t create a mental image of letters placed in a specific order in your mind. You will probably have a mental image of a small furry rodent running across a floor or of Mickey Mouse, or more likely a small hand held tool used as an input device for your computer. Our experiences will change the exact mental picture we see, but most of us will come up with something similar enough in nature that we will have some common ground.

The reason why we are able to have a written and verbal language is not because of any sort of ingrained understanding or even specific knowledge. It is because we all have very similar sensory capabilities, and although we don’t always interpret things the same, or create each thing we see in exactitude, we do have sufficient numbers of commonality to reference which allow others to interpret what we say into something they can understand.

Basically I wrote this whole thing so I would have a reason to use that topic.