How deep is deep? The effectiveness of clear communication.
Is this depth of analysis all that necassary? Do things mean more than they really are? Must inference be born from every action or statement?
If you have a puddle of water that's clear, you can see the bottom, you know it's depth. It has shown you all it holds. Or has it? Sure you can judge the depth or volume of water, but that is only in scale to your physical size. Snap closer and there's millions of molecules there, and closer still there's all sorts of particles making up those molecules.. and there's LOTS of space between them.. have you judged that? Anyhow we know - or can easily decide - if we would like to step in the puddle, it clearly shows us how wet we will end up.
But take the same puddle, and swish it up. Now pretend you've never seen it. Looking into it can you judge the bottom? Can you make a judgement as to the volume? You can see the surface, and think of all the NEW and exciting molecules swimming around that weren't in the clear water! There's so much more! But does it helps us to know if we can step into it or not?
Why not step into it to see how deep it is? It's unexplored, it's different (to the clear known puddle anyway, well actually every puddle is different, that's why we have to judge them) but do you wish to get into an unknown situation?
Likewise when talking to someone does "Hello" really mean "greeting" or does it mean more/less than that? "Hello!" may mean "HI! it's So great we've met again, I can't wait to do some much excitement and joyful things - I'm rearing to go. I thought we'd start by..." or it could mean, "Jesus McFuck! What have you done with your hair???". Again it's a muddy puddle that means so little, hides so much which makes life complicated. We generally take most people on the face value of what they say to us. They say "Hello" we assume they mean "greeting" they say, "I'm hungry, I'd like to get some lunch" we assume they mean it.
Is there a need to obscurify all things?
Some would have you believe that everything is hidden and that the world is moving at a layer beyond which it shows. That human behaviour is little more than the interpretation of the 15+ levels of different communication, and that's the trick to humanity - Interpreting those meanings... Following that theory every person I meet is not genuine and if they speak what they really mean, they are either simple (not able to think 'deeply enough'), or so deep I have no idea what the conversation is about. I fail to believe this, as 97% of people I meet that speak my language (with some degree of fluency!) I happily and easily communicate with.
Isn't this why we all attempt to speak the same language, so that we can communicate what we need/want to/from one another. It seems flawed to myself that there would be an unnecessary level of miscommunication between most of the population.
BUT also there is a fun element to intentional miscommunication (which is another way of terming obsurification or being 'deep') and this is where facial expression, body language and all those other human factors become so important. If I have a big cheesy grin and say "Hello!" it's pretty clear what I mean.. if I have a frown, am cocking my fist and say "Hello!" it's also pretty clear what I mean.. but does this help us? yes.
It's also about reference. If upon meeting someone you say, "The blue fish." they are going to be confused. You may well mean "Choose the blue fish when you get asked by the next person , because you will win a million dollars!" but your initial communication failed to reference the fact that there's a million dollars up for grabs, AND that someone else is going to ask you a question! Upon meeting a person the usual initial thing is to greet, "Hi" "hello" etc..
Whilst you may think you know what you are talking about it's never safe to assume that the person you are including in conversation actually also does. ".. so anyway the blue fish..." may be greeted by a blank stare. This would then require the stopping of the conversation to explain the blue fish reference, then diving on again.. it's all called conversation, and not to be underestimated.
So there you have it. A few simple ideas to follow.. a simple guide to the depth of a statement, reference, and clear meaning. I can now summarise all the above with "The blue fish in the muddy puddle" and YOU know what I mean.
This was prompted by a letter I wrote to a brutally obscure friend. Thank you for your time.