An Idea that Worked

Last night, I taught a class with a philosophical view of a theological topic. 

I was trying to explain how a word can convey some aspects of reality, but not very fully. A picture is a little more complete in conveying the reality that the word represents (as Bolter has been describing also). The thing itself is the most real, but it is not always available or accessible depending on the form/limitation of the receiver.

Anyway, I found a successful way to explain it. One of the class members recently had a grandson. So I wrote the baby's name on the board. The baby's name represents him - and it's true that that is who he is. Then, I asked the man to show us a picture, which he had on his iPhone. 

If he said, "This is my grandson," what he says is not untrue. Nobody would look at him weird and say, 'No it's not; it's a phone!" But in some sense, what he says is not totally accurate, either. If he were to bring his grandson to the class, we would all have a much more complete understanding of the reality of who the baby is. But he didn't have the baby with him, so the picture was as good as we could get under the circumstances.

So, the picture and the written name are predicated on the actual baby and represent the baby in some sense accurately, but the baby himself is the most real. However, the picture and the name are more accessible.