In a message dated 97-12-14 23:21:10 EST, [log in to unmask]
writes:

> I tried and tried Lyotard, but I could never shake the disquieting feeling
>  that he was, as is so much of contemporary discourse on language, trying to
>  do an end-run around the horror of Wittgenstein's fatalistic realism: i.e.
>  if you can build a schematic of discourse on the assumption that there is a
>  possibility of accurate discourse, then you don't have to buy
>  Wittgenstein's dreadful proposition that true discourse is impossible.

This makes sense to me, but I do not know who Lyotard is. Please elucidate.

Seems to me that accurate discourse would not ever occur except in an accurate
world. I don't buy fully into Wittgenstein's proposition, considering as well
that I do not believe a _true_ discourse to be a discourse in a real world.
What is "true"?

I rarely feel that a married discourse is either true, or fair, from either
side, more like play that descends into my need to go out to the yard and beat
up on a chunk of stone. Usually I end up feeling confused and wondering why I
don't have as precise a rule book as the opposition. I'm told my tactic is to
repeat myself over and over. I sure wish I could figure it out and shut up
sooner.

I am of the impression that Wittgenstein tried to reverse himself regarding
his proposition. That must have been fun.

A logical potential of his proposition would be the abject silence that Ezra
Pound fell into after spending so many years trying to promote the carcass
your father viewed and that we now today relate upon his relating.

So much talk about nameless things.

][<en