Related thought: I think meta is a direction, rather than one specific level. What that would mean is that you can always go further meta; there’s reading the text, and then there’s considering the text within the academic landscape, then there’s examining the text together with its whole branch of science amidst all the sciences, then with science in general amidst human endeavours, etc. Does that make sense?
Sure, you can go meta again and again. I don’t think in terms of meta as a direction, but I think of it as relative to the current level. So you go meta and step out of the current context, but this means you find yourself in a new context, and you can repeat: go meta and step out of this context. You find yourself in a new context and you can repeat: go meta and step out of this context. You find yourself in a new context… :-)
That still sounds like ‘meta’ is a direction of (metaphorical) movement, but that it can be a different direction every time. Do you suppose you could have a situation where repeatedly ‘going meta’ would have you moving from one subject to the other and then back again, and again?
I think it’s more of a relationship than a direction. There can be many metadiscussions to one object discussion, and there can of course be many object discussions for the same metadiscussion.
Yeah, that too.
Related thought: I think meta is a direction, rather than one specific level. What that would mean is that you can always go further meta; there’s reading the text, and then there’s considering the text within the academic landscape, then there’s examining the text together with its whole branch of science amidst all the sciences, then with science in general amidst human endeavours, etc.
Does that make sense?
Sure, you can go meta again and again. I don’t think in terms of meta as a direction, but I think of it as relative to the current level. So you go meta and step out of the current context, but this means you find yourself in a new context, and you can repeat: go meta and step out of this context. You find yourself in a new context and you can repeat: go meta and step out of this context. You find yourself in a new context… :-)
That still sounds like ‘meta’ is a direction of (metaphorical) movement, but that it can be a different direction every time. Do you suppose you could have a situation where repeatedly ‘going meta’ would have you moving from one subject to the other and then back again, and again?
I think it’s more of a relationship than a direction. There can be many metadiscussions to one object discussion, and there can of course be many object discussions for the same metadiscussion.
If you want to think of it as a direction, the direction is outside. I don’t think you can do loops.
That makes sense, I suppose.