Then the question is whether the idiosyncratic words are only ever explained using other idiosyncratic words, or whether at some point it actually connects with the shared reality.
The point is that the words ground out in actual sensations and experiences, not just other words and concepts. What I’m arguing is that it’s not useful to use the English word “suffering” to refer to ordinary pain or displeasure, because there is a distinction in experience between what we refer to as “pain” or “displeasure” and what is referred to by the term “dukkha,” and that “suffering” is best understood as this dukkha. That we commonly say things like “he suffered the pain” is an indication of this distinction already existing in English, even if there is a tendency to messily equivocate between the two.
The point is that the words ground out in actual sensations and experiences, not just other words and concepts. What I’m arguing is that it’s not useful to use the English word “suffering” to refer to ordinary pain or displeasure, because there is a distinction in experience between what we refer to as “pain” or “displeasure” and what is referred to by the term “dukkha,” and that “suffering” is best understood as this dukkha. That we commonly say things like “he suffered the pain” is an indication of this distinction already existing in English, even if there is a tendency to messily equivocate between the two.