The Idea of Idea

One of the lessons of the media age must be that as much as "idea" might matter locally, it is "the idea of idea" that begins new perspectives with global, that is to say transformative, impact.  This process is not predictable.  The factors in any specific equation of meaning are not mathematically fixed.  Reliant on words, which are far more slippery signifiers than numbers, one's notion of the idea shrinks or enlarges and adapts in a myriad of ways in the process of conveyance, in the course of transfer.  Object exists as object always in the context of whichever semblance of subjectivity has become the projector and which has become the screen.  

Interestingly, this shift in concern serves two seemingly contradictory purposes.  First, the swirl of consideration and light focused on the first will enhance its reputation in the world; the amorphous quality, the fog condensing between the lines, anchor the conversation in the actuality and the act.  Conversely, as the secondary critique necessitates, the evaluation in its ethereal concerns requires the substance of idea itself to create a  safe and constructive foundation for the emergent understanding of how this idea originates, morphs, and reassembles itself  in both intimate and broad cultural contexts.  

One need look no further than the problem of irony to illustrate this effect.  Humor, particularly humor owing its laughter to something in a sarcastic vein, ceases to be about the original object, act or actor and becomes about the author or speaker's perception and/or belief system.  The fundamental understanding is bent by his or her opinion,  the gravity of which will distort (further) the individual's version of whatever item or idea is under consideration.  While not obvious in many (perhaps most) situations, this process is universal.  It is the central dilemma in our communication.  That and the utter plague of bullshit that saturates it all.