Saturday

Saturday is Saturn-Day, or so say the folks who know such things. The cause of words -- referents and some such which linguists and Webster's ilk know with nerdly skill -- pass beyond most imagination. We just say what we say and know what we mean, or think we do. To think is enough, as is to speak. To think about thinking -- yikes! I don't even want to think about thinking about thinking.

But I say Happy Saturday -- if I do -- and acknowledge some ancient god who was named after the planet. Or was the planet named after him? Who first contrived the sound arrangement contrived in English and presumably -- (I won't look it up!) - Greek?

In any case the planet is joined at the hip with a Greek god.

No, that's not quite right. The planet is not even in the picture but rather the name of the planet. This word -- Saturn -- is the referent. Okay I had to look that up. The planet is the object to which the word refers, thus the word referent.

So we really have no-thing, only a word and the words are only sounds in the head, though quiet. We could play this reductionist game until we die, quite literally reduced to nothing.

I was just trying to know what I mean when I write or think or speak "Saturday." This rabbit hole is way longer than I care to travel, so I will take this detour. If Saturday refers to Saturn, what does that mean? I see two options, for which the reader awaits with 'bated breath:

• It means nothing -- it is just a name. This is complete nominalism and is never really true. It must be forced onto reality. Everything is more than a name. In this case, at minimum, the name has sounds and is associated with days in the calendar and habits of life. It refers to more than a distant planet.
• It means everything "Saturn" means -- the planet, not the god (I still refuse to look that up.) Distant, large, unknown, bright in the sky, mysterious, beyond.

Saturday is that sometimes and sometimes not. This is a case in which we make of it what we will. Saturday is a day at the end of the week and I am weary from trying to learn anything about it.