"Pathetic" has turned into a generic insult in the American version of English, but once upon a time it meant something on the far side of "pitiful," another essentially religious word that has lost most of its original force, and it isn't exactly surprising that pity would turn into a joke in a country where the left side of the political spectrum sponsored "Welfare Reform."

"You're pitiful."

"You're pathetic."

These characterizations are insults in America today, and vividly illustrate the absurdity of calling the United States a Christian country just because the parking lots of suburban mega-churches fill up on Sunday.

You might hope that the concept of pity could somehow survive the perversion of its name into something like contempt, but it's exactly this hope that was demolished in one of the most famous passages in the history of philosophy, Section 293 of Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations.

If I say of myself that it is only from my own case that I know what the word "pain" means - must I not say the same of other people too? And how can I generalize the one case so irresponsibly? Now someone tells me that he knows what pain is only from his own case! --Suppose everyone had a box with something in it: we call it a "beetle". No one can look into anyone else's box, and everyone says he knows what a beetle is only by looking at his beetle. --Here it would be quite possible for everyone to have something different in his box. One might even imagine such a thing constantly changing. --But suppose the word "beetle" had a use in these people's language? --If so it would not be used as the name of a thing. The thing in the box has no place in the language-game at all; not even as a something: for the box might even be empty. --No, one can 'divide through' by the thing in the box; it cancels out, whatever it is. That is to say: if we construe the grammar of the expression of sensation on the model of 'object and designation' the object drops out of consideration as irrelevant.

As remote as this paradox of "private language" may seem to be from everyday experience, it floated back into my consciousness last week when President Obama attacked suspected militants in Pakistan. About 18 people were killed, "including women and children," according to the Los Angeles Times.

A few days later, Barack and Michelle Obama visited the school where their daughters Malia and Sasha are enrolled, and there were big smiles all around. Michelle made a little joke about the unpaid postition of First Lady, and Barack read the children a story about Neil Armstrong, and then the President and his beautiful family went back to the White House.