How do you know that your perception of what is being communicated is accurate?

Answer 1

I view it from different angles and at different times to arrive at the conclusion.

Answer 2

Words have 2 different types of meanings: denotations, and connotations. If you are speaking about things that require precision in the understanding of the conversation, you need the denotations, which are the "precise contextual definition" of the word. Example: "human;" the denotation is "the rational animal." But if you are just talking about humans in general doing things men do, the connotation is "people doing what people do."

"Say what you mean and mean what you say" requires denotations, and I attempt to use them all the time so no one has any misunderstanding of what I mean.
If you suspect someone is using a word or a phrase differently than you understand it, ask him to define it for you--don't assume things like: "He can't possibly mean what he just said" and then give him the benefit of the doubt. Maybe he DID mean what he just said.

Answer 3

repeat what was said back to the person and ask if your perception is correct. that way there is no questioning on either of your parts as to the exact reasoning of the communication.

Answer 4

Our perception are colored with our emotions. So when I trust my emotions as true so I believe the truth in what I perceive but as the emotion changes I realize that my perception was wrong. That is why philosophers have told us that perceptions are illusions.

Answer 5

Think of communication, the oral verbal part of it, as the tip of a proverbial ice berg.

The written word is better, yet it is still fraught with misinterpretation.

Why? the iceberg underneath is a behemoth of things unsaid, emotions boiling, seething anger, rocks held together by the polite contrived veneer of upbringing, manners,etiquette et al.

Answer 6

what you are trying to communicate can only be at best partially understood, no matter how much feedback you draw from your audience.

each person percieves information differently, so while you are relaying something you thought of, they are recieving and processing something they heard from another (you).
by this manner, the information is instantly changed, because the personal experiences and frames of reference of each person is different, and whatever you are communicating is filtered and interpreted into a somewhat different concept based on the original.

so while things like numbers and letters can be transmitted for their face value, (ie: mathematics), the emotional or personal content can never be truly relayed to another by physical means.

Answer 7

you will know if you do understand the communicator.

Answer 8

Ask to see if there is a discrepancy.

Answer 9

ask a question and listen to the response.