There is no 'realm of shared human ideas and concepts,' there is only the activity of the person's brain, who is aware of the idea of Quinn the Eskimo, Sasquatch, or God, or "Being,", and is aware of the brain activity of his fellows, who happen also to be aware of the idea of Quinn the Eskimo, Sasquatch, or God or "Being" and are aware of the brain activity of their fellows, [which without them knowing it - includes you if you happen to believe in the existence of Quinn the Eskimo, Sasquatch, or God, or "Being."].

The idea that there is somewhere out there in the Platonic Wild Blue Yonder a mental Eldorado of shared human ideas and concepts, where the universal idea of 'Quinn the Eskimo, Sasquatch, or God, or "Being," ' awaits the call to be thought about, and whose universality is eternally inaccessible to those that do not think about them and do not hear the call to think about them is fantasy. For me the human brain is a self-referential system, and I hold to the importance of eigenbehaviors for the explanation of complex phenomena. As far as the idea of the concept of "operational closure" is concerned any cognitive system is semantically independent.

For Quinn the Eskimo, Sasquatch, or God, or "Being:" read numbers too, and imaginary lines, but the big difference between numbers and imaginary lines and poor old Quinn the Eskimo, Sasquatch, or God, or "Being, " is that of degrees of pragmatic utility. Sasquatch is only valuable inasmuch as he provides much needed tourist income for certain remote areas of the Eastern seaboard of America, from those hoping to catch a glimpse of the creature, and maybe get some saleable footage of this zoological will o the wisp. God and Being certainly oversupply fantasy-fodder for the ontologically challenged who are prone to states of religious and ontological raptus, whilst in addition no doubt providing much needed income for Die Industrie Heidegger and the Churches, but number provides a much more useful abstract construct, which though it no more exists than any other activity of our existential embodied brain, is absolutely essential as a cognitive tool to ensure the future development of humanity.

But Quinn the Eskimo? Where is he placed on the degree of utility scale? A synesthetic metaphor for the Messiah? Some hippy Mr. Fix-it? Death? Some entertaining Mr. Tambourine Man to jingle-jangle our blues away? I'd love to know, that is if Dylan meant anything by this interesting allusion?

Quinn the Eskimo.

Ev’rybody’s building the big ships and the boats,
Some are building monuments,
Others, jotting down notes,
Ev’rybody’s in despair,
Ev’ry girl and boy
But when Quinn the Eskimo gets here,
Ev’rybody’s gonna jump for joy.

Come all without, come all within,
You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn.

I like to do just like the rest,
I like my sugar sweet,
But guarding fumes and making haste,
It ain’t my cup of meat.
Ev’rybody’s ’neath the trees,
Feeding pigeons on a limb
But when quinn the eskimo gets here,
All the pigeons gonna run to him.

Come all without, come all within,
You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn.

A cat’s meow and a cow’s moo,
I can recite ’em all,
Just tell me where it hurts yuh, honey,
And I’ll tell you who to call.
Nobody can get no sleep,
There’s someone on ev’ryone’s toes
But when quinn the eskimo gets here,
Ev’rybody’s gonna wanna doze. * (see corrective note from Doug Meyer below.)

Come all without, come all within,
You’ll not see nothing like the mighty Quinn.

Words by Bob Dylan.

Note:

                         The following fascinating information has been kindly supplied by Doug Meyer.