Linguistic semantics is only a matter of correlation of words
Linguists involved in semantic research aren't concerned with meanings. In practice, they study correlations between terms of languages. They find synonyms between languages by observing how words are used; no other criterion is scientifically useful
Appeal to meanings has no part in linguistic research, because meanings can only be identified after the languages are already understood.
W. V. O. Quine, 1953.