Quote of the Day

p is nonsense simply means p is not a proposition. But there may be different reasons why p is not a proposition. (Wittgenstein's Lectures, Cambridge, 1930-1932, p. 114)

'∫', '/', '?'

Page 109 of The Big Typescript is a representative example of Wittgenstein's editing. The first paragraph is marked through with a single slash and marked with a '?'. The second paragraph is marked through with two slashes and marked with a '?'. And the third paragraph is marked through with two slashes and marked with a '∫'. Elsewhere Wittgenstein marks paragraphs with a check. And sometimes he marks through a paragraph with a big 'X' (or many).

Luckhardt and Aue, editors and translators of The Big Typescript, have only this to say about what any of these marks might mean:

'∫' is Wittgenstein's sign for Schlecht, presumably indicating what he thought a "bad" remark. ("Editors' and Translators' Introduction," x)

The problem, of course, is that this mark is written only at the beginning of paragraphs, and the reader is left to wonder what, exactly, Wittgenstein thought bad about the passage. Wittgenstein often marks the same paragraph through with slashes (apparently, the significance of these is different than marking a paragraph 'bad'; do they mean that the passage is to be rejected because it's wrong, or just that Wittgenstein intends to leave it out or rework it). In addition, Wittgenstein writes additions and revisions in the margins and between the lines. It's impossible to know whether these were written before or after the slashes and the Schlecht's (and if they were made after, whether they make the remark 'good'). All of this makes it very hard to know what to do with parts of The Big Typescript.

Quote of the Day

Now if I look at the word "is": How can I distinguish between two different kinds of its use if I pay attention only to the grammatical rules? For it's precisely these rules that allow the use of the word in "The rose is red" and "Twice two is four". Looking at these rules, I don't see that here we have two different words. — But I do see it, for example, if I try to substitute "equals" for "is" in both sentences (or "has the property"). But again only because I know the rule for the expression "equals", know that it can't be inserted into [nicht eingesetzt werden darf] "The rose . . . red". (The Big Typescript, §39)

If It Sounds Like Nonsense...

I have (this sounds like fantastic nonsense, but it isn't) frequently caught myself positively solving some problem (of a more or less philosophical nature) in, say, the key of A minor, where I had utterly failed to reason it out in words.

Donald Francis Tovey (quoted in Donald Francis Tovey: A Biography Based on Letters)

Language and Theory

The first phase of Davidson's argument was intended to take us from the duality of concepts and world, which presupposed the analytic/synthetic distinction, to the different duality of language or 'total scheme' and 'uninterpreted content'. Giving up the analytic/synthetic distinction was held to have the corollary that we cannot clearly distinguish between theory and language. Davidson's adversaries were described as holding that a conceptual scheme or language or theory stands in a relation of predicting, fitting, organizing, etc., to experience, nature, reality, sensory promptings, etc. This seems to be confused. It may be that there is no precise distinction between what is theory and what is pre- or non-theoretical (although it does not follow that there is no distinction). It may also be that changes to the meanings of expressions that are used in the formulation of a theory are surreptitiously introduced by the theory. But it does not follow for one moment that there is no clear distinction between a language and a theory, let alone that there is no distinction. Davidson, however, appears to be happy with the thought that we can coherently interchange the expressions 'language' and 'theory', and the proposal which he subjects to criticism is that a language or theory is a conceptual scheme which successfully faces the tribunal of experience, predicts future experience, etc., if it is borne out by the evidence. But, he claims, that is merely a fancy way of saying that something is an acceptable conceptual scheme or theory if it is true.

But this seems unhappy. [...] Second, a language such as English or German is in no sense a theory. It is a grammar and a vocabulary. In a given language there is a possibility of constructing indefinitely many different and incompatible theories, but the language in which such theories are constructed and articulated is itself no theory about anything. Third, a language does not even metonymically predict, fit or face reality. Its grammar determines the logical space of possibilities, in as much as its grammar determines what it makes sense to say. But the English language does not predict anything. It is assertions made in English that predict and describe, and in so doing assert which logical spaces are occupied, i.e., which logical possibilities are realized in the world. Some of these assertions will be constituents of theories, others will not. [...] Fourth, a language cannot be said to be true or largely true. It is the assertions made in the language and the theories couched in the language which can be said to be true or largely true. To speak of the truth of a language is therefore incoherent. (Peter Hacker, "On Davidson's Idea of a Conceptual Scheme," pp. 297-8).

Charity

Of course it is possible that the author of such a remark [viz., 'the Absolute enters into, but is itself incapable of, evolution and progress'] is using English words in a way in which they are not commonly used by English-speaking people, and that he does, in fact, intend to assert something that could be empirically verified. But until he makes us understand how the proposition that he wishes to express would be verified, he fails to communicate anything to us. (A. J. Ayer, Language, Truth and Logic, p. 17)

Wittgenstein and Theology

NDPR review by Duncan Richter of Tim Labron's Wittgenstein and Theology.

Translation Blog

I'm going to try to start another translation blog (my last one fizzled out pretty quickly). Here it is.

"Succus"?

MS 110, p. 271 (a passage that is the source for The Big Typescript, p. 44) contains the following sentence:

Und das ist vielleicht der Succus dieser Betrachtung.

And that is perhaps the Succus of this view.

The word 'Succus' is not in my Oxford Duden German Dictionary or in either of the online dictionaries I consult (here and here). Does anyone know what it means?

Update: Apparently, "der Succus" means "the quintessence" (see Joachim Schulte's translation). God, I love Google Books!

Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Wittgenstein and the Tractatus

NDPR review by Michael Potter of Michael Morris,'s Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Wittgenstein and the Tractatus.

Seeing Wittgenstein Anew

Seeing Wittgenstein Anew is the first collection to examine Ludwig Wittgenstein's remarks on the concept of aspect-seeing, showing that it was not simply one more topic of investigation in Wittgenstein's later writings but rather a pervasive and guiding concept in his efforts to turn philosophy's attention to the actual conditions of our common life in language. Arranged in sections that highlight the pertinence of the aspect-seeing remarks to aesthetic and moral perception, self-knowledge, mind and consciousness, linguistic agreement, philosophical therapy, and "seeing connections," the sixteen essays, which were specially commissioned for this volume, demonstrate the unity of not only Philosophical Investigations but also Wittgenstein's later thought as a whole. They open up novel paths across familiar fields of thought: the objectivity of interpretation, the fixity of the past, the acquisition of language, and the nature of human consciousness. Significantly, they exemplify how continuing consideration of the interrelated phenomena of aspect-seeing might produce a fruitful way of doing philosophy in a new century.

Quote of the Day

What sort of statement is mine about the table: "it doesn’t force me to use it in such and such a way?" And: "the application isn’t anticipated by the rule (or the table)"? Very likely of the same sort as the remark that explanation of signs do at some point come to an end. And that is similar to someone's saying: "What good does the assumption of a Creator do you, since it just postpones the problem?" (The Big Typescript, p. 47)

The Mystical in Wittgenstein's Early Writings

NDPR review by Russell Nieli, of James Atkinson's The Mystical in Wittgenstein's Early Writings.

Meaning the Unsayable

It [philosophy] will mean the unsayable by clearly displaying the sayable.

Sie wird das Unsagbare bedeuten, indem sie das Sagbare klar darstellt. (TLP, §4.115)

Philosophy will bedeuten the unsayable!

Ryle on Science and Philosophy

But Wittgenstein, as I construe him, and the Vienna Circle saw in this dichotomy the general clue that they required to the difference between science and philosophy. Science produces true (and sometimes false) statements about the world; philosophy examines the rules and reasons that make some statements (like those of good scientists) true-or-false, and others (like metaphysicians' statements) nonsensical. Science is concerned with what makes (significant) statements true or else false; philosophy is concerned with what makes them significant or nonsensical. So science talks about the world, while philosophy talks about talk about the world. (Gilbert Ryle, "Logic and Professor Anderson")

G. E. M. Anscombe

The SEP has a new entry on Anscombe.

Wittgenstein on Rules and Nature

NDPR review by Lars Hertzberg of Keith Dromm's Wittgenstein on Rules and Nature.

Paradigms and Certainty

In short, one might say that Wittgenstein's fundamental critcism of Moore's method was that he was wrong in believing that he could refute the skeptic by elucidating a series of propositions that were indubitable, known, and certain. In doing this Moore misused the word "know," since the way these propositions usually function is as paradigms for propositions which we can be said to know or not to know. Qua paradigms they do not themselves enter (directly) into the "known-is not known" language game. Doubt ends somewhere, and where it ends is not in propositions of which we are certain, or which we know, but in propositions A) which we do not doubt, because B) they do not enter directly into the language-game of doubting and knowing, but rather C) function as yardsticks or standards according to which such language-games are played. (C. G. Luckhardt, "Beyond Knowledge: Paradigms in Wittgenstein's Later Philosophy," p. 248.)

David Pears, 1921-2009

David Francis Pears, eminent Wittgenstein scholar, has passed away. Obituary here.

Together with Brian McGuinness, Pears translated the Tractatus. He authored several books on Wittgenstein: Ludwig Wittgenstein; False Prison: A Study of the Development of Wittgenstein's Philosophy, Vols. 1 & 2; and Paradox and Platitude in Wittgenstein's Philosophy. And his many articles on Wittgenstein include "The Relation Between Wittgenstein's Picture Theory of Propositions and Russell's Theory of Judgment," "Literalism and Imagination: Wittgenstein's Deconstruction of Traditional Philosophy," and "Wittgenstein's Account of Rule-Following."

Google's German to English Translator

Language Log has had several posts on the adequacy of Google's Farsi to English translator, so I decided to see what the German to English translator is capable of. Below is the German of §1 of the Philosophical Investigations (in red) followed by Anscombe's translation (in blue) and Google's (in green). The Google translation isn't terrible.

In diesen Worten erhalten wir, so scheint es mir, ein bestimmtes Bild von dem Wesen der menschlichen Sprache. Nämlich dieses: Die Wörter der Sprache benennen Gegenstände—Sätze sind Verbindungen von solchen Benennungen.—In diesem Bild von der Sprache finden wir die Wurzeln der Idee: Jedes Wort hat eine Bedeutung. Diese Bedeutung ist dem Wort zugeordnet. Sie ist der Gegenstand, für welchen das Wort steht.

These words, it seems to me, give us a particular picture of the essence of human language. It is this: the individual words in language name objects—sentences are combinations of such names.—In this picture of language we find the roots of the following idea: Every word has a meaning. This meaning is correlated with the word. It is the object for which the word stands.

In these words we get, it seems to me a picture of the nature of human language. Namely, this: The words of the language name objects—sentences are combinations of such appointments.—In this picture of language we find the roots of the idea: Every word has a meaning. This importance is assigned to the word. It is the purpose for which the word stands.

Von einem Unterschied der Wortarten spricht Augustinus nicht. Wer das Lernen der Sprache so beschreibt, denkt, so möchte ich glauben, zunächst an Hauptwörter, wie »Tisch«, »Stuhl«, »Brot«, und die Namen bon Personen, erst in zweiter Linie an die Namen gewisser Tätigkeiten und Eigenschaften, und an die übrigen Wortarten als etwas, was sich finden wird.

Augustine does not speak of there being any difference between kinds of word. If you describe the learning of language in this way you are, I believe, thinking primarily of nouns like "table", "chair", "bread", and of people's names, and only secondarily of the names of certain actions and properties; and of the remaining kinds of word as something that will take care of itself.

From a difference of word types Augustine saith not. Those who learn the language it describes, is, I believe, first of all nouns, like "table", "chair", "bread", bon, and the names of persons, only secondarily to the names of certain activities and characteristics, and to other word types rather than what is expected.

Denke nun an diese Verwendung der Sprache: Ich schicke jemand einkaufen. Ich gebe ihm einen Zettel, auf diesem stehen die Zeichen: »fünf rote Apfel«. Er trägt den Zettel zum Kaufmann; der öffnet die Lade, auf welcher das Zeichen »Apfel« steht; dann sucht er in einer Tabelle das Wort »rot« auf und findet ihm gegenüber ein Farbmuster; nun sagt er die Reihe der Grundzahlwörter—ich nehme an, er weiß sie auswendig - bis zum Worte »fünf« und bei jedem Zahlwort nimmt er einen Apfel aus der Lade, der die Farbe des Musters hat.—So, und ähnlich, operiert man mit Worten.—»Wie weiß er aber, wo und wie er das Wort »rot« nachschlagen soll und was er mit dem Wort »fünf« anzufangen hat?«—Nun, ich nehme an, er handelt, wie ich es beschrieben habe. Die Erklärungen haben irgendwo ein Ende.—Was ist aber die Bedeutung des Wortes »fünf«?—Von einer solchen war hier garnicht die Rede; nur davon, wie das Wort »fünf« gebraucht wird.

Now think of the following use of language: I send someone shopping. I give him a slip marked "five red apples". He takes the slip to the shopkeeper, who opens the drawer marked "apples"; then he looks up the word "red" in a table and finds a colour sample opposite it; then he says the series of cardinal numbers—I assume that he knows them by heart—up to the word "five" and for each number he takes an apple of the same colour as the sample out of the drawer.—It is in this and similar ways that one operates with words.—"But how does he know where and how he is to look up the word 'red' and what he is to do with the word 'five'?"—Well, I assume that he acts as I have described. Explanations come to an end somewhere.—But what is the meaning of the word "five"?—No such thing was in question here, only how the word "five" is used.

Think now of this use of language: I send someone shopping. I give him a piece of paper on this, the signs are: "Five red apples". He wears the label to the merchant and the opens the ark on which the sign "apple" is, then it looks for a table in the word "red" and found him a sample of a color, now he says the number of the basic number words—I suppose that he knows them by heart—until the words "Five" and every word of an apple, he made the ark, the color of the pattern has.—Sun, and similarly, one operates with words.—"How he knows where and how he made the word" red "should look and what to do with the word" Five "has started?"—Well, I suppose, he acts as I have described. The declarations have an end somewhere.—What is the meaning of the word "Five"?—From this it was not at the speech, only how the word "Five" is needed.