Ludwig Wittgenstein
1889-1951 · Austrian-British · Philosophy of Language, Philosophy of Mind, Philosophy of Mathematics, Logic, Ordinary Language Philosophy
The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.
Born into one of the wealthiest families in Vienna, Ludwig Wittgenstein gave away his inheritance, volunteered for dangerous posts in the First World War, and spent a decade as a village schoolteacher in rural Austria. He came to Cambridge in 1911 to study with Bertrand Russell, and in the trenches composed the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus — a work he believed had solved philosophy's central problems. Then he walked away from it.
Topics Ludwig Wittgenstein addresses
- the picture theory of language
- language-games
- forms of life
- the private language argument
- family resemblance
- meaning as use
- rule-following
- the saying-showing distinction
- logical atomism
- the general propositional form
- elementary propositions
- truth-functions
- the beetle in the box
- aspect-seeing
- philosophical therapy
- the Augustinian picture of language
- grammar
- criteria
- the limits of language
- whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent
- the world is everything that is the case
- states of affairs
- objects and names
- logical space
Questions to put to Ludwig Wittgenstein
The Tractatus and the Picture Theory
- What do you mean when you say a proposition is a picture of reality?
- What's the difference between what can be said and what can only be shown?
- Why did you think you had solved the problems of philosophy when you finished the Tractatus?
- How do you now see the mistakes you made in the Tractatus?
- What does 'whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent' mean for ethics and religion?
Language-Games and Forms of Life
- What do you mean by a language-game?
- How is meaning the same as use in the language?
- What's wrong with thinking of words as names for things?
- What is a form of life and why does it matter for language?
- How do we learn language if meaning isn't just pointing at objects?
- What do you mean by family resemblance instead of definitions?
Rule-Following and Going On in the Same Way
- How does a rule determine what counts as following it?
- What's the paradox you're raising about interpretations of rules?
- Is Kripke right that you're posing a skeptical problem about meaning?
- What do you mean when you say 'this is simply what I do' is bedrock?
- How can we tell the difference between following a rule and just thinking we are?
Private Language and the Inner Life
- Why can't I have a private language for my own sensations?
- What's the point of the beetle in the box example?
- Are you denying that I really feel pain when I say I do?
- How do we learn words for sensations if they're private experiences?
- What goes wrong in the diary case when I try to write 'S' for a sensation?
- How should I understand the grammar of psychological terms like 'pain' or 'thinking'?
Philosophy as Therapy
- What do you mean that philosophy is a battle against bewitchment by language?
- Why do you say philosophical problems aren't solved but dissolved?
- How is showing the fly the way out of the fly-bottle different from building theories?
- What's a surveyable representation and why does philosophy need it?
- If philosophy leaves everything as it is, what's the point of doing it?
Certainty, Hinges, and Doubt
- What's wrong with Moore's proof that the external world exists?
- What do you mean by a hinge proposition?
- Why isn't 'I have two hands' something I know in the ordinary sense?
- How can some propositions be beyond doubt without being dogmatic?
- What's the difference between a mistake and a confusion about the whole framework?
Converse with Ludwig Wittgenstein on Simposeum. Replies are grounded in Ludwig Wittgenstein's own writing, cited to the page.