The Resolute Reading and Its Critics
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Logic in Action: Wittgenstein's Logical Pragmatism and the Impotence of Scepticism
This is the final, pre-publication draft. Please cite only from published paper in Philosophical Investigations 26:2 (April 2003), 125-48. LOGIC IN ACTION: WITTGENSTEIN'S LOGICAL PRAGMATISM AND THE IMPOTENCE OF SCEPTICISM DANIÈLE MOYAL-SHARROCK UNIVERSITY OF GENEVA 1. The Many Faces of Certainty: Wittgenstein's Logical Pragmatism So I am trying to say something that sounds like pragmatism. (OC 422) In his struggle to uncover the nature of our basic beliefs, Wittgenstein depicts them variously in On Certainty: he thinks of them in propositional terms, in pictorial terms and in terms of acting. As propositions, they would be of a peculiar sort – a hybrid between a logical and an empirical proposition (OC 136, 309). These are the so-called 'hinge propositions' of On Certainty (OC 341). Wittgenstein also thinks of these beliefs as forming a picture, a World-picture – or Weltbild (OC 167). This is a step in the right (nonpropositional) direction, but not the ultimate step. Wittgenstein's ultimate and crucial depiction of our basic beliefs is in terms of a know-how, an attitude, a way of acting (OC 204). Here, he treads on pragmatist ground. But can Wittgenstein be labelled a pragmatist, having himself rejected the affiliation because of its utility implication? But you aren't a pragmatist? No. For I am not saying that a proposition is true if it is useful. (RPP I, 266) Wittgenstein resists affiliation with pragmatism because he does not want his use of use to be confused with the utility use of use. For him, it is not that a proposition is true if it is useful, but that use gives the proposition its sense. -
The Method of Wittgenstein's Tractatus
The Method of Wittgenstein’s Tractatus: Toward a New Interpretation Nikolay Milkov, University of Paderborn, Germany Abstract This paper introduces a novel interpretation of Wittgenstein‘s Tractatus, a work widely held to be one of the most intricate in the philosophical canon. It maintains that the Tractatus does not develop a theory but rather advances an original logical symbolism, a new instrument that enables one to ―recognize the formal properties of propositions by mere inspection of propositions themselves‖ (6.122). Moreover, the Tractarian conceptual notation offers to instruct us on how better to follow the logic of language, and by that token stands to enhance our ability to think. Upon acquiring the thinking skills that one can develop by working with the new symbolism, one may move on and discard the notation—―throw away the ladder‖ (6.54), as Wittgenstein put it. 1. The New Wittgensteinians This paper introduces a novel interpretation of Wittgenstein‘s Tractatus. In the process, it takes issue with the New Wittgensteinians, in particular Cora Diamond and James Conant,1 who some twenty-five years ago fielded a comprehensive, essentially skeptical interpretation of the entire body of the Tractatus. Diamond and Conant argued that the core propositions of the Tractatus are literally nonsense, gibberish equivalent to phrases like ―piggly wiggle tiggle‖ (Diamond, 2000, p. 151). To be more explicit, Diamond and Conant defended their view that the book‘s core content is philosophically vacuous by arguing (i) that the Tractatus is divided into a body and a frame; (ii) that the Preface, 3.32–3.326, 4–4.003, 4.111–2 and 6.53–6.54 compose the frame (Conant 2001, p. -
Wittgenstein's Wayward Student: the Unauthorized Autobiography
Wittgenstein’s wayward student: the unauthorized autobiography1 Annotated by Curtis Franks2 Note: Our hero has been confined until now to the space allotted him by other writers who only want to bounce their own ideas off of him because of their interest in the re- sulting trajectories. Quite reasonably he feels that he’s never been given a fair shake. His efforts to understand his critics turn up points where their arguments strike him as unconvincing or altogether absent. He delights in these discoveries, but his readers will see them instead as evidence of his own confusion and as clues to the sort of positions his critics adopt. When he meets another idealized character in Penelope Maddy’s Sec- ond Philosopher, he is intrigued by the difference in the treatment he receives. She raises many of the same questions that haunt him, the very considerations that others dismissed. But the answers she provides alienate him even more profoundly. Now that the impasse pervades everything from elementary logic to the higher infinite, new questions are met with a cool nonchalance. Struggling to fathom how she can carry on without the answers he seeks, he unwittingly reveals what sets the Second Philosopher’s position apart from related naturalistic accounts by chronicling how it leads him to confront the idleness of his demands. 1. First things I think the first thing you ought to know about me, if you’re going to appreciate much of what I have to say later on about my main scientific and philosophical agenda—the nature of logic and mathematics as it happens to be—is that I’m a lot older than I’m often made out to be. -
Koethe, University of Wisconsin
Philosophical Investigations 26:3 July 2003 ISSN 0190-0536 On the ‘Resolute’ Reading of the Tractatus1 John Koethe, University of Wisconsin It is customary to divide Wittgenstein’s work into two broad phases, the first culminating in the Tractatus, and the second comprising the writings that began upon his return to philosophy in 1929 and cul- minating in the Investigations. It is also commonly assumed that the Tractatus propounds various doctrines concerning language and rep- resentation, doctrines which are repudiated in the later work, and often criticized explicitly. One problem with this view of the Trac- tatus is Wittgenstein’s claim in 6.54 that its propositions are “non- sensical,”2 a claim which on its face is at odds with the idea that they present substantive philosophical theories. The usual way of handling this problem is to assume that the claim is not to be taken literally, that the sentences of the Tractatus are not nonsense in the sense of mere gibberish, but are intended somehow to engender in the attentive reader a grasp of certain important aspects of the rela- tionship between language and the world. Beginning with her seminal paper “Throwing Away the Ladder,” Cora Diamond has proposed reading the Tractatus in a way that takes literally 6.54’s claim of the book’s nonsensicality, and rejects the idea that its sentences represent a kind of elevated nonsense intended to 1. This is a revised version of a paper originally presented at a symposium on the resolute reading of the Tractatus at the 1999 Central Division meetings of the Amer- ican Philosophical Association in New Orleans. -
CRITICAL NOTICE Why We Need Ordinary Language Philosophy
CRITICAL NOTICE Why We Need Ordinary Language Philosophy Sandra Laugier, Translated by Daniela Ginsberg, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2013, pp. 168, £ 24.50. ISBN-13: 978-0-226-47054-2 (cloth). Reviewed by Derek A. McDougall Originally published in French in the year 2000, the English version of Sandra Laugier’s short book of 10 Chapters plus an Introduction and Conclusion, has a 7 page Preface, 9 pages of Notes, a brief Bibliography and 121 pages of actual text. The reading of Wittgenstein and Austin that she provides is distinctly Cavellian in character. Indeed, Stanley Cavell in a dust-cover quote, remarks that her work is already influential in France and Italy, exciting as it does a new interest in ‘language conceived not only as a cognitive capacity but also as used, and meant, as part of our form of life’. Cavell goes on to say that this new translation is not merely welcome but indispensable, and has at least the capacity to alter prevailing views about the philosophy of language, so affecting what we have come to think of as the ‘analytic-continental divide’. Toril Moi of Duke Uni., in another dust-cover quote, states that Laugier’s reading of Wittgenstein-Austin-Cavell shows how their claim that ‘to speak about language is to speak about the world is an antimetaphysical revolution in philosophy that tranforms our understanding of epistemology and ethics.’ She concludes with the thought that anyone who wishes to understand what ‘ordinary language philosophy’ means today should read this book. This is a large claim to make, and anyone who is inclined to read Wittgenstein and Austin strictly in their own terms, and with their own avowed intentions - where discernible - steadily in view, is almost bound to conclude that it is simply not true. -
Propositions, Functions, and Analysis This Page Intentionally Left Blank Propositions, Functions, and Analysis Selected Essays on Russell’S Philosophy
Propositions, Functions, and Analysis This page intentionally left blank Propositions, Functions, and Analysis Selected Essays on Russell’s Philosophy PETER HYLTON CLARENDON PRESS · OXFORD 3 Great Clarendon Street, Oxford ox2 6dp Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide in Oxford New York Auckland Cape Town Dar es Salaam Hong Kong Karachi Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Nairobi New Delhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto With offices in Argentina Austria Brazil Chile Czech Republic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore South Korea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries Published in the United States by Oxford University Press Inc., New York © Peter Hylton 2005 The moral rights of the author have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) First published 2005 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover and you must impose the same condition on any acquirer British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Data available Typeset by Newgen Imaging Systems (P) Ltd., Chennai, India Printed in Great Britain on acid-free paper by Biddles Ltd., King’s Lynn, Norfolk ISBN 0–19–928635–3 978–0–19–928635–5 13579108642 To the memory of Burton S. -
Warren Goldfarb, Notes on Metamathematics
Notes on Metamathematics Warren Goldfarb W.B. Pearson Professor of Modern Mathematics and Mathematical Logic Department of Philosophy Harvard University DRAFT: January 1, 2018 In Memory of Burton Dreben (1927{1999), whose spirited teaching on G¨odeliantopics provided the original inspiration for these Notes. Contents 1 Axiomatics 1 1.1 Formal languages . 1 1.2 Axioms and rules of inference . 5 1.3 Natural numbers: the successor function . 9 1.4 General notions . 13 1.5 Peano Arithmetic. 15 1.6 Basic laws of arithmetic . 18 2 G¨odel'sProof 23 2.1 G¨odelnumbering . 23 2.2 Primitive recursive functions and relations . 25 2.3 Arithmetization of syntax . 30 2.4 Numeralwise representability . 35 2.5 Proof of incompleteness . 37 2.6 `I am not derivable' . 40 3 Formalized Metamathematics 43 3.1 The Fixed Point Lemma . 43 3.2 G¨odel'sSecond Incompleteness Theorem . 47 3.3 The First Incompleteness Theorem Sharpened . 52 3.4 L¨ob'sTheorem . 55 4 Formalizing Primitive Recursion 59 4.1 ∆0,Σ1, and Π1 formulas . 59 4.2 Σ1-completeness and Σ1-soundness . 61 4.3 Proof of Representability . 63 3 5 Formalized Semantics 69 5.1 Tarski's Theorem . 69 5.2 Defining truth for LPA .......................... 72 5.3 Uses of the truth-definition . 74 5.4 Second-order Arithmetic . 76 5.5 Partial truth predicates . 79 5.6 Truth for other languages . 81 6 Computability 85 6.1 Computability . 85 6.2 Recursive and partial recursive functions . 87 6.3 The Normal Form Theorem and the Halting Problem . 91 6.4 Turing Machines . -
Chapter 5. Language: Private, Public, Solitary, Shared on the Received
Chapter 5. Language: private, public, solitary, shared On the received reading of Ludwig Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations1, the book contains an argument purporting to show the impossibility of a private language. There has been a lively debate, however, on how the relevant notion of a private language is to be understood, and what considerations should be taken to rule it out. Some have understood Wittgenstein to mean that a language must be something that several speakers actually share, while others take him to mean that a language must be something that they could, in principle, share. Or, slightly differently put, on one view, speaking a language presupposes the actual existence of a linguistic community upholding certain shared standards of meaning and correctness, while on the other view, it only presupposes that such a community might have existed. These views have come to be known as the ‘community view’ and the ‘solitary speaker’ view, respectively.2 Furthermore, supporters of the community view tend to think that the discussion about privacy holds a central place in Wittgenstein’s later philosophy, whereas those who support the solitary speaker view usually see its bearings as limited to the issue of the privacy of experience. 1 Ludwig Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1958). References to this work will be indicated with the abbreviation PI followed by paragraph number. 2 Rather than two monolithic positions, what we have here is a spectrum of views ranging between two extremes. To mention but a few examples: the best-known formulations of the community view are to be found in Norman Malcolm, “Following a Rule” in his book Nothing is Hidden (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1986), as well as in his essay “Wittgenstein on Language and Rules” in Wittgensteinian Themes: Essays 1978-1989 (ed. -
Between Realism and Rortianism
Epistemology R R R By Cora Diamond yoe who reads aes oas essay reedo rely ad Trh R R R R R I. Conant and Rorty on realism: how Conant sets up the issue and how Rorty responds irs will desrie he dispe ewee Rory ad oa ao realis H R R R T room R R between R R R T H R R Realism 1. The thesis that the Thing-in-Itself is a condition of the possibility of knowledge T T Cora Diamond is Kenan Professor of Philosophy emerita at the University of Virginia. Her works have analyzed philosophical problems in many areas, including Witgenstein, Frege, Philosophy of Language, Ethics, Political Philosophy and Philosophy of Literature. Her notable works include “What Nonsense Might Be”, an analysis of Fregean nonsense, as well as numerous writings on all of Witgenstein’s lifetime work. She has also been noted for her writing on animal rights, including the article “Eating Meat and Eating People” published by Cambridge University Press. The Harvard Review of Philosophy vol.XXI 2014 HRP Vol 21.indd 56 12/1/14 8:56 AM R R 57 of appearances about the way the world is in itself. think knowledge Realism 2. The thesis -
Future Pasts
FUTURE PASTS The Analytic Tradition in Twentieth-Century Philosophy Edited by JULIET FLOYD SANFORD SHIEH OXFORD VNWERSITY I'RSSS 2001 1879 Publication ofFr:ege's Begriffsschrift 1 Frege's Conception of Logic WARREN GOLDFARB Frege is of course an important progenitor of modern logic. The technical ad vances he made were compreheusive. He clearly depicted polyadic predication, negation. the conditional, and the quantifier as the bases of logic; and he gave an analysis of and a notation for t.he quantifier that enabled him to deal fully and perspicuously with multiple generality. Moreover. be argued that mathematical demonstrations, to be ti.illy rigorous, must be carried out using only explicitly for mulated rules, that is, syntactically specified axioms and rules of inference. Less clear, however. is the philosophical and interpretive question ofhow Frege understands his formalism and its purposes. Upon examination, it appears that Frege had a rather different view of the subject he was creating than we do nowa days. ln lectures and seminars as far back as the early 1960s, Burton Dreben called attention to differences between how Frege viewed i.he subject mauer of logic and how we do. The point has been taken up by several commentators, beginning with Jean van Heijenoort. 1 The technical development historically required to get from a Fregeau conception to our own was discussed in my "Logic in the Twenties: The Nature of the Quantifier."2 Yet there is currently litlle ap preciation of the philosophical import of these differences, that is, the role in Prege' s philosophy that his conception oflogic, as opposed to ours. -
This Is Simply What I Do”
View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Research Commons@Waikato 1 “This is Simply What I Do” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, vol. LXVI, no. 1 (January 2003) CATHERINE LEGG University of Melbourne Wittgenstein‟s discussion of rule-following is widely regarded to have identified what Kripke called “the most radical and original sceptical problem that philosophy has seen to date”. But does it? This paper examines the problem in the light of Charles Peirce‟s distinctive scientific hierarchy. Peirce identifies a phenomenological inquiry which is prior to both logic and metaphysics, whose role is to identify the most fundamental philosophical categories. His third category, particularly salient in this context, pertains to general predication. Rule-following scepticism, the paper suggests, results from running together two questions: “How is it that I can project rules?”, and, “What is it for a given usage of a rule to be right?”. In Peircean terms the former question, concerning the irreducibility of general predication (to singular reference), must be answered in phenomenology, while the latter, concerning the difference between true and false predication, is answered in logic. A failure to appreciate this distinction, it is argued, has led philosophers to focus exclusively on Wittgenstein‟s famous public account of rule-following rightness, thus overlooking a private, phenomenological dimension to Wittgenstein‟s remarks on following a rule which gives the lie to Kripke‟s reading of him as a sceptic. Introduction Wittgenstein noted that when we grasp a rule we grasp an idea that in principle outruns any set of particular applications of the rule. -
Wittgenstein and the Moral Life: Essays in Honor of Cora Diamond" Edited by A
Swarthmore College Works Philosophy Faculty Works Philosophy 4-1-2008 Review Of "Wittgenstein And The Moral Life: Essays In Honor Of Cora Diamond" Edited By A. Crary Richard Thomas Eldridge Swarthmore College, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://works.swarthmore.edu/fac-philosophy Part of the Philosophy Commons Let us know how access to these works benefits ouy Recommended Citation Richard Thomas Eldridge. (2008). "Review Of "Wittgenstein And The Moral Life: Essays In Honor Of Cora Diamond" Edited By A. Crary". Ethics. Volume 118, Issue 3. 543-549. DOI: 10.1086/587764 https://works.swarthmore.edu/fac-philosophy/65 This work is brought to you for free by Swarthmore College Libraries' Works. It has been accepted for inclusion in Philosophy Faculty Works by an authorized administrator of Works. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Alice Crary, ed., Wittgenstein and the Moral Life: Essays in Honor of Cora Diamond Wittgenstein and the Moral Life: Essays in Honor of Cora Diamond by Alice Crary, Review by: Reviewed by Richard Eldridge Ethics, Vol. 118, No. 3, Symposium on Agency (April 2008), pp. 543-549 Published by: The University of Chicago Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/587764 . Accessed: 17/02/2015 14:22 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive.