Royal Institute of Philosophy Throwing Away the Ladder Author(s): Cora Diamond Source: Philosophy, Vol. 63, No. 243 (Jan., 1988), pp. 5-27 Published by: Cambridge University Press on behalf of Royal Institute of Philosophy Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3750493 Accessed: 19-11-2015 13:34 UTC 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. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Royal Institute of Philosophy and Cambridge University Press are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Philosophy. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 130.88.20.147 on Thu, 19 Nov 2015 13:34:10 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions ThrowingAway the Ladder CORA DIAMOND Whetherone is readingWittgenstein's Tractatus or his laterwritings, one must be struckby his insistencethat he is not puttingforward philosophicaldoctrines or theses;or byhis suggestion that it cannot be done,that it is onlythrough some confusion one is in aboutwhat one is doingthat one could takeoneself to be puttingforward philosophical doctrinesor theses at all. I thinkthat there is almost nothingin Wittgensteinwhich is of value and whichcan be graspedif it is pulled awayfrom that view of philosophy. But thatview of -philosophy is itself somethingthat has to be seen firstin the Tractatus if it is to be understoodin itslater forms, and inthe Tractatus it is inseparablefrom whatis centralthere, the distinction between what can be said and what can onlybe shown. Now whatabout that distinction? Peter Geach has writtenthat it has itssource in 'thegreat works of Frege', in Frege'sdiscussion of contrasts likethat between function and object.The differencebetween function and objectcomes out in language,but Frege, as is wellknown, held that thereare insuperableproblems in any attemptto put thatdifference properlyinto words. We cannotproperly speaking say what the differ- enceis, butit is reflectedin featuresof language; and whatholds of the differencebetween function and objectholds too of otherdistinctions oflogical category. Geach is rightthat we can bestunderstand what the Tractatusholds about sayingand showingif we go back to Fregeand thinkabout what the saying/showing distinction in itsorigin looks like there.Geach actuallymakes a strongerclaim: he saysthat 'a greatdeal of the Tractatusis best understoodas a refashioningof Frege'sfunc- tion-and-argumentanalysis in orderto remove[from it the] mistaken treatmentof sentencesas complexnames'.I That last pointof Geach's, abouthow to understandthe Tractatus, splitsinto two points if you think about it. Wittgensteinis trying to hold on to Frege'sinsight that there are distinctionsof logical category, like thatbetween functions and objects,or betweenfirst and secondlevel I P. T. Geach, 'Sayingand Showingin Fregeand Wittgenstein',Essays on Wittgensteinin Honour of G. H. von Wright,Jaakko Hintikka (ed.), Acta PhilosophicaFennica 28 (1976) (Amsterdam:North-Holland), 54-55, 64. Philosophy63 1988 5 This content downloaded from 130.88.20.147 on Thu, 19 Nov 2015 13:34:10 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Cora Diamond functions,which cannot be put intowords but whichare reflectedin distinctionsbetween the signs for what is in one categoryand thesigns forwhat is in the other.He wantsto hold on to that,and at the same timeto getrid of the assimilation of sentences to propernames. So for Wittgensteina sentence will count as a whollydifferent sort of linguistic itemfrom a propername or any otherkind of name. But if you are holdingon to Frege'sinsight that fundamental differences in kindsof linguisticexpression are the way fundamentaldifferences in reality showthemselves, differences in realitythat cannot be putinto words- and if you are also saying,against Frege, that sentences are a wholly differentlinguistic category from any kind of name, thatwill make sense if you are also sayingthat there are featuresof realitythat can come out onlyin sentences,in theirbeing the particularkind of sign theyare, in contrastwith names. Here, then,is how Geach's pointsplits into two: (1) In the Tractatustreatment of Frege'sinsight, sentences are no longerassimilated to complexnames. (2) Makingthat break, separating sentences off that way from names, is linkedwith the possibilityof treatingthe distinctivefeatures of sentencesas reflectionsof featuresof reality,features that can onlybe reflectedin sentencesand thatcannot themselves be said to be features of reality.Such a treatmentof sentenceswould then be radically differentfrom Frege's, but could neverthelessbe said to be deeply Fregeanin spiritand inspiredby Frege. Geach himselfgives some detail of what is involvedin Wittgenstein's gettingrid of the assimilation of sentences to names;but he has rather less on what I have just been talkingabout: the applyingof Frege's insightto sentencesby taking their distinctive and essentialcharacteris- ticsto be thereflection of something in thenature of things that cannot be putinto words.2 But now to getback to whereI wasat thebeginning: ifwe wantto knowwhy Wittgenstein thinks that there cannot (in some sense)be philosophicaldoctrines, we needto see theapparent doctrines of the Tractatusas theywill look ifwe go furtherdown the road that Geach pointsout as a road. That is, we need to see whatkind of sign Wittgensteintook a sentenceto be and how,by being that kind of sign, itcan showthings that cannot be said. Butthere is somethingthat has to be donefirst. And one convenientway of doing it is togo backto Geach. I haveso farfollowed Geach in his wayof putting the Frege insight. As he puts it, variousfeatures of realitycome out in languagebut it cannotbe said in languagethat reality has thosefeatures. Geach is here followingboth Frege and Wittgensteinin an importantrespect. Witt- 2 Hans Sluga also touchesbriefly on the point; see Sluga, GottlobFrege (London: Routledgeand Kegan Paul, 1980), 144. 6 This content downloaded from 130.88.20.147 on Thu, 19 Nov 2015 13:34:10 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Throwing Away the Ladder genstein,throughout the Tractatus, when he speaksabout what shows itselfbut cannotbe said, speaksof thesethings as featuresof reality. Thereis, he says, what cannotbe put into words. Propositionsand realityhave something in commonthat cannot be putinto words. Even the linguisticform 'what cannotbe put into words',the words 'das Unsagbare', 'das Undenkbare'-such ways of talkingrefer, or must seemto, to featuresof reality that cannot be putin wordsor captured in thought.Frege, in speakingof the distinction between first and second level functions,describes it as foundeddeep in the natureof things;3 and itis evidentthat he wouldsay exactly the same about the distinction betweenfunction and object.There is a questionhow to takethis sort of talk:the use ofwords like 'reality', 'the nature of things', 'what there is' and so on, in specifyingwhat cannot be putinto words. The problemis particularlyacute in Wittgenstein,given the passage at theend of the Tractatus(6.54): 'whoeverunderstands me eventuallyrecognizes [my propositions]as nonsensical,when he has used them-as steps-to climbup beyondthem. (He must,so to speak,throw away the ladder afterhe has climbedup it.)' The problemis how seriouslywe can take thatremark, and in particularwhether it can be appliedto thepoint (in whateverway it is put) thatsome features of reality cannot be put into words. Let me illustratethe problem this way. One thingwhich according to the Tractatusshows itself but cannotbe expressedin languageis what Wittgensteinspeaks of as thelogicalform of reality. So itlooks as ifthere is thiswhatever-it-is, the logical form of reality, some essential feature ofreality, which reality has all right,but which we cannotsay or think thatit has. Whatexactly is supposedto be leftof that,after we have thrownaway the ladder?Are we goingto keep the idea thatthere is somethingor otherin realitythat we gestureat, howeverbadly, when we speak of 'the logical formof reality',so that it, what we were gesturingat, is therebut cannotbe expressedin words? That is what I want to call chickeningout. What counts as not chickeningout is thenthis, roughly: to throwthe ladder away is, among otherthings, to throwaway in theend theattempt to takeseriously the languageof 'featuresof reality'.To read Wittgensteinhimself as not chickeningout is to say thatit is not,not really, his viewthat there are featuresof realitythat cannot be put intowords but showthemselves. Whatis his viewis thatthat way of talking may be usefulor evenfor a timeessential, but it is in theend to be letgo ofand honestlytaken to be realnonsense, plain nonsense, which we arenot in theend to thinkof as I GottlobFrege, 'Function and Concept',Translations from the Philosoph- ical Writingsof GottlobFrege, P. T. Geach and Max Black (eds) (Oxford: Basil Blackwell,1952), 41. 7 This content downloaded from 130.88.20.147 on Thu, 19 Nov 2015 13:34:10 UTC All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Cora Diamond correspondingto an ineffabletruth. To speakof featuresof realityin connectionwith what shows itself in languageis to use a veryodd kind of figurativelanguage.