[lit-ideas] we are now hard at work with daffy duck
- From: "Adriano Palma" <Palma@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 13 Apr 2012 11:54:05 +0200
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>>> Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx> 13/04/2012 11:50 AM >>>
There are longer ways but here is a shorter way with Richard Henninge’s
post.
Richard, as I recall, knows important things about the shortcomings of
the English translation of Wittgenstein’s work. Whatever these
shortcomings, for example in conveying the exact sense of W’s writing in
German, they were translated by humans not computers. And this for good
reason.Their shortcomings would arguably be much greater if the
translation had been performed by a computer following some programme:
and that is because computers have no grasp of the “sense” of language
as humans do. What computers do by way of processing “rules” does not
involve their grasping the “sense” of the “rules” involved.
A simple example: a computer may contain an error in its programme so
that it produces the calculation ‘2 + 2 = 44’; but where a human would
baulk because they grasp that this must be mistaken, the computer,
having no grasp of the sense of what it processes, will not baulk at
this mistake – it will not baulk because it does not grasp it must be a
mistake [it will only ‘baulk’ if another part of its programme causes it
to ‘baulk’ i.e. treat this as an “error”]. A computer will no more baulk
at ‘2 + 2 = 44’ than will a blackboard it is chalked on: for, in
Popper’s useful terms, both the computer and the blackboard are
confined to processing information at the level of World 1, and lack
conscious understanding of the content they process [still less, in
Popper's terms, do they grasp the World 3 content or mathematical
principle according to which '2 + 2 = 44' must be a mistake).
And so what computers do cannot be taken to show anything about the
“sense” of a “rule” in the sense in which W is interested in “rules”
and their “sense”: for what computers do by way of processing does not
involve computers grasping the “sense” of a “rule”. And since their
processing does not involve grasping the sense of a rule, what they do
cannot be taken to show that the “sense” of a “rule” may be said (on the
basis that it is “said” in what they process).
Richard’s attempted refutation is therefore entirely misconceived.
What Richard should really try to do (if he really wants to refute W's
position) is state a “rule” so that its sense is _said_ in what is
stated: but stating a computer programme, even one comprising “rules”
[of computation], is not to state any “rules” whose “sense” is _said_ in
what is stated.
Wittgenstein would also agree that Richard’s attempted refutation is
entirely misconceived because [in W’s use of “rules” and their ‘sense’]
stating a computer programme, even one comprising “rules” [of
computation], is not to state any “rules” whose “sense” is _said_ in
what is stated. Stating 'a computer programme' no more achieves this
than stating 'this combination of chemicals always produces this
compound' achieves stating a "rule" whose sense is _said_ in what is
stated (indeed, it no more achieves this than actually 'combining the
chemicals to produce the compound' would amount to 'saying' the _sense_
of the chemical "rule" involved).
Richard's suggested "refutation" is as hopelessly naive as Moore's
refutation of idealism by holding his hands out. It is no better than if
Richard had chalked some mathematical "rule" on a blackboard and then
claimed, "See, the sense of that "rule" has just been _said_ in what I
chalked".* Or no better than if Richard chalked some proposition on a
blackboard and then claimed, "See, the sense of that proposition has
just been _said_ in what I chalked".**
As to any such claims, the answer is "No, it hasn't" (Ludwig
Wittgenstein, both 'later'* and 'earlier'**).
Anyone who thinks the answer is otherwise simply does not 'get it' re
Wittgenstein.
Donal
Who thinks history shows people should be careful before being first to
allege others are hoist by their own petard
From: Richard Henninge <RichardHenninge@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Friday, 13 April 2012, 5:05
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Philosophical Investigations online -
amplification re PI
Donal Hoisted On His Own Petard
So choose your weapons as you wish - any example of a "rule"
participants prefer (though personally a mathematical "rule" is I
suggest best here for bringing out W's POV, and so that i[s] what I
offered for discussion).
Bring it on.
Dnl
Ldn
So the weapon chosen by Donal is a rule, preferably mathematical (since
that is "best . . . for bringing out W's POV), with victory to go to
anyone who can show that it is _not_ the case that
> for W, their sense is not /said/ in 'what is said' but can only be
> shown. So all the apparent clear articulation or expression of
"rules"
> is beside the point and philosophically deceiving if we think 'what
is
> said' contains the sense of the "rules".
I will reserve judgment on rules unprogrammable, since they indeed fall
into the realm of anthropology and linguistics, where only observation
can begin to reveal what and when something is a rule and what
constitutes its having been followed. I believe this is a fundamentally
open question in Wittgenstein and what really makes for all the fun of
his Untersuchungen, his philosophical "under-seekings" in which he pokes
at, teases, twists, probes, and twiddles with the freaky human language
we live and breath in, in an effort to get some kind of grip, hold,
purchase on what he clearly sees as an infinitely tricky subject that is
not about to yield as categoric a solution as the purported POV Donal
attributes to him.
Instead, I will address the easy lob that Donal throws at us in his
high-arcing gauntlet--a rule eminently programmable, so programmable
that any computer could be made to play the game according to that rule.
And--you must be getting ahead of me with this argumentation--if a
computer, a mindless computer, mind you, can play the game perfectly
according to the rule--say, of taking a number and adding 2 to it and
then of adding 2 to the number then generated [Donal's suggested
rule]--(chess would be an acceptable alternative), then the "sense" of
that rule is most definitely contained in "what is said," since that is
all a computer can "understand." The commands or instructions do not
"show" the computer what to do at any given point in the game; it's not
as if the computer is looking over the programmer's shoulder and
learning by "seeing" the rule in action shown to it, then applying it,
by trial and error, over a gradual learning curve, by doing, up to a
mastery of performing according to it: no, the computer takes the
rigorous logic of its program, a sequence of written directives that it
carries out faithfully, mindlessly, to play the "game" according to the
rules, which is basically all it knows and all it will ever need to
know. You can program a window to lower its blinds when the sunlight
hitting its sensors surpasses a specific light intensity parameter; you
can tell a person to do the same thing, to follow this rule, to play
this game. In each case the sense of the rule is contained in "what is
said," and not "in what is shown."
Furthermore, Donal's corollary insight into Wittgenstein's _Tractatus
Logico-Philosophicus_
[It may be noted that W's position here, re "rules" in PI, *parallels*
[my emphasis RH] his position re "propositions" in TLP: for TLP holds
that there is no proposition whose sense is _said_, rather than shown,
in 'what is said' by the proposition i.e. no proposition 'says' its
sense - rather, a "proposition shows its sense". And it may further be
noted that we are likewise apt to wrongly think that 'what can only be
shown' re the sense of a "proposition" is _said_ by the proposition, for
again 'what can only be shown' ordinarily _seems to be there_ in 'what
is said'].
is but another self-hoisting petard, especially and ironically, when he
thinks he has discovered a passage in it in which Wittgenstein seems
explicitly to support his notion that the sense of a proposition is not
said by the proposition, but only shown by the proposition:
>[From the C. K. Ogden translation
<http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/5740>
4.022 The proposition shows its sense.
The proposition shows how things stand, if it is true. And
it says, that they do so stand.>
[italicization mine, RH, in accordance with the original]
A computer "knows not seems." It cuts always to the chase, logically
speaking. It cannot know "how things stand" unless you tell it "they do
so stand." The show/say distinction is reserved for the humans in
attendance, but the computer can process the propositions as
instructions that it, so to speak, takes on faith as being true,
according to the sense "on their face." For the computer, the show/say
distinction collapses. Ideally, if a computer were fed Wittgenstein's
numbered propositions, it could "go on" with the language-game they
create, by following the rules of the game that they make up, in so far
as it could generate new non-contradictory propositions employing the
terms used in the TLP. For example, in keeping with Wittgenstein's
rigorous logic (which is little else than his extreme attention to the
wording he chooses, and hence my--personal--exasperation when
translators play fast and loose with his formulations, and, I think, his
exasperation when people in his midst play fast and loose with their own
use of language, hence, too, his readiness to raise a poker against such
abuses on occasion) the computer would not be able or allowed to spit
out such propositions as
The proposition says its sense.
The proposition says how things stand.
The proposition shows that things do so stand.
You'll notice that these three bogus, infelicitous propositions
literally violate the rules implied by (or contained in) the 3-prop
world encompassed in 4.022, a world in which sense, which is how things
stand, cannot be said, but it, sense, i.e. how things stand, can indeed
be shown, whereas that things do so stand cannot be shown; that can only
be said. What we learn from this playing (serious philosophical playing)
with the language is that the proposition does *double duty*, a double
duty in keeping with Frege's key Sinn and Bedeutung distinction. Frege's
interest was to create a language, a logic, that would facilitate the
advancement of science, or knowledge, by exposing cases in which the
difference is crucial. For instance, that the moon is made out of green
cheese is a legitimate Sinn, our word "sense" in the above discussion,
but the proposition cannot flat-out say that, basically claim that. It
must take a conservative two-step of (1) presenting or setting out or
describing or showing how things would be if that were so (this Sinn, or
sense, after all, can turn out to be Unsinn, or nonsense), and (2)
saying or stating or claiming, maintaining that it is so.
As I said, the computer is a fine follower of rules and its following
of rules is not affected by the saying/showing distinction. "For all
intents and purposes" the propositions it has to work with in its
programming "say" their sense directly to it since it accepts the truth
of everything the program tells it (to do). The fact that one could use
the words show and say interchangeably when describing how the computer
"learns" the rules of a game it can play thereafter, should be
indication enough that the distinction plays no rôle here, and hence is
not, as Donal says
beside the point and philosophically deceiving if we think 'what is
> said' contains the sense of the "rules".
Richard Henninge
University of Mainz
----- Original Message -----
From: Donal McEvoy ( mailto:donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx )
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sent: Thursday, April 12, 2012 12:01 PM
Subject: [lit-ideas] Re: Philosophical Investigations online -
amplification re PI
----- Original Message -----
From: Robert Paul <rpaul@xxxxxxxx>
>Phil wrote
> >The issue is not the rules, which can be clearly articulated,
> but rather their use.>
to which Donal replied
> Phil puzzles me by earlier asking for clarity where I have been very
> clear and indeed have used italics to identify a key tenet that
provides
> a fundamental continuity between TLP and PI: /the sense of 'what is
> said' is never said in 'what is said/ etc.
In the Tractatus, the sense of a proposition is how things would be if
it were true.>
Robert seems to posit this last claim as if it refutes, or is somehow
inconsistent with, my claimed "key tenet".
It does not refute the "key tenet". It is quite consistent that (a) the
sense of a proposition is how things would be if it were true and (b)
the sense of a proposition is never _said_ in 'what is said' by a
proposition.
And indeed what Robert then quotes from W plainly reflects that this is
W's position:-
>[From the C. K. Ogden translation
<http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/5740>
4.022 The proposition shows its sense.
The proposition shows how things stand, if it is true. And
it says, that they do so stand.>
Exactly as my "key tenet" has it. A proposition "_shows_ its sense". It
does not 'say' its sense. Its sense is not _said_ in 'what is said' but
can only be _shown_ (even if it is shown by 'what is said').
So what Robert seems to offer by way of counter-example turns out to be
an example of W 'saying' [or, strictly speaking, _showing_] the "key
tenet".
Robert then objects to this 'key tenet' in PI, in particular my claims
below:-
>> Now this tenet means that we can perhaps have rules that seem
"clearly
> articulated" or whose sense is clear. But, and it is a fundamental
but
> for W, their sense is not /said/ in 'what is said' but can only be
> shown. So all the apparent clear articulation or expression of
"rules"
> is beside the point and philosophically deceiving if we think 'what
is
> said' contains the sense of the "rules".
I don't recognize anything of what Wittgenstein says in this.>
Robert continues:-
>He nowhere explicitly says it>
Here we may agree. (And I have tried to explain why W does not 'say'
this explicitly, even though this is his POV - a POV that marks a
fundamental continuity between TLP and PI).
>> We might argue out a case to see W's POV here: take the rule 'for
every
> number add 2 and then for that number add two' and then ask how "what
is
> said" determines its sense?
Why should we do this, when much richer examples are right there in the
text? >
Fair enough, Robert doesn't like this example (there are reasons a
mathematical "rule" is, imo, a good example to start with, but be that
as it may). Choose any example you like and we may argue it. What is the
argument about? As per the "key tenet", I shall be arguing that no
matter what example of a "rule" is chosen, W's POV is that the sense of
any such "rule" is not _said_ in 'what is said' when we state the
"rule". And if an example is chosen, where someone claims that they have
stated a "rule" whose sense is _said_ in 'what is said', I will put what
I take to be W's POV - and 'point to' what W takes as 'showing' that any
such claim _only appears true_ by a kind of optical illusion where we
have simply assumed 'what can only be shown' as being 'said' in 'what is
said' (something we are unthinkingly apt to do, as 'what can only be
shown' ordinarily _seems to be there_ in 'what is said').
While I may express what I take to be W's POV in my own terms, I will
also try to relate those terms expressly to what W writes.
The issue is stark and goes to fundamentals. My claim is not merely
that there are _some_ "rules" [as W means the term] whose sense is not
'said' in a statement of that "rule", but that (for W) *there is no
"rule" whose sense is _said_ in a statement of that "rule"*.
[It may be noted that W's position here, re "rules" in PI, parallels
his position re "propositions" in TLP: for TLP holds that there is no
proposition whose sense is _said_, rather than shown, in 'what is said'
by the proposition i.e. no proposition 'says' its sense - rather, a
"proposition shows its sense". And it may further be noted that we are
likewise apt to wrongly think that 'what can only be shown' re the sense
of a "proposition" is _said_ by the proposition, for again 'what can
only be shown' ordinarily _seems to be there_ in 'what is said'].
So choose your weapons as you wish - any example of a "rule"
participants prefer (though personally a mathematical "rule" is I
suggest best here for bringing out W's POV, and so that it what I
offered for discussion).
Bring it on.
Dnl
Ldn
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