Chiming in briefly on an existing thread.

Michael Martin's essay asks:

"Is there any interpretation that makes Wittgenstein's view neither noncontroversial nor clearly wrong?"

As I see it, this is the central problem with his reading: he sees both "noncontroversial" and "clearly wrong" as both being problematic interpretations.

He passes over interpretations that are "either dubious or not very interesting," rejecting a straightforward reading with, "But few people would deny this," and "But who would deny that this is true...?"

"Who would want to deny the thesis that some religious believers and nonbelievers talk past one another?"

Perhaps Martin ought to read and really consider, take seriously, PI 89-133, especially

128. If one tried to advance theses in philosophy, it would never be possible to debate them, because everyone would agree to them.

What is he really up to in making these remarks that no one would deny? That requires a much lengthier post than I have time to make, but that section of _Philosophical_Investigations_ is a good guide.

J.DeMouy

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--- In WittrsAMR@yahoogroups.com, "J" <wittrsamr@...> wrote:
>
<snip>
>
> Perhaps Martin ought to read and really consider, take seriously, PI 89-133, especially
>
> 128. If one tried to advance theses in philosophy, it would never be possible to debate them, because everyone would agree to them.
>
> What is he really up to in making these remarks that no one would deny? That requires a much lengthier post than I have time to make, but that section of _Philosophical_Investigations_ is a good guide.
>
> J.DeMouy
=========================================

I've actually always wondered just what Wittgenstein was really trying to say with such a remark. After all, isn't it the case that philosophers advance theses all the time and always seem to disagree? Yet he wants to say otherwise. Is he using "theses" in some special sense (one that is not the same as when an Idealist disagrees about some statement about the world with a Realist, for instance)?

Philosophers have debates all the time and if Wittgensteinians can say, look, you're not really debating anything factual, you just think you are differing substantively about something that is or is not the case because you are reading one another's words differently (as we often see in such debates, even here), isn't that still a type of disagreement? After all, the next step is to say, 'no, we mean the same' or "no, so and so is misunderstanding the meaning of what he says.'

Just look at the many debates we've seen here. I argue with Bruce, all the time, about whether it is sensible to make claims that boil down to "brains cause consciousness" (in the sense of the latter being existentially dependent on the former) and with Cayuse as to whether it makes sense to say that 'when I refer to myself as an I, and mean only my sense of being a conscious self, there is really a referent for that term.'

Or I've argued with Neil here, over whether we can rightly say that what we think about the world is reflective to some extent of the way the world really is or whether it is entirely imposed on a world we can never know by the mere act of our thinking!

I've argued with Joe here about whether we can reasonably embrace an idea that mind is physically based and thereby simply discard dualist assumptions and, indeed, what it means to think dualistically.

On a prior list I've argued with a fellow named Walter and another named PJ over whether John Searle's Chinese Room Argument, which purports to demonstrate logically why computational processes can never be a basis for consciousness, is deficient because it is circular, contains various equivocations and is based on an unestablished preconception of consciousness which, itself, cannot be defended.

With Walter I have argued that a claim that consciousness is just a claim that certain physical items and events have certain mental properties (like intentionality) is is an insufficient explanation of consciousness and finally comes down to dualism, too. (I haven't argued for or against dualism, by the way, only that there is no reason to presume dualism from the existence of minds alone if one can satisfactorily explain minds without dualism.)

And, of course, there have been innumerable arguments over the years over whether I or my interlocutors have various claims by third parties right or wrong.

And yet we come back to this Wittgensteinian remark from the PI:

"128. If one tried to advance theses in philosophy, it would never be possible to debate them, because everyone would agree to them."

So I'm left wondering what he could have meant in light of the extensive room for argument in philosophy that we actually encounter all the time. Does the remark just mean, as Sean sometimes seems to want to say, that none of the things I have cited are arguable, that they are all just linguistic confusions (rather than my own view, that linguistic confusions are deeply embedded in these -- what I would call -- conceptual issues)?

If Sean's reading is right, then there is never any point in arguing about any of this at all, right? We should all just shut up and read the papers (whether newspapers or scientific ones -- assuming they are peer-reviewed by East Anglian approved monitors, of course!).

Now we know that Wittgenstein does often speak as though he thinks there is nothing worth talking about in philosophy so this is a possible reading, to be sure. On the other hand, he did philosophy (in the form of examining how we think about things) up to his dying day (remember that On Certainty is said to have been completed by him only the day before he died).

Was he being merely disingenuous with us or was he being inconsistent himself?

I suspect this would be a good subject for extensive discussion in the manner that Sean has proposed, eh?

SWM

P.S. I am on record, by the way, as thinking that Martin's assessment of Wittgenstein's position on religion is fairly astute and does point up some real problems in his approach, by the way. (Another possible subject for detailed discussion!)

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I wrote, in re:a paper by Michael Martin:

> > Perhaps Martin ought to read and really consider, take seriously, PI 89-133, especially
> >
> > 128. If one tried to advance theses in philosophy, it would never be possible to debate them, because everyone would agree to them.

a comment to which SWM replied:

> I've actually always wondered just what Wittgenstein was really trying to say with such a remark. After all, isn't it the case that philosophers advance theses all the time and always seem to disagree?

Indeed.

Let us suppose that Wittgenstein was claiming that philosophers never put forward theses or that when they do, no one debates those theses.

It's damned odd, isn't it?

Why would he say something so completely and utterly absurd?

Did he believe that? Perhaps when he attended meetings of the Vienna Circle, he just zoned out during their debates, like reciting Rabindrath Tagore while facing the wall. Was he possibly that autistic, that he was completely oblivious to the fact that they were debating theses left and right? Was he oblivious to Waismann's book _Theses_, a book that started out as a collaboration between Waismann and himself? And likewise with debates that surrounded him at Cambridge?

Or perhaps not autism but dementia. Had all of the debates he had witnessed simply slipped his mind when he wrote that? And rewrote it? (A similar remark occurs at several points in the Nachlass.)

How does one make that sort of mistake?

Does it help matters to say that he was not confused but "merely disingenuous", as you later put it? Is "disingenuous" the right word here?

Isn't telling other philosophers that philosophers don't put forth theses or debate them like the man whose wife catches him naked in bed with another woman and asks, "Are you going to believe me or your lying eyes?"?

Isn't it worse in fact, because it's not that any one incident would prove him a liar? Wouldn't a philosopher's entire educational and teaching career would lead him to reject such a claim as completely fatuous?

To read him in that way don't we have to see him as not just "confused" but completely out of touch with reality? Or as not just deceptive but as a brazen liar?

So what's the alternative? You suggested an alternative usage of "theses", but what possible usage could that be? (Isn't this unlike his alternative usage of "grammar", where the usage in various contexts makes it clear enough how he's using it and why?)

If we deny that he's using "theses" in very much the sense you mention "...as when an Idealist disagrees about some statement about the world with a Realist..." or again in very much the sense that Waismann used "theses", then what special sense is at work here? Why doesn't he spell it out? And what is his purpose in saying something that seems so absurd but isn't so long as we somehow glean how he's using "theses"?

The surrounding context may help. It should be noted that PI 128 takes place within a larger section wherein Wittgenstein has shifted from apparent conversation between different "voices" to speaking with a single voice. One may then suppose that these remarks unambiguously reflect Wittgenstein's own views. And one could reasonably say that these are views on the nature of philosophy, the nature of its problems and how they are best addressed.

And obviously, he's not writing the history of philosophy. It ought to go without saying that he is not primarily presenting a description of how various philosophers have proceeded (except where he obviously is!) but of how he has found it fruitful to proceed.

It makes sense that in discussing "philosophy" as a source of problems and as a way of dealing with those problems, there may be some ambiguity in how "philosophy" is used. There is a descriptive sense, describing how philosophers have been led into various muddles, and a prescriptive sense, how philosophy ought to be done in order to deal with such muddles.

An example of the latter:

"119. The results of philosophy are the uncovering of one or another piece of plain nonsense and of bumps
that the understanding has got by running its head up against the limits of language. These bumps make us see the
value of the discovery."

I take it as obvious that this cannot be meant as a description of all or even most philosophical work.

And here, "may" makes clear that the point is a normative one:

"124. Philosophy may in no way interfere with the actual use of language; it can in the end only describe it.

For it cannot give it any foundation either.

It leaves everything as it is.

It also leaves mathematics as it is, and no mathematical discovery can advance it. A 'leading problem of
mathematical logic' is for us a problem of mathematics like any other."

But the transition to "can" and the supporting "for it cannot..." also demand close reading. As well, "...for us..." is important.

Reading these passages requires very close attention.

Again "It is the business of philosophy..." (PI 125) is prescriptive.

"One might also give the name 'philosophy' to what is possible before all new discoveries and inventions." (PI 126)

And immediately prior to the remark we're considering:

"127. The work of the philosopher consists in assembling reminders for a particular purpose.'

Doesn't it make sense to read "theses" as being contrasted with "assembling reminders"?

And subsequently:

"129. The aspects of things that are most important for us are hidden because of their simplicity and
familiarity. (One is unable to notice something--because it is always before one's eyes.) The real foundations of his
enquiry do not strike a man at all. Unless that fact has at some time struck him.--And this means: we fail to be struck
by what, once seen, is most striking and most powerful."

Isn't it natural to read the "reminders" to be "assembled" as reminders of things "hidden because of their simplicity and
familiarity"?

Doesn't it make sense then to read PI 128 as an aside in this train of thought, viz. if we tried to present these reminders of simple and familiar truths always before our eyes as "theses", i.e. as claims to be advanced, supported by argument, defended against counter-arguments ("theses" in a perfectly ordinary sense of the word), it would be absurd. No one would argue with such reminders!

Now, it is a legitimate to ask whether Wittgenstein was consistent, whether he didn't really limit himself to reminding us of simple and familiar truths. And many philosophers and exegetes have debated this point.

But for our present purposes, it isn't necessary to show that Wittgenstein never advanced controversial theses, that what appear to be controversial theses are really no such thing. It is sufficient to show that a reading that is "noncontroversial" is not a bad thing in Wittgenstein's case. Being noncontroversial is a virtue by his lights, because it is consistent with the idea of assembling reminders of simple and familiar truths.

So, when Martin rejects readings that have Wittgenstein saying things that are "noncontroversial" or "not very interesting," when he rejects a straightforward reading by saying, "few people would
deny this," or asking, "But who would deny that this is true...?" and
"Who would want to deny the thesis...?" he is making a mistake!

If what Wittgenstein says is something no one would deny, then he is being true to his word. Attempts to extract broader conclusions, especially highly dubious ones, are misguided if the only claim that can be made for the approach is that otherwise Wittgenstein is being "noncontroversial" - as if that were an obviously bad thing!

J.DeMouy

> P.S. I am on record, by the way, as thinking that Martin's assessment of Wittgenstein's position on religion is fairly astute and does point up some real problems in his approach, by the way. (Another possible subject for detailed discussion!)

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Very interesting comments!

--- In Wittrs@yahoogroups.com, "J" <wittrsamr@...> wrote:

<snip>

>
> "129. The aspects of things that are most important for us are hidden because of their simplicity and
> familiarity. (One is unable to notice something--because it is always before one's eyes.) The real foundations of his
> enquiry do not strike a man at all. Unless that fact has at some time struck him.--And this means: we fail to be struck
> by what, once seen, is most striking and most powerful."


> Isn't it natural to read the "reminders" to be "assembled" as reminders of things "hidden because of their simplicity and
> familiarity"?
>
> Doesn't it make sense then to read PI 128 as an aside in this train of thought, viz. if we tried to present these reminders of simple and familiar truths always before our eyes as "theses", i.e. as claims to be advanced, supported by argument, defended against counter-arguments ("theses" in a perfectly ordinary sense of the word), it would be absurd. No one would argue with such reminders!
>

Yes, the issue is whether there is value in pointing out the implications of the common place, the things we normally accept without thinking about or feeling we have to make a case for, the things which, like the points he makes in On Certainty, underpin the more explicit arguments we get into.

Philosophy of course, in its theses, has traditionally treated these sorts of deeply embedded assumptions as grist for the debater's mill and it does seem that Wittgenstein is saying hold on here, you can't argue these things. What you have to do is recognize them and their role and cut the reasoning process about them short.

In that sense I think it's fair to say that by "theses" he means philosophical claims about such things which look like, seem to us to be, the kinds of claims we can make about factual statements and beliefs.

But it looks to me like a very fine line is being drawn here. Many of the arguments I alluded to in my comments (all drawn from real discussions on this and related lists) seem to fall in a somewhat ambiguous area on that difficult to discern line.

For instance, arguing about what we mean by "consciousness" or "mind" is often just about what we mean by these words in different contexts. And yet what we mean by the words includes whatever it is we think they refer to. Thus the referents of such terms, insofar as these terms name anything (whether phenomenon, activity or something else) are grist for the discussion, too. And often scientific findings, as well as common sense knowledge, about these referents must also be considered. And now we stumble into places where metaphysics starts poking its head in the door. Here we get arguments that are often at cross purposes, i.e., someone saying this is about the concepts (and talking about the word usages) and someone else saying no, this is about a theory about the world.

And now we get different kinds of theses, both the kind that ape scientific theses only they aren't about anything accessible to observation, and the kind that involve talking about what it is we're actually doing. And this later sort seems to me to be in sync with the things Wittgenstein thinks philosophy should be talking about but then, can we genuinely deny that these are theses, too?


<snip>

>
> But for our present purposes, it isn't necessary to show that Wittgenstein never advanced controversial theses, that what appear to be controversial theses are really no such thing. It is sufficient to show that a reading that is "noncontroversial" is not a bad thing in Wittgenstein's case. Being noncontroversial is a virtue by his lights, because it is consistent with the idea of assembling reminders of simple and familiar truths.
>
> So, when Martin rejects readings that have Wittgenstein saying things that are "noncontroversial" or "not very interesting," when he rejects a straightforward reading by saying, "few people would
> deny this," or asking, "But who would deny that this is true...?" and
> "Who would want to deny the thesis...?" he is making a mistake!
>

Is he? Should we simply assume that Wittgenstein's points that religion and science are not at odds because they aren't playing the same language game have no implications for actual practice? In my own initial response to the piece by Michael Martin I noted how, in my own history, I had tried to apply Wittgenstein's apparent approach (based on this kind of consideration) and I had concluded it doesn't really work. Why not? Because in the end religious claims typically have a factual component or the activities are empty, just going through the motions as it were and no serious religionist would grant that someone just going through the motions is doing anything more than a form of playacting.

> If what Wittgenstein says is something no one would deny, then he is being true to his word. Attempts to extract broader conclusions, especially highly dubious ones, are misguided if the only claim that can be made for the approach is that otherwise Wittgenstein is being "noncontroversial" - as if that were an obviously bad thing!
>
> J.DeMouy
>
>

I don't think the issue is whether his claim in this case is to be non-controversial. Indeed, his claim about religious practice and believe is anything but that! It appears to directly contravene our usual understanding of what it means to assert a belief ("I will go to heaven", "I will be resurrected in my body thousands of years after I have died and become food for worms," "my prayers will be answered," etc.). If people do not believe such things in a way that sees them as facts, their power to guide and produce behavior is lost and then the behavior, without the belief, is empty, too.

My view, of course, is that Wittgenstein had some interesting insights with regard to religion but that, in the end, he missed a pretty big boat on this one.

SWM

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I wrote:

> > Doesn't it make sense then to read PI 128 as an aside in this train of thought, viz. if we tried to present these reminders of simple and familiar truths always before our eyes as "theses", i.e. as claims to be advanced, supported by argument, defended against counter-arguments ("theses" in a perfectly ordinary sense of the word), it would be absurd. No one would argue with such reminders!
> >

to which SWM replied:

> Yes, the issue is whether there is value in pointing out the implications of the common place, the things we normally accept without thinking about or feeling we have to make a case for, the things which, like the points he makes in On Certainty, underpin the more explicit arguments we get into.

I want to interject here: I don't know what you mean by the phrase "implications of the common place (sic)," but it seems fishy. Still, I'd rather ask for clarification than jump to any conclusions. What sorts of "implications"?

>
> Philosophy of course, in its theses, has traditionally treated these sorts of deeply embedded assumptions as grist for the debater's mill and it does seem that Wittgenstein is saying hold on here, you can't argue these things. What you have to do is recognize them and their role and cut the reasoning process about them short.

Interjecting again: if you "can't argue about these things" then there's no need to say "hold on". (As if the speed of light were a speed limit that needed to be enforced!) And there's nothing to say that we "have to... recognize them". We simply do recognize them. When we're doing philosophy? That's one question to which _On_Certainty_ is addressed. But if the answer is that yes, we do recognize them even when we're doing philosophy, it would be because otherwise we fail to actually say anything at all, not because it's silly or foolish or pointless to argue such matters.

>
> In that sense I think it's fair to say that by "theses" he means philosophical claims about such things which look like, seem to us to be, the kinds of claims we can make about factual statements and beliefs.
>
> But it looks to me like a very fine line is being drawn here. Many of the arguments I alluded to in my comments (all drawn from real discussions on this and related lists) seem to fall in a somewhat ambiguous area on that difficult to discern line.

If they provoke debate then they aren't the sorts of "reminders" with which "theses" are being contrasted.

>
> For instance, arguing about what we mean by "consciousness" or "mind" is often just about what we mean by these words in different contexts. And yet what we mean by the words includes whatever it is we think they refer to. Thus the referents of such terms, insofar as these terms name anything (whether phenomenon, activity or something else) are grist for the discussion, too. And often scientific findings, as well as common sense knowledge, about these referents must also be considered. And now we stumble into places where metaphysics starts poking its head in the door. Here we get arguments that are often at cross purposes, i.e., someone saying this is about the concepts (and talking about the word usages) and someone else saying no, this is about a theory about the world.

Hmmm

I'll just say again: if a statement is contentious, it isn't the sort of reminder that Wittgenstein is recommending.

>
> And now we get different kinds of theses, both the kind that ape scientific theses only they aren't about anything accessible to observation, and the kind that involve talking about what it is we're actually doing. And this later sort seems to me to be in sync with the things Wittgenstein thinks philosophy should be talking about but then, can we genuinely deny that these are theses, too?
>

If it is the sort of claim that one supports with arguments and defends against counter-arguments, if it is contentious, it is a thesis. The sorts of reminders Wittgenstein speaks of, things that are simple and familiar, things with which no one would disagree, are not theses in this sense.

But we may be surprised at what people will argue against. So being contentious depends in part on context, on the audience.

If I suppose that I am expressing nothing but truisms, if I am reminding my interlocutor of something with which I suppose she could not disagree, but she does disagree, then I must retract the statement in question.

I might first ask questions to identify more precisely the point of disagreement or I might rephrase to clarify if I have perhaps expressed myself poorly, but once I argue I am in the realm of theses and no longer doing Wittgensteinian philosophy as I understand it.

Better that I retract the contentious claim.

Or at least recognize that, by arguing, I am doing something different than I'd first set out to do.

I had previously written:

> > So, when Martin rejects readings that have Wittgenstein saying things that are "noncontroversial" or "not very interesting," when he rejects a straightforward reading by saying, "few people would
> > deny this," or asking, "But who would deny that this is true...?" and
> > "Who would want to deny the thesis...?" he is making a mistake!
> >

prompting SWM to ask:

> Is he? Should we simply assume that Wittgenstein's points that religion and science are not at odds because they aren't playing the same language game have no implications for actual practice?

First, where does Wittgenstein himself actually say such a thing as "religion and science are not at odds because they aren't playing the same language game"?

Second, even if I grant Wittgenstein saying such a thing (I most assuredly do not!) and even if I grant that accepting such a claim would have implications for one's religious practice (I'd imagine it would), what bearing does that have on the exegetical point? This strikes me as non sequitur.

SWM continued:

In my own initial response to the piece by Michael Martin I noted how, in my own history, I had tried to apply Wittgenstein's apparent approach (based on this kind of consideration) and I had concluded it doesn't really work. Why not? Because in the end religious claims typically have a factual component or the activities are empty, just going through the motions as it were and no serious religionist would grant that someone just going through the motions is doing anything more than a form of playacting.
>

I don't question your experience and it seems quite plausible to me as an illustration of why such a view of religion would be problematic in some contexts.

I question the use of "typically" but at the very least "quite often" would illustrate the problem and even "sometimes" would show that the view ascribed to Wittgenstein doesn't work for all cases. I'd also note that what is "empty" to one may not be for another and that "no serious religionist" sounds suspiciously like "no true Scotsman". Still, let's set all of these quibbles aside, because my point is that what you call Wittgenstein's "apparent approach" is a misreading.

Showing what is wrong with such an approach (and I certainly wouldn't defend it) is irrelevant to my point that that approach is wrongly ascribed to Wittgenstein.

But let's even set that aside. Suppose that it is right to ascribe such an approach to Wittgenstein. Still, Martin's route to ascribing that approach (or something like it) to Wittgenstein would still be a mistake.

If we want to rightly ascribe such an approach to Wittgenstein, then it is not enough to say, "He must have meant that because the other reading would be uncontroversial," assuming that an "uncontroversial" reading is somehow a bad reading.

The "uncontroversial" reading is the reading that takes him at his word about advancing theses!

SWM further remarked:

> I don't think the issue is whether his claim in this case is to be non-controversial.

Interjecting again: what do you mean by "the" issue? It is the issue I am raising. If you wish to raise another issue, so be it.

SWM continued:

Indeed, his claim about religious practice and believe is anything but that!

Interjecting again: that assumes that he was making such claims! But Martin's argument for ascribing such claims is that the alternative is to ascribe to him claims that are uncontroversial!

SWM continued:

It appears to directly contravene our usual understanding of what it means to assert a belief ("I will go to heaven", "I will be resurrected in my body thousands of years after I have died and become food for worms," "my prayers will be answered," etc.). If people do not believe such things in a way that sees them as facts, their power to guide and produce behavior is lost and then the behavior, without the belief, is empty, too.

Interjecting again: I wonder about "our usual understanding". Whose?
And what does it mean to believe things in a way that "sees them as facts"? I also wonder about the picture of belief "producing" behavior and of "empty" behavior without belief.

Of course, I wouldn't deny that people's beliefs are often their reasons for acting. Nor would I deny that people sometimes "go through the motions", that it makes sense to speak of someone acting "as if" they believed, even though they do not.

Still, we must be careful here because actions are in part constitutive of what we mean by believing.

Still, for my present purposes, these are again quibbles.

My main point again: Martin ascribes dubious views to Wittgenstein merely because he sees the alternative interpretation as "uncontroversial". he acknowledges the alternative possibility and he acknowledges that what Wittgenstein is saying on this alternative reading is not controversial, but he insists on the dubious reading precisely because it is more controversial. And in light of what Wittgenstein said elsewhere about contentious theses, this is a mistake.

I would add that in each case where Martin insists on reading Wittgenstein as making "dubious" claims rather than "uncontroversial" remarks, it is by assuming that Wittgenstein must mean his remarks to apply more generally than he actually says. He must be talking about religious belief in general, about religious believers in general, and about religious disagreements in general. (Otherwise, no one would disagree.) But this is another mistake, ignoring Wittgenstein's warnings about our "craving for generality" and "contempt for the particular case" (Blue Book).

JPDeMouy

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--- In Wittrs@yahoogroups.com, "J" <wittrsamr@...> wrote:

> I wrote:
>
> > > Doesn't it make sense then to read PI 128 as an aside in this train of thought, viz. if we tried to present these reminders of simple and familiar truths always before our eyes as "theses", i.e. as claims to be advanced, supported by argument, defended against counter-arguments ("theses" in a perfectly ordinary sense of the word), it would be absurd. No one would argue with such reminders!
> > >

> to which SWM replied:
>
> > Yes, the issue is whether there is value in pointing out the implications of the common place, the things we normally accept without thinking about or feeling we have to make a case for, the things which, like the points he makes in On Certainty, underpin the more explicit arguments we get into.
>

> I want to interject here: I don't know what you mean by the phrase "implications of the common place (sic)," but it seems fishy. Still, I'd rather ask for clarification than jump to any conclusions. What sorts of "implications"?
>

"Ordinary" as in ordinary language, our linguistic usages under ordinary, everyday conditions. When we say 'I am certain' of something in a particular situation we don't look for, or expect others to look for (demand of us) a logical argument that can be traced back to some indubitable first premises. 'Did you see that man standing under the lamp post on the night of the event?' 'Yes.' "Are you sure?' 'Yes.' 'How can you be certain?' "The light was on, it was a clear night, I was no more than ten feet away, I don't need glasses and I had seen him many times before.' And so forth. No one wants to know whether the witness can trust his senses under those conditions or whether he is certain the world is really what it seems.

> >
> > Philosophy of course, in its theses, has traditionally treated these sorts of deeply embedded assumptions as grist for the debater's mill and it does seem that Wittgenstein is saying hold on here, you can't argue these things. What you have to do is recognize them and their role and cut the reasoning process about them short.
>

> Interjecting again: if you "can't argue about these things" then there's no need to say "hold on". (As if the speed of light were a speed limit that needed to be enforced!) And there's nothing to say that we "have to... recognize them". We simply do recognize them.
>

That's the point I was making, and that traditional philosophy often wants to know why? Not in the sense of how the mechanisms of our various systems work, though, but in the sense of how we can logically draw the conclusions we draw, up to and including the things we think about our sensory inputs.

> When we're doing philosophy? That's one question to which _On_Certainty_ is addressed. But if the answer is that yes, we do recognize them even when we're doing philosophy, it would be because otherwise we fail to actually say anything at all, not because it's silly or foolish or pointless to argue such matters.
>

The issue raised was whether Wittgenstein's saying that philosophers, insofar as they advance any substantive claims about anything (theses), would not be saying anything controversial (that anyone else would disagree with (presumably including other philosophers).

I made the point that, still, philosophers do disagree all the time and that often it looks like they disagree over substantive matters, i.e., they advance competing theses.

To some extent Wittgenstein's point seems to be that the things philosophers often argue about cannot really be argued about intelligibly and I noted that this seems to be the case when philosophers want to argue about the things that underpin our ways of understanding the world.

Sometimes a statement will express something about the world. 'There is a rock.' The rock is either there, where the speaker is pointing, or it isn't -- or some other phenomenon can be identified that would explain why the speaker said what he did, e.g., it's really a piece of papier mache made to look like a rock, the light is such that that shadow looked like a rock, etc.

From this we can say that rock is real, or not, of course.

But can we say 'That rock is not real' once we have determined it to be what we would call a rock?

Now it seems to mean something like 'Physical things are not real' or 'Nothing physical is real'.

The form of these statements look the same as that of the earlier statement, i.e., we have a named entity and a relation to a known condition (actually being present to the senses) but something else is going on here that makes the second set of sentences rather different.

One of the important differences is that the use of "real" seems to have changed. It no longer means what we usually mean by "real" because it doesn't have to do with what is present to the senses. A new game is afoot but we often don't notice it.

So Wittgenstein says philosophers need to go back to what we mean by "real" in the ordinary way we use the term. Can we use the term in this new way and still treat it as we did before, as a statement about the same kind of condition?

Anyway, that's what I had in mind and I've gone to the trouble of sketching it out because you're new here and presumably don't know what has gone before in past discussions. I am assuming, going forward, that now we are on the same page about this. If not, feel free to point that out and then we'll see if we share an understanding of these Wittgensteinian insights.

> >
> > In that sense I think it's fair to say that by "theses" he means philosophical claims about such things which look like, seem to us to be, the kinds of claims we can make about factual statements and beliefs.
> >
> > But it looks to me like a very fine line is being drawn here. Many of the arguments I alluded to in my comments (all drawn from real discussions on this and related lists) seem to fall in a somewhat ambiguous area on that difficult to discern line.
>

> If they provoke debate then they aren't the sorts of "reminders" with which "theses" are being contrasted.
>

I don't understand that point. I was referring to the tendency of philosophers to take perfectly ordinary terms and apply them out of their natural milieu, i.e., in contexts that are not ordinary for them. However, the broader point I had made was that insofar as philosophy is about concepts, how we think about things, we CAN and do still have room for arguments and arguments imply rival theses. So it looks to me as if Wittgenstein either overstates his case or has something more subtle in mind, i.e., that he does not count claims (or at least certain kinds of claims) about meanings and concepts as "theses".

He famously eschewed theorizing in his later thinking. By theorizing, I take him to have meant formulating sentential claims about the way things are and making arguments, based on evidence or logic for or against their truth. I'm guessing that it is here that he places "theses".

Now suppose I make a statement about what we mean by the word "mind". I say we mean that array of features we recognize in our own subjective experience including, but not limited to, ideas, memories, feelings, perceptions, mental images, etc. And someone else says no, we only mean certain behaviors and dispositions to behave. And someone else comes along and says no, we mean the person's soul or spirit. Still someone else says, not at all, we mean a non-physical property or set of properties that some physical things have and some don't. Another person says, oh no, we mean a set of physical events going on in the brain. And on and on.

To what extent are we arguing about competing theories and to what extent about variant conceptions? Theories will be seen to play a role here. For instance, there are various theories about how the brain works to produce the phenomenon of a subjective entity. These are basically scientific. Then there are other theories about the way the world itself is, i.e., is it all physical or all mental or is it some mix of both? These latter are outside the realm of science since they can all be the case, no matter what the evidence, while the first group, about how brains work, cannot since we can study brains and actually see what they do.

Now where does the philosopher come in?

Wittgenstein would have said, I believe, that one cannot argue or speak intelligibly about the various theses concerning what the world really is insofar as there are no observations, no evidence, for one position over another. Our language breaks down here, just like the word "real" cannot be extracted from the milieu in which it has meaning and inserted into a milieu where that meaning no longer works. Wittgenstein would not have said we can't speak intelligibly about the theories where science has a purchase though he would certainly have agreed that philosophers cannot add any information here based on just thinking about the matter. Here the philosopher must step back and let science do what it does.

Yet I have seen some claim that on a Wittgensteinian view we can say nothing intelligible about such scientific questions, e.g., 'how do brains produce consciousness?' That just strikes me as anti-scientific and inconsistent with anything Wittgenstein would have held.

> >
> > For instance, arguing about what we mean by "consciousness" or "mind" is often just about what we mean by these words in different contexts. And yet what we mean by the words includes whatever it is we think they refer to. Thus the referents of such terms, insofar as these terms name anything (whether phenomenon, activity or something else) are grist for the discussion, too. And often scientific findings, as well as common sense knowledge, about these referents must also be considered. And now we stumble into places where metaphysics starts poking its head in the door. Here we get arguments that are often at cross purposes, i.e., someone saying this is about the concepts (and talking about the word usages) and someone else saying no, this is about a theory about the world.
>
> Hmmm
>
> I'll just say again: if a statement is contentious, it isn't the sort of reminder that Wittgenstein is recommending.
>

It would seem not from the quotes you have presented but my point is to look a little further in order to get a better sense of the meaning of those quotes and consider whether he was overstating the case or, perhaps, narrowly denoting "theses". Philosophers argue all the time after all, as I've said. Even Wittgensteinians do.

> >
> > And now we get different kinds of theses, both the kind that ape scientific theses only they aren't about anything accessible to observation, and the kind that involve talking about what it is we're actually doing. And this later sort seems to me to be in sync with the things Wittgenstein thinks philosophy should be talking about but then, can we genuinely deny that these are theses, too?
> >
>
> If it is the sort of claim that one supports with arguments and defends against counter-arguments, if it is contentious, it is a thesis. The sorts of reminders Wittgenstein speaks of, things that are simple and familiar, things with which no one would disagree, are not theses in this sense.
>

Yes, Wittgenstein did not engage in making arguments though some of the points he made have the look of arguments, e.g., the private language claims in the PI. The question, though, is whether argument in all its possible forms is therefore excluded from the Wittgensteinian model of philosophy or whether it still has a place, if not the same place?

After all, here you and I are having a sort of argument, no?

Traditional philosophy engages in claims and counter-claims, debates drawing on claims that support other claims. Think of Searle's Chinese Room argument for instance. Wittgenstein steered clear of such formulations. But just because he didn't go in for constructing and analyzing formal arguments doesn't mean his claims were not often informal kinds of arguments.

When I and some others here argue over whether "mind" is best understood as a non-physical entity or substance, or as an abstraction or as a physical phenomenon such as a kind of process or set of behaviors, or as subjective experience, there's lots of difference of opinion at work.

Sometimes someone will say, but here you are being inconsistent, your logic is flawed. For example, here you sound like you are asserting mind-brain identity but there are the following problems with that. Then we may go back and forth a bit about meanings and use and maybe we get agreement and maybe we don't. But is THAT the same thing as two people saying mind is this and giving a logical argument to prove the claim and another replying no it's that and giving his logical argument in rebuttal?

In this latter case, the classical philosophical approach is deployed.

In the former, there's more informality and the focus seems to be more about meanings and uses and contexts. To what extent is this not consistent with Wittgenstein on your view?

> But we may be surprised at what people will argue against. So being contentious depends in part on context, on the audience.
>

I think we need to better explicate what it means to be contentious. After all, Wittgenstein was famously contentious wasn't he?

> If I suppose that I am expressing nothing but truisms, if I am reminding my interlocutor of something with which I suppose she could not disagree, but she does disagree, then I must retract the statement in question.
>

Or question whether she understands what you have said or whether you have made it as clearly as necessary.

> I might first ask questions to identify more precisely the point of disagreement or I might rephrase to clarify if I have perhaps expressed myself poorly,

Yes.

> but once I argue I am in the realm of theses and no longer doing Wittgensteinian philosophy as I understand it.
>

So why are you arguing with me about our apparently competing claims about what Wittgenstein may actually have meant? And why, as you've rightly noted, do Wittgenstein exegetes argue among themselves? Have they all forsaken Wittgenstein or was Wittgenstein's point, rather, directed against the tendency of traditional philosophy to pursue philosophy as though it were one of the sciences?

> Better that I retract the contentious claim.
>
> Or at least recognize that, by arguing, I am doing something different than I'd first set out to do.
>
> I had previously written:
>
> > > So, when Martin rejects readings that have Wittgenstein saying things that are "noncontroversial" or "not very interesting," when he rejects a straightforward reading by saying, "few people would
> > > deny this," or asking, "But who would deny that this is true...?" and
> > > "Who would want to deny the thesis...?" he is making a mistake!
> > >
>
> prompting SWM to ask:
>
> > Is he? Should we simply assume that Wittgenstein's points that religion and science are not at odds because they aren't playing the same language game have no implications for actual practice?
>
> First, where does Wittgenstein himself actually say such a thing as "religion and science are not at odds because they aren't playing the same language game"?
>

My paraphrase of course. But if you think his thinking should be paraphrased differently then please offer yours.

> Second, even if I grant Wittgenstein saying such a thing (I most assuredly do not!) and even if I grant that accepting such a claim would have implications for one's religious practice (I'd imagine it would), what bearing does that have on the exegetical point? This strikes me as non sequitur.
>

Why? Wittgenstein himself practiced or tried to practice certain religious activities, even if he had trouble bending the knee as it were. We have the whole group of personal jottings he left us in Culture and Value and other personal correspondence and the testimony of people who knew him. Are we to think his lectures on religion had nothing to do with any of that? Michael Martin is specifically examining his statements in that little book and asking how they apply to actual religious practice and whether they make sense in the context of such religious practices.

> SWM continued:
>
> In my own initial response to the piece by Michael Martin I noted how, in my own history, I had tried to apply Wittgenstein's apparent approach (based on this kind of consideration) and I had concluded it doesn't really work. Why not? Because in the end religious claims typically have a factual component or the activities are empty, just going through the motions as it were and no serious religionist would grant that someone just going through the motions is doing anything more than a form of playacting.
> >
>
> I don't question your experience and it seems quite plausible to me as an illustration of why such a view of religion would be problematic in some contexts.
>

Yes. For his part Wittgenstein had an on again off again relationship with Catholicism, even having a priest brought to his bedside as he was dying. The question is to what extent his statements about what it means to be religious explain his own actions or work in terms of such practices. If he had something to add here of use to us then, of course, it must at least tell us how religious activity really does work in the context of all the things we do. I am saying that I think it doesn't.

> I question the use of "typically" but at the very least "quite often" would illustrate the problem and even "sometimes" would show that the view ascribed to Wittgenstein doesn't work for all cases. I'd also note that what is "empty" to one may not be for another and that "no serious religionist" sounds suspiciously like "no true Scotsman".

Or "no ordinary language speaker"? Are you suggesting a logical flaw in my point then? Or are you engaging in one by suggesting something that's not there?

> Still, let's set all of these quibbles aside, because my point is that what you call Wittgenstein's "apparent approach" is a misreading.
>

Why?

> Showing what is wrong with such an approach (and I certainly wouldn't defend it) is irrelevant to my point that that approach is wrongly ascribed to Wittgenstein.
>
> But let's even set that aside.

Why? That is rather critical to what I have said, don't you think?

> Suppose that it is right to ascribe such an approach to Wittgenstein. Still, Martin's route to ascribing that approach (or something like it) to Wittgenstein would still be a mistake.
>

Why? He does a careful and thoughtful analysis of Wittgenstein's own words and considers their implications. That is a perfectly respectable way to proceed.

> If we want to rightly ascribe such an approach to Wittgenstein, then it is not enough to say, "He must have meant that because the other reading would be uncontroversial," assuming that an "uncontroversial" reading is somehow a bad reading.
>

No, there is no reason to assume "uncontroversial" is "a bad reading". The issue is whether anything is gained by telling us what he tells us. After all, as I've already noted, it is certainly a controversial claim by Wittgenstein (one to which we would not all readily assent) to say that there is no assertion of actual belief in a religionist's claims to believe in the Resurrection or God or life after death.

> The "uncontroversial" reading is the reading that takes him at his word about advancing theses!
>

But his claims about religion are anything but "uncontroversial".

> SWM further remarked:
>
> > I don't think the issue is whether his claim in this case is to be non-controversial.
>
> Interjecting again: what do you mean by "the" issue? It is the issue I am raising. If you wish to raise another issue, so be it.
>

The issue was whether Wittgenstein's suggestions re: the role of religious claims relative to certain other kinds made sense and whether Michael Martin had unfairly criticized them or not. What other issue do you think has been on the table in this part of our discussion?

> SWM continued:
>
> Indeed, his claim about religious practice and belief is anything but that!
>
> Interjecting again: that assumes that he was making such claims! But Martin's argument for ascribing such claims is that the alternative is to ascribe to him claims that are uncontroversial!
>

But the claim that religious claims are not about the facts they appear to reference IS made by Wittgenstein in the Lectures and it IS controversial. What is not controversial is that religious claims do contradict one another and that religious practitioners typically do so when making those claims. But that tells us nothing we didn't already know about religion and its practitioners and if that is all Wittgenstein is saying he is telling us nothing at all. On the other hand, Wittgenstein's remarks in a book like On Certainty, about how our beliefs interlock and depend on lots of things and not merely some set of empirically testable statements, is to show us something we already knew but failed to notice. Thus it is noncontroversial but hardly noticed until pointed out while the uncontroversial interpretation of the remarks quoted by Martin never needed to be pointed out at all.

> SWM continued:
>
> It appears to directly contravene our usual understanding of what it means to assert a belief ("I will go to heaven", "I will be resurrected in my body thousands of years after I have died and become food for worms," "my prayers will be answered," etc.). If people do not believe such things in a way that sees them as facts, their power to guide and produce behavior is lost and then the behavior, without the belief, is empty, too.
>
>
> Interjecting again: I wonder about "our usual understanding". Whose?

This is something taken from my personal experience, of course. However, I have never encountered a real believer who does not think that what he believes in is the case, even if he will not agree that any particular scientific finding has the power to overturn it. Do you know of any?

> And what does it mean to believe things in a way that "sees them as facts"?

It means to believe that what I say I believe is true and that to be true is to have happened as my belief says they happened, etc.

> I also wonder about the picture of belief "producing" behavior and of "empty" behavior without belief.
>

Why? Ask a priest if you can take communion if you really don't believe the Church doctrine concerning Jesus.

Buddhism is a little trickier. The kind I was involved in, Zen, eschews all doctrine and yet it involves its practitioners dutifully sitting in meditation in order to liberate themselves from the karmic cycle of death and rebirth. If one doesn't believe in rebirth after death, then what is the point of pursuing a practice to free yourself from it?

I actually sat for a number of years like that and then I got up, having decided that just sitting was pointless if I wasn't concerned about the goal. Was I sincere while I was doing it? I believe I was, but I was also confused so being sincere was easy. Once it was clearer to me, there was no longer any reason to continue the practice.

> Of course, I wouldn't deny that people's beliefs are often their reasons for acting. Nor would I deny that people sometimes "go through the motions", that it makes sense to speak of someone acting "as if" they believed, even though they do not.
>
> Still, we must be careful here because actions are in part constitutive of what we mean by believing.
>

Yes. Believing is not entirely separate and apart which is why when the belief part falls away, so, too, does the action. Now we can continue to act as if we still believed but that kind of action is no longer what counts in a religious milieu. That's why I stopped sitting.

> Still, for my present purposes, these are again quibbles.
>

Lots of quibbles. When do we get to the heart of your purposes?

> My main point again: Martin ascribes dubious views to Wittgenstein merely because he sees the alternative interpretation as "uncontroversial". he acknowledges the alternative possibility and he acknowledges that what Wittgenstein is saying on this alternative reading is not controversial, but he insists on the dubious reading precisely because it is more controversial. And in light of what Wittgenstein said elsewhere about contentious theses, this is a mistake.
>

No, that is a misreading of Martin's piece. I think we need to go back to it and look at the text. I think you have him wrong.

> I would add that in each case where Martin insists on reading Wittgenstein as making "dubious" claims rather than "uncontroversial" remarks, it is by assuming that Wittgenstein must mean his remarks to apply more generally than he actually says. He must be talking about religious belief in general, about religious believers in general, and about religious disagreements in general. (Otherwise, no one would disagree.) But this is another mistake, ignoring Wittgenstein's warnings about our "craving for generality" and "contempt for the particular case" (Blue Book).
>
> JPDeMouy
>
>

You are generalizing from the Blue Book then?

Note, that the Blue Book reflects his transitional phase and is only the result of notes taken in his classes by some of his students. At least the Brown Book had the merit of being supervised and corrected by him with an eye toward possible publication. I don't think we can take anything said in the Blue Book as dispositive for Wittgenstein's ideas. It is, at best, helpful and somewhat indicative of where he was going.

SWM

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I don't know if anyone here would be interested in this but I came across a
book which interested me as a student of Wittgenstein's thought whose
complete text is available online.

? ¦ _Austrian_Philosophy:_The_Legacy_of_Fran_ Brentano_ by Barry Smith

? ¦ http://ontology.buffalo.edu/smith/book/austrian_philosophy/? ¦ 

? ¦ It is reviewed or summarized at several sites online, from various perspectives:
? ¦ http://www.jstor.org/pss/2953761? ¦ 
? ¦ http://sammelpunkt.philo.at:8080/1737/? ¦ 
? ¦ http://mises.org/misesreview_detail.aspx?control=59? ¦ 
? ¦ http://www.asiaing.com/austrian-philosophy-the-legacy-of-franz-brentano.html? ¦ 
? ¦ http://www.friesian.com/austrian.htm? ¦ 

? ¦ Why is it relevant?? ¦  Apart from the obvious point, viz. Wittgenstein
was Austrian, the book documents the milieu (or one of the milieus) in
which Wittgenstein's thought developed.

? ¦ The influence of Russell and Frege, of the Vienna Circle, of Schopenhauer, and of Tolstoy are more or less well understood but most of us, but it is sometimes
neglected that Wittgenstein, even while teaching at Cambridge, still
spent much of his life in Austria.? ¦ 
And he was acquainted with much of the discussion taking place there -
and not just the Circle.? ¦  His writings shortly after his return to
philosophy, such as _Philosophical_Remarks_, are filled with references
to "Phenomenology",
but there are references again in late works like _Remarks_on_Colour_.? ¦ 
I would suggest that much of the Philosophical Psychology of the
post-Investigations work is more strongly influenced by confrontation
with the ideas of many of the figures discussed in this book
-? ¦   figures whose ideas trace back to Brentano, such as the
Phenomenologists and Gestalt psychologists - than by the "usual
suspects" (Russell, Frege, Plato, Augustine, Descartes).

? ¦ This book is not about Wittgenstein, though he gets a few mentions, but
it may help those of us who find ourselves asking, "To whom is this
addressed?" or "Why is he making this point?"

? ¦ For those who've read _Wittgenstein's_Poker_, this elaborates on some of the shared background of Wittgenstein and Popper.

? ¦ Finally, for those interested in the history of Analytic Philosophy
or in the divide between Analytic and "Continental" philosophy, this
book makes in the compelling case for very distinct philosophical
traditions in Austria (including the territory once covered by the
greater Austro-Hungarian Empire) and Germany.

? ¦ I would add: rather than a divide between Anglophone and Continental philosophy, it is more helpful to think in terms of a divide between Austrian/English and German/French philosophy.

? ¦ J. DeMouy

Hello J.

Welcome to Wittrs. Tell us a little about yourself. From where do you hail, what do you do (and so forth?). I try to catch new members for a quick introduction. (The message board has a space for that).

And by the way, for anyone else who has recently joined and not introduced themselves, why not start a thread with your name, and say hello?

Regards.? ¦  
? ¦ 
Dr. Sean Wilson, Esq.
Assistant Professor
Wright State University
Personal Website: http://seanwilson.org
SSRN papers: http://ssrn.com/author=596860
Discussion Group: http://seanwilson.org/wittgenstein.discussion.html

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Hello and thanks for the welcome.

I tend not to share much personal information online but I'll offer a bit. I am a writer and like many, largely an autodidact. And I am a Wittgenstein enthusiast, "Wittgensteinian" at least by my own lights. I reside in sunny Florida, USA.

Other interests include science-fiction, free software, Unix-like computer systems, the visual arts, and an eclectic (or simply indiscriminate) taste in music.

--- In Wittrs@yahoogroups.com, Sean Wilson <whoooo26505@...> wrote:
>
> Hello J.
>
> Welcome to Wittrs. Tell us a little about yourself. From where do you hail, what do you do (and so forth?). I try to catch new members for a quick introduction. (The message board has a space for that).
>
> And by the way, for anyone else who has recently joined and not introduced themselves, why not start a thread with your name, and say hello?
>
> Regards.? ¦  
> ? ¦ 
> Dr. Sean Wilson, Esq.
> Assistant Professor
> Wright State University
> Personal Website: http://seanwilson.org
> SSRN papers: http://ssrn.com/author=596860
> Discussion Group: http://seanwilson.org/wittgenstein.discussion.html
>
>
>
> =========================================
> Need Something? Check here: http://ludwig.squarespace.com/wittrslinks/
>

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(JP)

... could you elaborate, if you know, on what might be the difference in the benefits one would obtain from the Barry Smith book, versus, say, "Wittgenstein's Vienna" in terms of putting Wittgenstein's thoughts into cultural context?? ¦ Or I am? ¦ completely off base here with such a comparison?

Yours wanting a little more info, if possible,

Dr. Sean Wilson, Esq.
Assistant Professor
Wright State University
Personal Website: http://seanwilson.org
SSRN papers: http://ssrn.com/author=596860
Discussion Group: http://seanwilson.org/wittgenstein.discussion.html

S. Wilson asked

> ... could you elaborate, if you know, on what might be the difference in the benefits one would obtain from the Barry Smith book, versus, say, "Wittgenstein's Vienna" in terms of putting Wittgenstein's thoughts into cultural context?? ¦ Or I am? ¦ completely off base here with such a comparison?
>
> Yours wanting a little more info, if possible,

That's an excellent question and an apt choice of comparison.

Both works could be described as "intellectual history", but Janik and Toulmin's would also be well described as "cultural history" while Smith's would be better described as belonging to the "history of ideas" and "history of philosophy".

Also, while the focus of _Wittgenstein's_Vienna_ is on a wide range of issues over a narrow period, from Fin-de-Siecle to the First World War, Smith's book is concerned with a narrower set of issues but with coverage from the mid-19th century up to the Anschluss.

Finally, Smith's book deals with "Austria" in a sense that includes, e.g. Polish philosophy, i.e. with the territory included in the Hapsburg's Empire, while Janik and Toulmin are very much focused, as befits the title, on Vienna.

On the first point about classification: Janik and Toulmin are concerned with the wider culture of Vienna, with art, music, social mores, and so on. This is what I mean by "cultural history". The focus of Smith's work is much narrower, with issues that overlap to a large extent between philosophy of science, philosophy of mathematics, and psychology, and specifically with the influence that Franz Brentano had in each of these fields through students like Freud, Ehrenfels, Husserl, Twardowski, Steiner, and Masaryk.

Just that point, that one man taught the founder of Psycho-Analysis, the founder of Gestalt psychology, the founder of Phenomenology, and the founder of the Lvov-Warsaw School of logic (which gave us Tarski, among others), the founder of Anthroposophy, and the founder of Czechoslovakia is remarkable enough (more remarkable when one discovers he never received a professorship!) but they are also illustrative of wider tendencies in Austrian thought, going back further to Bolzano, and they show a distinct contrast with the post- and neo-Kantian philosophy prevalent in Germany.

Focusing specifically on the connection with Wittgenstein, the purpose served by Janik and Toulmin's work was to emphasize the ethical, religious, and spiritual concerns so long neglected in readings of the Tractatus. But where Smith sheds light is on more technical matters, e.g. the a priori, modality, the relationship between logic and psychology, the analysis of intention and intentionality, and the role of perception in knowledge, and on aspects of Wittgenstein's middle, transitional period (_Philosophical_Remarks_ in particular, but also _Remarks_on_Logical_Form_) as well as concerns of the post-Investigations Wittgenstein, i.e. Part II of the PI, _Remarks_on_the_Philosophy_of_Psychology_, _Last_Writings_on_the_Philosophy_of_Psychology_, _Remarks_on_Colour_, and _On_Certainty_.

I hope this helps.

JPDeMouy

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