[Wittrs] Anscombe on Tractarian epistemology & its incompatibility with verificationism
- From: "walto" <walterhorn@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 10 Aug 2010 15:02:40 -0000
The following is a lengthy excerpt (pp. 152-154) from Anscombe's
Introduction to W's Tractatus. I apologize in advance for the
inevitable typos.
`Psychology is no more akin to philosophy than any other natural
science. Theory of knowledge is the philosophy of psychology'
(4.1121). In this passage W is trying to break the dictatorial control
over the rest of philosophy that had long been exercised by what is
called theory of knowledge?that is, by the philosophy of
sensation,perception, imagination, and, generally, of `experience'. He
did not succeed. He and Frege avoided making theory ofknowledge the
cardinal theory of philosophy simply by cutting it dead; by doingnone,
and concentrating on the philosophy of logic. But the influence of the
Tractatus produced logical positivism, whose main doctrine is
`verificationism'; and in that doctrine theory of knowledge once more
reigned supreme, and a prominent position was given to the test of
significance by asking for theobservations that would verify a
statement. (Further, in the period between the Tractatus and the time
when he began to write Philosophical Investigations, W's own ideas were
more closely akin to those of the logical positivists than before or
after.)
We can see how the Tractatus generated logical positivism, although the
two philosophies are incompatible,by studing Mortiz Schlick's essay,
"Meaning and Verification": `Whenever we ask about a sentence, "What
does it mean?" what we expect is instruction as to the circumstances in
which the sentence is to be used; we want a description of the
conditions under which the sentence will form a true proposition, and
of the those which will make it false.' Here Schlick seems to follow
the Tractatus, except in the last clause of his statement: the
Tractatus says that I `determine the sense of a proposition by
`determining in what circumstances I call it true; (4.063). (It is
implicit in this that the `circumstances I question may hold or not
hold;for it is an essential part of the picture theory that a
proposition which heldin all circumstances would not have `sense': it
would lack TF poles.)
Schlick class the `description of the conditions; under which a word
has application, or a sentence is true, the ;rules for the use; of the
word or sentence. These `rules' will consist partly of `ostensive
definitions', of which the simplest form will be a pointing gesture
combined with the pronouncing of the word; this can be done with words
like `blue'. For words like `immediate',`chance', `because', `again',
Schlick says, the ostensive definition is of a more complicated kind:
`in these cases we require the presence of certain complex situations,
and the meaning of the words is defined by the way we use them in these
different situations.' All rules for use `ultimately point of
ostensive definitions'. `This,' Schlick says, `is the situation, and
nothing seems to me simpler or less questionable. It is this situation
and nothing else that we describe when we affirm that the meaning of a
proposition can be given only by giving the rules of its verification
in experience. (The addition "in experience" is really superfluous, as
no other kind of verification has been defined.)'
This shews us the transition from the Tractatus to `verificationism'
very clearly. What Schlick says leads immediately (a) to the quick
test for significance: `What experience would verify this?' and (b) to
the maintenance of theory of knowledge as the cardinal theory of
philosophy.
In the Tractatus, the `determination of the circumstances in which I
call a proposition true' must be a statement ofits truth-conditions.
This is a completely different thing from a `rule for the use' of a
sentence, if this takes the form of an `ostensive definition'. There
could be no statement of the truth-conditions of an elementary
proposition, other than a restatement of it;and for all non-elementary
propositions there can always be statements oftruth-conditions. If,
then, Schlick is following the Tractatus, `ostensive definition' can
only be relevant to the elementary proposition.
Further, Schlick insists that our `rules for use; are `arbitrary';we
give what rules we like; all that is essential is that we give some.
Theonly arbitrariness in the Tractatus is in the assignment of names.
There is no arbitrariness about the fact that a certain type of
arrangement of names is capable of representing such-and-such a
situation; it can do that only by reproducing in its own structure the
arrangement of objects in the situation,and we cannot make it do so at
will. ?
On the Tractatus view,then, one could not ask what observations would
establish the truth of aproposition unless the `structures' of possible
observation statements alreadystood in certain internal relations to
the `structure; of the proposition. In the presence of these internal
relations,the question of meaningfulness cannot arise, except in the
form of a questionabout the reference of the individual signs; if these
signs are not given areference, the proposition could not be `given' a
sense, even by stipulating that its truth would be established if and
only if such-and-such observation statements were verified?.
My only comment here is that there seems to me to a kind of
epistemological strain functioning here despite W's (and Anscombe's)
denials. That, e.g., language MUST have a particular sort of relation
with the world, that there MUST be elementary objects or there could be
no understanding?these seem to me akin to Descartes' methodological
claims regarding the impossibility of error with respect to the cogito.
There is a metaphysical "comfort" supplied by the non-empirical, yet
non-tautological props of the Tractatus, and W's certainty of the
impossibility of the falsehood of any of them is its own sort of
foundationalism.
When Anscombe says "There is no arbitrariness about the fact that a
certain type of arrangement of names is capable of representing
such-and-such a situation; it can do that only by reproducing in its
own structure the arrangement of objects in the situation..."?it's
the very assurance of the impossibility of any invasion by "the
arbitrary" that may give an empiricist pause.
Walto
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