[Wittrs] Comments on last points of theTractatus
- From: "gabuddabout" <gabuddabout@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 18 Aug 2010 22:31:05 -0000
Message #129 of 136 < Prev | Next >
Re: The Conclusion of the Tractatus
It's interesting that you mention Schopenhauer. Until I read the Richter study
guide to the Tractatus, I had no idea how much of an influence he was on W.
Particularly "The Fourfold Root" apparently.
W
--- In quickphilosophy@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "gabuddabout" <gabuddabout@...> wrote:
>
>
>
> --- In quickphilosophy@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "walto" <calhorn@> wrote:
> >
> > 6.41
> >
> > The sense of the world must lie outside the world. In the world everything
is as it is and happens as it does happen. In it there is no value?and if there
were, it would be of no value.
>
>
> This just seems false to me for the following simple reason:
>
> All fictions (like anything spoken of that is not in the world) have a sense
because any fiction spoken of, by that token, has a sense from the author of the
fiction, no?
>
> >
> > If there is a value which is of value, it must lie outside all happening and
being-so. For all happening and being-so is accidental.
>
>
> This sounds like patent nonsense. If I value a good treatise on how rhythmic
ear training can be represented at every step by written notation, it follows
(by abduction) that the value is mine, I'm in the world.
>
> OTOH, what is the point of deliberately writing (or defining that which is not
entirely about blind brute physics as nonsense) nonsense and calling it such at
the end of a so-called book _of_ philosophy? I conclude that a book _of_
philosophy with the upshot that philosophy has subject matter that makes no
sense and is defined (arbitrarily) as having no connection to science, is simply
bad philosophy (by arbitrary?) definition.
>
>
>
> >
> > What makes it non-accidental cannot lie in the world, for otherwise this
would again be accidental.
> >
> > It must lie outside the world.
>
> I'm a causal realizer of a mambo groove I wrote and tweaked today for a
student. I needed nonaccidental causality to get it done and it couldn't have
gotten done just accidentally, though I feel I could have realized other grooves
as well, and as I did. And all that happened in the world as far as I'm aware.
>
> How does Wittgenstein get away with this sort of thing? Well, one can get a
taste for it by reading Schopenhauer's _The World as Will and Representation,
Vol.2, "On Man's Need for Metaphysics." Just as some of the flavor of Schop's
fourfold root of the principle of suff. reason is the reason why Witters picks
up on calling value-assertions senseless, Schop. doesn't think that ethical
statements, er, considerations are to be eliminated or reduced to a place where
they aren't.
>
> I consider Schop. one of the first nonreductive materialists (though
complaining that materialism proper just forgets to think there can be an
(scientific) account of subjectivity) who took consciousness seriously and
allowed that there probably is no arguing against the idea that such may be
given a causal account. Note that what Schop. regards as grades of
objectification of the will (natural forces combining into systems that are both
conscious and capable of being moved by art being at the highest grade) are
distinct grades even though all grades reduce to natural forces. Causal
reducibility without ontological reduction as Seare has it. Middle sized
objects (brains and concepts) as allowing for distinct sciences that have a
vocabulary that cross-classifies without introducing anything not there,
maintaining that, contra some concept pragmatists, there are bona fide mental
events without there being an a priori argument available which suggests such a
view to be saddled with what Kim calls causal overdetermination (Something like
Fodor's view if I have him right).
> >
> > 6.42
> >
> > Hence also there can be no ethical propositions.
> >
> > Propositions cannot express anything higher.
>
>
> Well, one can define propositions that way I suppose. What is the upshot,
though? Now it's 6.42 and, later, that 6.42 is nonsense. But surely this is an
important (ethically speaking?) art that Witters concocted because the upshot is
not to do philosophy a certain way. Perhaps he shows this by writing a book
that is both good and good insofar as it shows that it can only show the ethical
upshot without talking about it? Somehow it seems better books are possible, as
it seemed later to Witters.
>
>
>
> >
> > 6.421
> >
> > It is clear that ethics cannot be expressed.
> >
> > Ethics is transcendental.
> >
> > (Ethics and æsthetics are one.)
>
>
> I think my student had better practice that mambo along with transitioning to
the punk groove I also wrote in order to hack something new and cool to play.
Or is Witters saying that ethical statements that are in a more general form
ought not to be thought as expressible given some definitions of expressibility
for (four-fold root?) reasons?
>
>
>
> >
> > 6.422
> >
> >
> > The first thought in setting up an ethical law of the form "thou shalt . .
." is: And what if I do not do it? But it is clear that ethics has nothing to do
with punishment and reward in the ordinary sense. This question as to the
consequences of an action must therefore be irrelevant. At least these
consequences will not be events.
>
>
> Is it not _possible events_ as consequences that are implied by following or
not following a rule? Thou shalt count in order to tell me where that
particular eighth note right there (pointing) is in 4/4 time. So the student
points at the note without saying anything. Then I remind about the type of
answer required. But I now see that I probably missed the point about "ethical
law"--Witters might have read Nietzsche complaining about how unfair it would be
to allow our not following ethical laws while disallowing God not to follow some
too on a whim. I allow that I still may have missed the point. Perhaps Witters
is critiquing the idea of an abstract consequence as the "material" from which
an ethical proposition gets its content?
>
>
>
> > For there must be something right in that
> > formulation of the question. There must be some sort of ethical reward and
ethical punishment, but this must lie in the action itself.
> >
> > (And this is clear also that the reward must be something acceptable, and
the punishment something unacceptable.)
> >
> > 6.423
> >
> > Of the will as the subject of the ethical we cannot speak.
>
> Is this taken as a fact now, and later (at 7) not a fact?
> How about the will as the subject of some natural force systems with the gift
of gab and bossiness?
>
> >
> > And the will as a phenomenon is only of interest to psychology.
>
> Here Witters seems to be using will in a more restricted sense than Schop.
does (everthing is will--though that may seem senseless as Walter pointed out
about generalities of such kinds as use the whole world as subject of a
proposition). But Witters seems to allow here what Fodor might think a
concession to the view that philosophy has to be a bit about science, psychology
being an important one due to all the concepts running around in philosophy
books.
>
> >
> > 6.43
> >
> > If good or bad willing changes the world, it can only change the limits of
the world, not the facts; not the things that can be expressed in language.
>
>
> This will soon look like nonsense if it doesn't already..
>
> >
> > In brief, the world must thereby become quite another, it must so to speak
wax or wane as a whole.
>
>
> As a whole--neat! Wax or wane where as a whole? And so on.
>
> >
> > The world of the happy is quite another than that of the unhappy.
>
>
> It is pointless to parade truisms as philosophy only later to point out that
the truisms are nonsensical.
>
> >
> > 6.431
> >
> > As in death, too, the world does not change, but ceases.
>
>
> As a whole for that person who doesn't know that it ceases? Or did the world
cease after the death of Adam? I'm just making fun now. And what about
possible eternal occurrence of possible worlds in both series and parallel
(somehow and don't ask!) such that each of them get played over and over like a
record? Note that this doesn't imply that each possible world doesn't contain
potential realizers of causes in the form (of persons) that we have today (Hey
mambo! Mambo Italiano!)
>
>
> >
> > 6.4311
> >
> > Death is not an event of life. Death is not lived through.
>
>
> Yes it is; furthermore, since it is not lived through, death can't constitute
cessation of the world, including mine as far as I can tell.
>
>
> >
> > If by eternity is understood not endless temporal duration but timelessness,
then he lives eternally who lives in the present.
>
>
> That holds (or seems to possibly) even if by eternity is understood endless
temporal duration. How thin of a present?
>
> >
> > Our life is endless in the way that our visual field is without limit.
>
> Witters on acid! I can see for miles and miles and Miles Davis plays on
endlessly in the eternal music of playfulness that is so innocent it forgot to
stop playing, ever, according to Nietzsche's view of the most scientific
possible hypothesis--.
> >
> > 6.4312
> >
> > The temporal immortality of the human soul, that is to say, its eternal
survival after death, is not only in no way guaranteed, but this assumption in
the first place will not do for us what we always tried to make it do. Is a
riddle solved by the fact that I survive for ever? Is this eternal life not as
enigmatic as our present one? The solution of the riddle of life in space and
time lies outside space and time.
>
> Pure Schopenhauer--except that space and time as we conceive them
(phenomenon), for Schop., are not real in the way will in itself "is," and that
only possibly (hence the scare quotes), what with Schop. going on and on in his
"Epiphilosophy" chapter at the end of the 2nd vol. of WWR as concerns our
inability to speak of it (will in itself) because all our understanding is
equipped to deal with are things/events that fall under the fourfold root of the
PSR. So Schop. is a realist (just like Witters seems to be in the Tractatus)
about truths that are not speakable in the way ordinary and scientific truths
are.
>
> >
> > (It is not problems of natural science which have to be solved.)
>
> Note that this squares with Schop.'s "On Man's Need.." (vol.2) where Schop.
makes the point that the most complete science would be the most proper
statement of the problem of metaphysics.
> >
> > 6.432
> >
> > How the world is, is completely indifferent for what is higher. God does not
reveal himself in the world.
> >
> > 6.4321
> >
> > The facts all belong only to the task and not to its performance.
>
> All of 'em?
> >
> > 6.44
> >
> > Not how the world is, is the mystical, but that it is.
>
>
> Seems consistent with Schop's "On Man's Need.."
>
> >
> > 6.45
> >
> > The contemplation of the world sub specie aeterni is its contemplation as a
limited whole.
> >
> > The feeling that the world is a limited whole is the mystical feeling.
>
> But a limited whole that endures without limit ought to be just as mystical
because just as, later, senseless.
> >
> > 6.5
> >
> > For an answer which cannot be expressed the question too cannot be
expressed.
>
> We can do a thought experiment like Witters is now doing such that we say that
the most complete science just _is_ the proper statement of the riddle.
> >
> > The riddle does not exist.
>
> Or not!
>
> >
> > If a question can be put at all, then it can also be answered.
>
> Call to all constructionists, Searle and Fodor fans, hell, even probably the
human population if everybody must think this way--assuming thinking this way is
not nonsense, as it later is called.
> >
> > 6.51
> >
> > Scepticism is not irrefutable, but palpably senseless, if it would doubt
where a question cannot be asked.
>
> But the sceptics can just ask about justification for any claim, including the
above. Either regress or circularity threatens (including the circularity of
Schopenhaurian fallibilism as expressed unequivocally in "On Man's
Need.."--perceptions justify perceptions, all of which are empirical and not a
priori).
>
> >
> > For doubt can only exist where there is a question; a question only where
there is an answer, and this only where something can be said.
>
> How many times has the world in its entire range of possible worlds repeated
itself from any unique slice of its duration in x dimensions?
> Perhaps there is no answer to this question, though it seems meaningful even
if we can give an a priori reason (ex hypothesi) why it is a question that can't
be answered. Maybe I just got way too mystical for my own good--I liked the
ambiguity here!
> >
> > 6.52
> >
> > We feel that even if all possible scientific questions be answered, the
problems of life have still not been touched at all. Of course there is then no
question left, and just this is the answer.
>
> This is an awesome piece of Witters pie; I think it tastes just right.
>
> >
> > 6.521
> >
> > The solution of the problem of life is seen in the vanishing of this
problem.
> >
> > (Is not this the reason why men to whom after long doubting the sense of
life became clear, could not then say wherein this sense consisted?)
>
> Fair enough I guess. So far at least!
>
> >
> > 6.522
> >
> > There is indeed the inexpressible. This shows itself; it is the mystical.
> >
> > 6.53
> >
> > The right method of philosophy would be this: To say nothing except what can
be said, i.e. the propositions of natural science, i.e. something that has
nothing to do with philosophy: and then always, when someone else wished to say
something metaphysical, to demonstrate to him that he had given no meaning to
certain signs in his propositions. This method would be unsatisfying to the
> > other?he would not have the feeling that we were teaching him
> > philosophy?but it would be the only strictly correct method.
>
>
> I'm afraid that giving a meaning to certain signs hasn't been given a sense.
Senses, they say, are sometimes given to things after the gates close to the
public at Oxford, but Fodor suggests this to be a leg pull.
> >
> > 6.54
> >
> > My propositions are elucidatory in this way: he who understands me finally
recognizes them as senseless, when he has climbed out through them, on them,
over them. (He must so to speak throw away the ladder, after he has climbed up
on it.)
> >
> > He must surmount these propositions; then he sees the world rightly.
> >
> > 7
> >
> >
> > Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.
>
>
> On the cover of Jonathan Dancy's _Introduction to Contemporary Epistemology_:
>
> AVT TACE,
> AVT LOQVERE MELIORA
> SILENTIO
>
> Probably would have done better not write these gazillion responses, but who
can say really I would have been doing anything better if not?
>
> Cheers,
> Budd
>
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