I would just point out that it is somewhat problematic to ascribe intention
or even a program to a book that was published posthumously, and may not
have been intended to be published in the same form that we have, if at all.
I apologize to RP: somehow I was under a mistaken impression that he was a
Wittgenstein scholar. He never said that he was, it was a misinterpretation
/ misrerembering on my part of some comments made long ago, probably even
on the Phil-Lit of old.
O.K.
On Wed, Apr 29, 2015 at 10:26 AM, Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
We thought it was a very funny book.>
This remark is of some interest. It does not make clear whether "funny"
means "funny-peculiar" or "funny-ha-ha", my guess being that "funny" here
derives from both senses.
*Investigations* is a peculiar book - on many levels. (At least one of
its early readers, Feyerabend, set out to rewrite it in a different form -
so as to make it all clearer.)
But it is also a book with a strange kind of wit to it. What is hard to
tell is to what extent this wit was accident or design.
Part of its wit is not accident: for *Investigations *can fairly be
described as a debunking book - debunking of the nonsense of philosophy,
that is. It must be debunking of much of traditional philosophy because it
takes the view that there are *no* genuine philosophical problems of the
sort traditional philosophy tries to solve - rather there are just
conceptual confusions which, by the correct therapeutic practice of
examining carefully the sense of language, can be dissolved. That '*no*'
deserves emphasis: for it is plausible enough that at least some, and
perhaps many, of the problems of philosophy are the result of conceptual
confusions - but are all? Wittgenstein thinks so, though it is part of his
view (as he showed in his response to Popper at the Moral Sciences Club)
that where there is some genuine problem that problem will not be
'philosophical' but should be classified as within some substantive field
of investigation (e.g. what is genuinely problematic about 'induction',
beyond mere 'conceptual confusion', lies within the field of 'logic' and
not 'philosophy').
This debunking is entirely serious and its wit is of the sort that can
come from a point made with complete seriousness. So it is unclear to me to
what extent Wittgenstein was aware of its comic aspects - Wittgenstein is
not generally noted for his sense of humour. OTOH Wittgenstein is rightly
noted for a sharpness of verbal expression that is also the source of much
'wit'. As regards *Investigations* being regarded as "funny",
Wittgenstein may be like the Popper of the 1930s who was once taken
unawares by an audience response of clapping and cheering when Popper said
"I believe in science but not in induction", which was taken as a mere joke
by an audience trained in the dogma that science is based on 'induction'.
It is clear from his writings that Wittgenstein thought that, only if they
were very radically retrained, would a general audience properly understand
his work - I suspect Wittgenstein would not warm to any response to
*Investigations* as "very funny" but would sense some radical retraining
was required.
Dnl
On Tuesday, 28 April 2015, 23:59, Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
It may be that I am paranoid, but I am beginning to doubt that you are the
same Robert Paul with whom I was having discussions for almost 20 years now.
On Wed, Apr 29, 2015 at 12:47 AM, Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
These are found at least in the work published as Conjectures.
(Posthumously published, but then so is the PI.) Were you a Hume scholar,
or I misrembered that too ?
O.K.
On Wed, Apr 29, 2015 at 12:41 AM, Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Well then I must be senile. I thought that you were a W. scholar. If you
are not, that would explain how you didn't know that there are statements
refering to philosophy as a language game.
On Wed, Apr 29, 2015 at 12:33 AM, Robert Paul <rpaul@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
Omar wrote
Now, I must say that I find it odd that a Wittgenstein scholar would not
know where he died, especially since it was the place where he spent much
of his career. But no matter.
I reply
If I'm supposed to be the 'Wittgenstein scholar,' who did not know where
[Wittgenstein] died, I think you've got the wrong scholar, for I'm not a
'Wittgenstein scholar,' whatever that might mean—or imply. It's clear that
I got the date of his death wrong.
I'm sure I read the *Investigations* quite a bit before anyone else on
this list. In 1953, Anscombe's English translation of it was published; I
learned of it from Freddie Hagen, of happy memory, who had learned of it
from Oets Bouwsma, who has also passed on. Sometimes Freddie would pick up
the book, and read a passage from it aloud. We thought it was a very funny
book.
Robert Paul
Mutton College
Sheepskin NE
