[lit-ideas] Re: Philosophical Investigations online - amplification re PI
- From: Donal McEvoy <donalmcevoyuk@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 11 Apr 2012 16:07:07 +0100 (BST)
From: Adriano Palma Palma@xxxxxxxxxx
>can we cut to the chase?
would 'donal' provide a text where in philosophical investigations the funny
man from Vienna states there is a say/show difference or what?>
But, equally, where does W say there is no say/show "difference" or distinction
in PI (or his later philosophy generally)?
Absent explicit statements either way, the burden of proof cannot be used here
to say 'unless he said it then it's not the case': when he has not 'said'
anything explicit either way, then both ways are equally supported by the mere
fact that he has not said anything explicit on the point, and that means
that the fact he has said nothing explicit on the point in itself supports
neither of them as against the other.
What this leaves us with, then, is what are the arguments pro and con on the
point (absent explicit statement by W either way)?
My previous post addressed this at some length and argued, inter alia, that as
the 'saying/showing' distinction was fundamental to TLP then W would have said
in PI if he had abandoned it; but if he had not abandoned it, then it is
understandable why he did not say so but took it as part of the "background" to
PI - especially, as Monk says, because in the later philosophy W follows more
closely or "literally" his view that the philosopher cannot say but only show,
and so does not 'say' he is "showing not saying" but simply shows it.
In textual support of this, I have also quoted at some length what W 'says' in
PI where he concludes that what this "shows" is that there is a way of
following a rule that is "not an interpretation" but which is "exhibited" [or
shown] in 'obeying the rule' and 'going against it' in particular cases. I
claim that this shows, though it does not say, that the 'saying/showing'
distinction is at work in PI - indeed, is clearly fundamental to understanding
what is involved in following a rule.
[Of course, a twelve part series can be made into a twenty four part series if
every episode has to be repeated, and a thirty-six part series if it has to be
repeated three times etc. ....]
Dnl
Ldn
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