[Wittrs] Re: My Chinese Encyclopedia: The Red Chicken Footnote
- From: "College Dropout John O'Connor" <sixminuteabs@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 10 Jun 2010 14:36:55 -0400
I wrote:
> You can look into W's argument for there being nothing outside of logic, for
> then we would have to think illogically, etc.
>
> I mean, if we aint logical, then we are all ... well, could anything even be
> said if that were the case?
You wrote:
"Ouch" "I love you" "Don't kill" "Where's Waldo?"
I write:
You could just have easily made animal sounds, but sensible or senseless, these
are logical. Unless you were making some other point... Maybe you think of
logic narrowly? The TLP has remarks dismissing the notion that sentences are
T/F. Truth tables help illustrate this.
I quoted:
> 314. Here we come up against a remarkable and characteristic phenomenon in
> philosophical investigation: the difficulty-- I might say-- is not that of
> finding the solution but rather that of recognizing as the solution something
> that looks as if it were only preliminary to it. "We have already said
> everything.-- Not anything that follows from this, no, this itself is the
> solution!"
> This is connected, I believe, with our wrongly expecting an explanation,
> whereas the solution of the difficulty is a description, if we give it the
> right place in our considerations. If we dwell upon it, and do not try to
> get beyond it.
> The difficulty here is: to stop.
>
> -LW, Zettel
You wrote:
Yes, in some contexts that is the way we use language.
I write:
What makes you think we are speaking of language use? Surely the generality
can be applied to any search. Again, what does an ellipse add that is not
already present? A marker? An instruction?
I wrote:
> What is the difference between [1 2 3] and [1 2 3 ...]?
You wrote:
Depends. One could say it's the way the notation of inscription is to be read.
The first allows for the idea that three numbers are the whole story, the
second, with its dots of continuation (a notational convention), that they
aren't. The first could be a way of presenting a descriptor that reflects the
combination of the three digits. The second, suggests not a descriptor but
merely the commencement of a counting series, etc.
I write:
Saying it is notation is hardly any more than saying it is three period is a
row. And that, of course, leaves us with the notion that an ellipse says
nothing. You say it depends.
As for the whole story description, consider that we have a base 10 number
system, but ten numbers is not the whole story. Thus, from whence does your
description come from?
I wrote:
> And of the "Wittgenstein paradox" of the PI?
You wrote:
Can you be more specific?
I write:
That any numerical sequence has a variety of patterns that it could be
following, of which it can never be set in stone which one IT follows, because
only we recognize it. So many teachers say, "No, you must count this way" and
never ask the student what pattern she is counting along. Here I am inclined
to quote Wittgenstein on what he finds in every cultures' chapter titled
WISDOM...
I wrote:
> And that you insist that "a+b=c" is true and not false (and do not care to
> recognize it as nonsense to even say of it)?
> --
> He lived a wonderful life.
> ==========================================
You wrote:
Are you referring to my response here? I did not "insist" that "a+b=c" is "true
and not false" but only that there could be contexts in which it would make
sense to say that, e.g., in cases where we already know what the variables
stand for or where we are speaking of a formula which is true, say, by
stipulation, i.e., if one learned a certain set of such statements as part of
learning some larger operation and then understood that the "a+b=c" formulation
must always be constructed so as to be true for the formula to work. And so
forth.
I write:
Well, is it true that it is true that a+b=c? Or is it false that it is true
that a+b=c? "Socrates is Identical"??? Ah, the confusion of philosophers!
You wrote:
I am not wedded to the idea of "nonsense" nor would I characterize it in any
definitive way. What we mean by "nonsense" may vary in lots of ways. I can
think of five right off the bat:
1) non-sense as in lacking a referent or meaning while appearing to have one
2) being a claim that is obviously false or mistaken (factually or logically)
and yet held to be the case as though it weren't
3) being an instance of doggerel in the service of an artistic effort
4) being a mistaken combination of terms because of a confusion in the
grammatical rules of use
5) being expressed in a context for which the expression is obviously unsuited
I write:
You say you would not characterize nonsense in any definite way, and then you
characterize in 5 definitions. All of which say the same thing: nonsense
breaks rules, or nonsense is obvious.
What are we even speaking about?
It seems that your first definition would define a+b=c as nonsense (and, thus,
not T/F).
--
He lived a wonderful life.
==========================================
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