[Wittrs] Re: My Chinese Encyclopedia: The Red Chicken Footnote
- From: "College Dropout John O'Connor" <sixminuteabs@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 22 Jun 2010 15:39:23 -0400
> I write:
> All you ever do is hide behind false presentations with me.
You wrote:
I'm sorry you feel that way. I have tried to give an honest response, to the
best of my understanding, to all your comments in your various posts. The above
is no exception.
I write:
I apologize if I was an asshole in my last post. I was hoping to make a point
with it. And yes, I know our conversation has been honest and good natured,
and have enjoyed our talks. Sorry for the delay.
You wrote:
I think Wittgenstein's point in his later phase (which is the one that mainly
interests me) is that our word usage is context dependent, i.e., there is no
overarching meaning or use for a term, only how we deploy it in this or that
instance, how it fits within some particular "language game". So yes, it's a
matter of a given word or word usage being relative to this or that context,
this or that intention of the speaker, this or that understanding of the facts
in play.
I write:
But what you just described is not a point, but a description of what he says.
The point, if I can be so arrogant, is as you put it, but with a direction (so
to speak). In the PI, he begins with "primitive" word uses and then steadily
moves up (and he never finished the PI, should facts have to enter this
dialog). It could be argued that such a work could never be finished, but then
I would be assuming the goal of such an endeavor. Is my assumption unjustified?
You wrote:
I disagree strongly. However, as Wittgenstein himself famously noted, the
meaning of a word, in a large number of cases (I would say most), is to be
equated with how the word is used.
I write:
Okay, relate what you just said with the paragraph you wrote before. 'Language
games' and 'meaning is use'. If we were to invent new 'language games', we may
not even require new words..
4.027 It belongs to the essence of a proposition that it should be able to
communicate a new sense to us.
I mean, the issue of whether Wittgenstein was an atheist and also how important
his philosophy is to religious discourse are some of the other applications of
W's work besides whatever else we are speaking about. Surely this appeals to
multiplicity of uses/meanings/senses.
I wrote:
> We were originally speaking of the uselessness of the word >"mind" in
> scientific discourse. Your response seems to be that >it is not useless;
You wrote:
Yes. I think it is perfectly useful, particularly when we are keen to
distinguish the mass of tissue we call the brain from the array of subjective
experiences we think of as being conscious, i.e., having a mind.
I write:
But does not your point here imply that metaphysics is related to physics?
You wrote:
Do you think that Wittgenstein would not have thought the meaning depends on
the context, the language game in which the word whose meaning we are
interested in is deployed?
I write:
I do, but that does not mean I think there is no significant context. The
language I would spew if I were following what is customary in philosophy has
no place in my life if I am to follow Wittgenstein's lead (Whereof one cannot
speak, thereof one must be silent). Again, his lecture on ethics: should you
find any reviews on this lecture, they will undoubtedly come to diverse
conclusions. But is then the point of Wittgenstein that all is relative? No.
He speaks within this lecture on absolutes, but shows how any words he attempts
to describe them (etc.) fail. I only hope to make the grammar clear.
You wrote:
In his later phase Wittgenstein shifts famously from a focus on logic to a
focus on the grammar and it is certainly the case, given his discussions of
grammar as being given rules of usage deployed in different activities, that he
has something quite differnt in mind than classical formal logic which informed
his earlier work in the TLP.
I write:
Wittgenstein himself said the TLP had an ethical point. You say it has a
logical focus. The TLP is no more concerned with classical logic than the PI
is with correcting grammatical mistakes like a schoolteacher.
> > 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?
> >
>
> You wrote:
> Yes, language is just one of the things we do and I agree that we may just
> decide to stop in many other activities in which we are engaged. That is the
> value, though, of noting that this is also the way language works when making
> claims, arguing, etc. Language, after all, is just another form of human
> behavior, just another thing we humans do.
>
> I write:
> How is language only one of the things we do? Considering the context of you
> and I, language is all we have. And yet all these 'other things' you wish to
> say are important are contained; What sort of tone does my writing confer?
>
You wrote:
Language may be all we have on-line where the medium of communication is typed
in words which can only be of use in the context of a commonly grasped
language. But, of course, my reference was to the gamut of things we, as
humans, do and that is far more extensive than this kind of on-line
communication. I don't yet have a good fix on your "tone" (sometimes it seems
peevish to me, actually) but that is hardly relevant. We humans do lots of
things including play ball games, watch games ball games, attend concerts, read
books, express affection, eat, drink and generally act as if we're merry. Nor
would I propose that I have exhausted the options. I make no claim that all
these other things (a quite open ended list, actually) are contained in the
words I type onto this list though.
I write:
But have you exhausted the the fact that all that you describe is in
words/propositions/etc.? What could you see that you could not iterate in
words? Where will words fail you? (And then turn to Wittgenstein, and not
before this.)
> > 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.
>
> You wrote:
> That would be a description of this particular notation. Saying it's a
> notation is to say it has a role in our method of employing written
> communication, i.e., it signifies something (or some things) when added to a
> sentence, the proper recognition (understanding) of which will reflect seeing
> the context in which it occurs in a clear enough way.
>
[Note: above I have corrected a mistake I had previously made in writing the
text in question where I had typed "written coordination" but meant to type
"written communication" -- which now appears in replacement of the earlier
mistyped text!]
> I write:
> All I see is a bunch of abstract language in that last paragraph. Which, as
> I have attested to, says nothing. I don;t think I can stand to hear much
> more of it. "proper" and "particular" and "some thing" ...
>
You wrote:
Whatever. I certainly have no illusions that I can forcefeed what I think I
understand into some other, either on this list or anywhere else. You either
see my point or don't. If you don't, you can ask for clarifications of course
and I would try to oblige, but if your response is simply to announce that all
you "see is a bunch of abstract language", implying, thereby, that it is empty
for you, then that's it then, isn't it? No sense my trying to be clearer or to
elaborate. However, sometimes what looks "abstract" to us does so because we
simply don't grasp what has been said.
I write:
And I thought this was the part where I was least peevish! But can you not see
the similarity between me saying "a+b=c is true" and agreeing with your
definitions or "descriptions"? Going with (the 'latter') Wittgenstein,
abstract language does not define the use/meaning of words. (and here I stop)
I wrote:
> (See, I can use the ellipse as signifying exasperation. But was that not
> present even without the ellipse?)
You wrote:
The ellipse also signifies that you have more to say or might have more to say
but you choose not to, which is the message of your self-avowed "exasperation".
But what is the point of telling us this? Of course the ellipse serves a
purpose and, like many of our notations, multiple purposes depending, again, on
context. It seems to me that you want in Wittgenstein a set of hard and fast
rules, a way of explaining things or some such. I don't think that was
Wittgenstein's aim or point at all. Not to give us a fixed set of rules but,
rather, to show us a method for examining statements we make, especially in the
context of pursuing philosophical questions, that will enable us to see how our
statements, and often the questions which prompt them, are misguided and
thereby prone to lead us astray, to prompt us to think there must be fixed
theoretical answers to such questions when, in fact, the answer lies often
enough in blowing up the question.
I write:
But if my exasperation was present with a single period then why would I choose
to use three periods? And if you don't think Wittgenstein is about following
rules, then you may have skipped part II of the PI. I wouldn't be so vain as
to say I can express those rules, or that if you followed the rule then you
would do as I (or even Wittgenstein). Here we might be at the limits of
language. I was looking for a quote, I think in C&V, where W expresses that it
isn't always bad to follow a tyrant. ;)
> I wrote:
> > 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?
> >
>
> You wrote:
> An understanding that something has been left out when an ellipse is employed
> in this way. And that is to recognize its notational role.
>
> I write:
> Nothing is left out! Read the quote from Zettel again. This is the
> confusion of philosophers; all this superfluous nonsense adds nothing.
>
You wrote:
I'm glad you take Wittgenstein to heart so much. Look, what is left out are the
further numbers you could list but don't, using the three dots instead to
indicate you could go on and on and on, i.e., that the sequence you are
referencing is open ended!
I write:
Do you suggest that I need write out "all" numbers (assuming such a thing even
exists) for there to be something not left out? What is not open ended (other
than Popper's Open Society)?
You wrote:
What is left out? In your sequence the numbers that come after. Could they ever
be definitively and completely listed? No, because that is not in keeping with
the game in which these numbers are deployed in this way.
So your ellipse certainly has a meaning, even if it doesn't convert to a single
word (though it might, i.e., maybe we'd want to say it signifies infinity or
endlessness). At bottom it tells us how to take the statement that has been
made, i.e., that it is incomplete, that the statement denotes an endless
sequence that could be continued but which you, the writer, do not continue
and, presumably, do not need to continue in order to make your point that the
number sequence is not complete but is open-ended (could never be completed),
etc.
I write:
That is the best explanation of the TLP I have ever read!
I will have to return later, as I am off to work right now.
Good tidings,
John O
--
He lived a wonderful life.
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