[Wittrs] Re: My Chinese Encyclopedia: The Red Chicken Footnote
- From: "SWM" <SWMirsky@xxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 23 Jun 2010 00:26:36 -0000
--- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "College Dropout John O'Connor" <wittrsamr@...>
wrote:
> > 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?
>
It's dangerous to make assumptions about what others are saying, especially
when it's Wittgenstein.
> 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..
>
The use is how the word is played in the particular game, in the context that
obtains.
> 4.027 It belongs to the essence of a proposition that it should be able to
> communicate a new sense to us.
>
The later Wittgenstein would never talk of the essence of things, certainly not
of propositions. One has to be very careful reading the Tractatus and the
Investigations together. There are certainly points of confluence but there are
also many areas of divergence. Certainly the idea of essences is one.
> 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?
>
Well there is a relationship -- several, actually. "Metaphysics" is the name
given by subsequent scholars to the work that Aristotle presumably wrote after
the Physics. It also deals with claims concerning things not amenable to
empirical observation and study as suggested by that work), hence the
application to the non-empirical. But insofar as it is theoretical, it is very
like theoretical thinking in the empirical sciences. For instance, at a certain
level, it is very hard to differentiate purely metaphysical claims from the
claims of theoretical physics. Here we might want to say that theoretical
physics is not metaphysics insofar as it leads to predictions about events in
the world, the occurrence of which would serve to confirm (or in classical
Popperian terms disconfirm) those predictions. Metaphysical theory, on the
other hand, will be seen to be consistent with any kind of empirical outcome as
it must, by design, offer an explanation that is consistent with every
possibility.
> 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,
Please clarify: Are you saying you do think Wittgenstein would NOT have thought
the meaning of the terms we use in language depends on their context?
> 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).
He abandoned the idea of showing through linguistic assertions (propositional
claims) that he held in the Tractatus. By the Investigations he sought to show
particular instances of language use to throw light on various claims
concerning the words being used.
> 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.
I agree that the answer is no. But that is not the same as thinking that our
terms find their meanings in particular contexts, within the language games we
are accustomed to play with them. The issue is that once we see that terms find
their meanings in contexts, there is no issue of relativity. Within any given
language game, the meaning is the way in which we deploy the term(s) according
to the game's rules. And that is not relative even if it is open-ended (subject
to ongoing alteration).
> 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.
>
Wittgenstein wrote the Tractatus in a rigid logical form where each proposition
supports the next, etc. He also famously invented the Truth Tables, an
important logical tool, in that work. As to his claim that what he left out was
what was most important and that was ethical, well, it's hard to see what that
is from the affirmative claims alone. Presumably he meant to build a
scaffolding that would give structure to our overall picture of how the world
is, a picture which, when "rightly" grasped would lead one to certain choices
in one's behavior. I think that aspect of the Tractatus simply failed. His
later work, abandoning the method of the Tractatus, suggests to me that he saw
that, too.
<snip>
>
> > You wrote:
> > . . . 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.)
>
How is that relevant to a claim that language, like everything else we do, is
behavioral?
> > > 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.
> >
>
>
<snip>
> > 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:
> . . . 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"?
No. I don't see what you're getting at.
> 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?
Only you know the reasons you choose to express something one way rather than
another. Possibly you chose a familiar notation (the three periods) though, of
course, two periods or four periods are also used in the same way, though
perhaps without the same standardized frequency.
> 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. ;)
>
>
Wittgenstein famously focused on the way speaking a language, expressing
oneself in words, is to follow rules in the same way that playing a game is
(hence "language game"), or many other human practices are. However he did not
suggest by this that there we should expect to find, thereby, lists of fixed
and finite rules but only that to play such games we must engage in the
formulating or following of rules as part of the commonality of our public
lives, i.e., our community practices.
> > 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)?
>
Yes, all numbers absent which, insofar as you are communicating a series of
numbers that is infinite, you are saying by the "..." and so forth or and we
can then continue, etc., etc. That's the point of this particular convention in
this particular context.
> 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 would say it barely scratches the surface.
> I will have to return later, as I am off to work right now.
>
> Good tidings,
> John O
> --
> He lived a wonderful life.
> ==========================================
All right, then.
SWM
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