Online research in philosophy

Wittgenstein's treatment of private language is the dissolution of some of the major problems in traditional philosophy. Philosophical problems, for Wittgenstein, are the conceptual confusion arising due to the abuse of language. They can be fully dispensed with by commanding a clear view of language. Language, for Wittgenstein, is on the one hand, the source of philosophical problems while, on the other hand, it is a means to dispense with them. Private language is one such issue which is ultimately rooted I a mistaken conception of language and is the sources of various philosophical problems/ puzzles.

Four years after the publication of Wittgenstein's Investigations, Rush Rhees began writing critical reflections on the masterpiece he had helped to edit. In this edited collection of his previously unpublished writings, Rhees argues, contra Wittgenstein, that although language lacks the unity of a calculus it is not simply a family of language games. The unity of language is found in its dialogical character. It is in this context that we say something, and grow in understanding: notions not captured in Wittgenstein's emphasis on language games, following rules, and using language. Rhees develops Wittgenstein's notion that to imagine a language is to image a form of life, without suggesting that we are all engaged in an all-inclusive conversation. The result is not only a major contribution to Wittgenstein scholarship, but an original discussion of central philosophical questions concerning the possibility of discourse.

Wittgenstein claims that the concept of a synoptic representation (übersichtliche Darstellung) is of fundamental significance for him (PI 122). In the first two sections of this chapter it is argued that what he had in mind as synoptic representations are simplified language-games, like the one of the builders in PI 2. Section 3 turns to the Private Language Discussion: the lack of a synoptic view of Wittgenstein’s strategy in these passages makes them notoriously difficult to understand. Section 4 attempts to provide such a synoptic view by clarifying the target of Wittgenstein’s attack, and its corollaries, and by characterizing the kinds of moves he makes against it. The famous private diary language-game (PI 258ff.) is interpreted as an instance of a synoptic representation (of the kind mentioned in PI 122). Finally, some reasons are suggested why in the Philosophical Investigations Wittgenstein did not present his views in a more perspicuous manner.

Wittgenstein claims that the concept of a synoptic representation (übersichtliche Darstellung) is of fundamental significance for him (PI 122). In the first two sections of this chapter it is argued that what he had in mind as synoptic representations are simplified language-games, like the one of the builders in PI 2. Section 3 turns to the Private Language Discussion: the lack of a synoptic view of Wittgenstein’s strategy in these passages makes them notoriously difficult to understand. Section 4 attempts to provide such a synoptic view by clarifying the target of Wittgenstein’s attack, and its corollaries, and by characterizing the kinds of moves he makes against it. The famous private diary language-game (PI 258ff.) is interpreted as an instance of a synoptic representation (of the kind mentioned in PI 122). Finally, some reasons are suggested why in the Philosophical Investigations Wittgenstein did not present his views in a more perspicuous manner.

Ineffability, method, and ontology, by G. Bergmann.--The glory and the misery of Ludwig Wittgenstein, by G. Bergmann.--Stenius on the Tractatus, by G. Bergmann.--Naming and saying, by W. Sellars.--The ontology of Wittgenstein's Tractatus, by E. D. Klemke.--Material properties in the Tractatus, by H. Hochberg.--Wittgenstein's pantheism: a new light on the ontology of the Tractatus, by N. Garver.--Science and metaphysics: a Wittgensteinian interpretation, by H. Petrie.--Wittgenstein on private languages, by C. L. Hardin.--Wittgenstein on private language, by N. Garver.--Wittgenstein and private languages, by W. Todd.--The private-language argument, by H.-N. Castañeda.--Wittgenstein on privacy, by J. W. Cook.--"Forms of life" in Wittgenstein's Philosophical investigations, by J. F. M. Hunter.--Privacy and language, by M. S. Gram.--On language games and forms of life, by F. Zabeeh.--Wittgenstein on meaning and use, by J. F. M. Hunter.--Wittgenstein on phenomenalism, skepticism, and criteria, by A. Oldenquist.--Tractarian reflections on saying and showing, by D. W. Stampe.--Wittgenstein and logical necessity, by B. Stroud.--Negation and generality, by H. Hochberg.--Facts, possibilities, and essences in the Tractatus, by H. Hochberg.--Arithmetic and propositional form in Wittgenstein's Tractatus, by H. Hochberg.--Selected bibliography (p. 543-546).

Wittgenstein at Work: Method in the Philosophical Investigations explores the least well-understood aspect of Wittgenstein's later work: his aims and methods. Specially-commissioned papers by twelve of the world's leading Wittgenstein scholars analyze the way he approached key topics such as rule-following and private language, and examine his remarks on clarification, nonsense and other central notions of his methodology. Many contributors touch on the therapeutic aspects Wittgenstein's approach, the focus of much current debate. Wittgenstein at Work provides both students and specialist with a much-needed methodological companion to one of the greatest philosophical works of the twentieth century.

Wittgenstein wrote: 'Working in philosophy … is really more a working on oneself. On one's own interpretation. On one's own way of seeing things.' In what sense, for Wittgenstein, is work in philosophy 'work on oneself'? This paper will be devoted to answering this question, and to delineating the moral aspects of this work.

It is a shared concern of Adorno and Wittgenstein to find a reasonable way of handling the limits of language and the philosophical urge to pass over them. Following this shared motive some peculiar affinities between Adorno and Wittgenstein can be shown. Both use rhetorical means in their philosophical language because they hold that what is said and how it is said cannot be seperated in philosophy. Furthermore, some structural resemblences of Adornos and Wittgensteins methods can be made plausible, viz. Adorno's method of constructing conceptual constellations and Wittgenstein's method of finding a "perspicuous representation". Their methods aim at a philosophical use of language which shows what cannot directly be said.

Who was Wittgenstein? -- Wittgenstein, neutral monism, and privacy -- Common sense, skepticism, and reductionism -- An ordinary language philosopher? -- Meaning and verification -- Investigating Wittgenstein's practice -- On being fair to Wittgenstein -- Wittgenstein and conceptual relativism -- Language-games -- The wages of empiricism -- Are there objective scientific truths? -- Belief, superstition, and religion -- Wittgenstein on primitive practices -- Religious belief and reductionism -- Are there religious language-games? -- A failed defense of Wittgenstein -- Preconceptions and philosophical descriptions.

Stephen Mulhall presents a detailed critical commentary on sections 243-315 of Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations: the famous remarks on 'private language'. In so doing, he makes detailed use of Stanley Cavell's interpretations of these remarks; and relates disputes about how to interpret this aspect of Wittgenstein's later philosophy to a recent, highly influential controversy about how to interpret Wittgenstein's early text, the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, by drawing and testing out a distinction between resolute and substantial understandings of the related notions of grammar, nonsense and the imagination. The book is concerned throughout to elucidate Wittgenstein's philosophical method, and to establish the importance of the form or style of his writing to the proper application of this method.