This paper investigates the role of visual experience in Wittgenstein's work. The specific thesis is that visual experience provides not only diverse illustrative examples of what could be an explanation of meaning, but that it also provides a recurrent metaphor for the whole process of meaning and understanding. Wittgenstein uses a great number of visual examples in his texts. Their diversity may be accounted for by the great diversity of ways in which he attempts to describe the relationship between a (...) word and its meaning. The resultant variety of visual examples may be summarised by what I call the Visual Discontinuity Thesis. However, beneath this diversity there lies a thread of continuity. This is provided by the persistent use of visual experience in the description of the word-meaning relation. This use underlies the projection relationship of the Tractatus and the "seeing-as" relationship of the Investigations. This recurrent visual metaphor may be summarised by what I call the Visual Continuity Thesis. This paper presents the latter thesis in the context of a description of the former. (shrink)

This monograph is a detailed comparison of the two published forms of Wittgenstein’s "Notes on Logic": the so-called Russell and Costello Versions. It also includes complete transcriptions of the two related typescripts and one manuscript in the collection of The Bertrand Russell Archives at McMaster University, and a transcription of a photocopy of a related typescript in the collection of The Wittgenstein Archives at the University of Bergen, hitherto unpublished in their original form. From these comparisons, the majority of McGuinness’ (...) description of the sequence of the production of the typescripts is confirmed. However, additional source material in the sequence is inferred. On the basis of the proposed identification of the Bergen typescript as the copy made by D. Schwayder, it is concluded that McGuinness was mistaken in asserting that the Costello Version was a rearrangement from this copy. Finally, it is proposed that the von Wright catalogue of Wittgenstein’s Nachlaß is misleading inasmuch as it gives a single reference to a pair of scripts generated at different times. In response, three Nachlaß items are differentiated within the classification for the Russell Version (catalogue item 201a). In support of the argument the monograph is supplemented by a phrase by phrase comparison of the Russell and Costello Versions, a list of phrases which are not common to both, and a detailed comparison of the various published issues including comments on the diagrams. (shrink)