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Worldviews and World-Pictures. Avoiding the Myth of the Semantic Given

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Abstract

In this paper I focus on the notion of worldview as a conceptual scheme and the role of language in shaping our view of reality. In particular, I engage with Wittgenstein’s notion of World-picture in order to suggest an alternative account to the deceptive dogmatic conception of worldview, which is exemplified by C.I. Lewis’s account of cognitive experience. I argue that worldviews constitute the way in which the world is given in a particular socio-linguistic context and they presuppose the mastery of a World-picture, that is, the inherited background of our acting and thinking. First, I will distinguish between two different uses of the term “worldview”. Then I will show the way in which a metaphysical-dogmatic conception of worldview leads to the Myth of the Semantic Given. Finally, I will present Wittgenstein’s notion of World-picture and its connection to the notion of worldview.

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Notes

  1. The statement is general because this connection can take different forms. We can argue that nature causally grounds language, or that it determines the features of our concepts, or that it merely has to be taken into account methodologically in the study of language. In Wittgenstein’s case, nature does not ground language. Rather, some natural facts should be taken into account if we want to better understand our language use without being grounding facts.

  2. According to the denotative theory of meaning, «meaning is correlated with the word. It is the object for which the word stands» (PI, §1). In very general terms, according to the psychologistic theory of meaning, meaning is somehow identified with the mental state or process of the subject who understands the word. For example, a mental representation associated to the word, an act of understanding, an inner disposition, and so on. Wittgenstein does not want to deny the existence of mental state and processes; he simply thinks that such entities do not determine the meaning of words. In this sense, his anti-psychologism is merely semantic.

  3. A similar point is made by Brusotti (2006). He states that the term “Weltbild”, at least as far as Wittgenstein is concerned, refers to a system whose mastery is presupposed by the different worldviews people can have. In his account, the term “Worldview” stands for a set of theories and opinions about the world. This characterisation of worldviews constitutes what we will call the ideological use of the term. See next paragraph for the distinction between the two uses of the term.

  4. Betz (1980), Meier (1967), Honecker (1938). All found in Naugle (2002).

  5. Of course, we could object to Freud that he is actually endorsing a particular worldview: the scientistic one. However, our point here is just to give an example of the idealogical sense of the term and Freud in this passage refers to worldviews—although critically—in this way.

  6. Hereafter “Tractatus”.

  7. See the section “Abbreviations of Wittgenstein’s works”.

  8. To be more precise, Davidson considers and discusses at least two notions of conceptual scheme: 1. Conceptual schemes as partial linguistic incommensurability, 2. Conceptual schemes as complete linguistic incommensurability. The latter, according to two different metaphors, that of organizing and that of fitting the world. I thank one of the anonymous reviewers of this paper for this useful insight.

  9. Relativism could be defined as the idea that truth is relative to the choice of a set of criteria of justification. Saying that a sentence is true means saying that the sentence conforms to a set of truth criteria set by a particular system, or scheme (Marconi 1999).

  10. I do not want to argue that Davidson thinks that conceptual schemes are worldviews. My point is not exegetical. I just wanted to show that the notion of conceptual scheme discussed by Davidson could take the form of the methodological notion of worldview described in the paper. That is, my point is that Davidson’s critique could apply to such a notion as well.

  11. Hereafter “Investigations”.

  12. See also Boncompagni (2016, p. 237) on this point.

  13. Andronico (1998) constitutes a reference point for the discussion. See also Schulte (2007), Brusotti (2006), McGuinness (2008). Wittgenstein is interested in the works of Goethe and Spengler because they both legitimize and make use of the morphological method: while Goethe applies it to the study of nature, Spengler applies it to the study of history. In particular, he treats cultures as organisms.

  14. For example, Spengler admits the possibility of different mathematical systems. «There is not, and cannot be, number as such. There are several number worlds as there are several Cultures. We find an Indian, an Arabian, a Classical, a Western type of mathematical thought and, corresponding with each, a type of number — each type fundamentally peculiar and unique, an expression of a specific world feeling, a symbol having a specific validity which is even capable of scientific definition, a principle of ordering the Become which reflects the central essence of one and only one soul, viz., the soul of that particular Culture» (Spengler 1926, I, p. 59).

  15. A perspicuous representation is a representation that shows the grammar of the linguistic expression under scrutiny in a clear way. «A main source of our failure to understand is that we do not command a clear view of the use of our words. – Our grammar is lacking in this sort of perspicuity. A perspicuous representation produces just that understanding which consists in 'seeing connexions'» (PI, §122).

  16. This is what Andronico (2010) calls “the aesthetic commitment of conceptual enquiry”.

  17. Hereafter “MWO”.

  18. Hereafter “AKV”.

  19. Therefore, the given is also necessary for the very distinction between fact and fiction (Sachs 2014, 24).

  20. See for example Zarębski (2017), Misak (2014), Dayton (1995), Hookway (2008).

  21. A similar point is made by O’Shea (2002) in terms of “the Myth of the Categorial Given”.

  22. See Kolenda (1964) and Beal (2017) for this kind of enquiry.

  23. The distinction is functional, rather than formal. See Glock (1996) and Andronico (2007).

  24. For recent debates on hinge epistemology see Coliva (2016).

  25. «All testing, all confirmation and disconfirmation of a hypothesis takes place already within a system» (OC, §105).

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  1. University of Turin, Turin, Italy

    Alice Morelli

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Morelli, A. Worldviews and World-Pictures. Avoiding the Myth of the Semantic Given. Topoi 41, 449–460 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11245-021-09781-y

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