Wittgenstein’s forgotten lesson

Wittgenstein's philosophy is at odds with the scientism which dominates our times. Ray Monk explains why his thought is still relevant.

by Ray Monk / July 20, 1999 / Leave a comment

Ludwig Wittgenstein in 1930

Ludwig Wittgenstein is regarded by many, including myself, as the greatest philosopher of this century. His two great works, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1921) and Philosophical Investigations (published posthumously in 1953) have done much to shape subsequent developments in philosophy, especially in the analytic tradition. His charismatic personality has fascinated artists, playwrights, poets, novelists, musicians and even movie-makers, so that his fame has spread far beyond the confines of academic life.

And yet in a sense Wittgenstein’s thought has made very little impression on the intellectual life of this century. As he himself realised, his style of thinking is at odds with the style that dominates our present era. His work is opposed, as he once put it, to “the spirit which informs the vast stream of European and American civilisation in which all of us stand.” Nearly 50 years after his death, we can see, more clearly than ever, that the feeling that he was swimming against the tide was justified. If we wanted a label to describe this tide, we might call it “scientism,” the view that every intelligible question has either a scientific solution or no solution at all. It is against this view that Wittgenstein set his face.

Scientism takes many forms. In the humanities, it takes the form of pretending that philosophy, literature, history, music and art can be studied as if they were sciences, with “researchers” compelled to spell out their “methodologies”—a pretence which has led to huge quantities of bad academic writing, characterised by bogus theorising, spurious specialisation and the development of pseudo-technical vocabularies. Wittgenstein would have looked upon these developments and wept.

There are many questions to which we do not have scientific answers, not because they are deep, impenetrable mysteries, but simply because they are not scientific questions. These include questions about love, art, history, culture, music-all questions, in fact, that relate to the attempt to understand ourselves better. There is a widespread feeling today that the great scandal of our times is that we lack a scientific theory of consciousness. And so there is a great interdisciplinary effort, involving physicists, computer scientists, cognitive psychologists and philosophers, to come up with tenable scientific answers to the questions: what is consciousness? What is the self? One of the leading competitors in this crowded field is the theory…

YOU’VE HIT THE LIMIT

You have now reached your limit of 3 free articles in the last 30 days.
But don’t worry! You can get another 7 articles absolutely free, simply by entering your email address in the box below.

When you register we’ll also send you a free e-book—Writing with punch—which includes some of the finest writing from our archive of 22 years. And we’ll also send you a weekly newsletter with the best new ideas in politics and philosophy of culture, which you can of course unsubscribe from at any time

Prospect may process your personal information for our legitimate business purposes, to provide you with our newsletter, subscription offers and other relevant information.

Click to learn more about these interests and how we use your data. You will be able to object to this processing on the next page and in all our communications.

19470520255dd6c70cdca149.26315835

Go to comments

The hidden lives behind the Bauhaus movement

Keith Miller / June 9, 2019

Though often understood as a rigid cult of technocrats, the Bauhaus movement was a...

Watch: Prospect Book Club—Sameer Rahim on “Asghar and Zahra”

Prospect Team / June 25, 2019

This month your usual host turns guest to discuss the themes in his debut novel

Share with friends

Comments

lamo
October 27, 2012 at 02:56
What is being suggested here is that science and non-theoretical forms of understanding are alternatives each valid in its own domain and neither being complete. This cant be true. Many essays on this topic underestimate, how big a hold science claims on reality. In principle, all the non-theoretical behavior, in the scientific viewpoint, is reducible to simple mechanical events. Recognizing expressive playing would correspond to a loose pattern in the brains (not necessarily a symbolic representation). Sure, one can say that a pragmatic, non-theoretical understanding is the only practical understanding right now. Analyzing it in terms of brain events is too complex. Neuroscientists might not admit this complexity and say superficial things about music. However, this incompleteness in science is contingent on our present limitations, not a deep incompleteness. Potentially, a computer program might be able to play and also recognize expressive piano music as defined by any given culture. OTOH, if you wants to seriously question this radical scientific claim, then dont understate the challenge. Also, we need to work out how to reconcile this challenge with all the successful evidence that the reductionist model has in its favor.
1. Edward Mooney
  April 27, 2017 at 18:26
  "Potentially, a computer program might be able to play and also recognize expressive piano music as defined by any given culture." But would you tell your kid that she didn't really understand 'twinkle twinkle' until she understood the neurology, and that until then she was faking 'understanding' the tune? We'll say to our children -- "you don't understand what I mean" without having to have a neurological account of "understanding."
lamo
October 27, 2012 at 02:56
What is being suggested here is that science and non-theoretical forms of understanding are alternatives each valid in its own domain, neither being complete. This cant be true. Many essays on this topic underestimate, how big a hold science claims on reality. In principle, all the non-theoretical behavior, in the scientific viewpoint, is reducible to simple mechanical events. Recognizing expressive playing would correspond to a loose pattern in the brains (not necessarily a symbolic representation). Sure, one can say that a pragmatic, non-theoretical understanding is the only practical understanding right now. Analyzing it in terms of brain events is too complex. Neuroscientists might not admit this complexity and say superficial things about music. However, this incompleteness in science is contingent on our present limitations, not a deep incompleteness. Potentially, a computer program might be able to play and also recognize expressive piano music as defined by any given culture. OTOH, if you wants to seriously question this radical scientific claim, then dont understate the challenge. Also, we need to work out how to reconcile this challenge with all the successful evidence that the reductionist model has in its favor.
Al_de_Baran
January 25, 2013 at 15:08
"Many essays on this topic underestimate, how big a hold science claims on reality." No, I think that the commentators on the subject understand the power-play of Scientism perfectly well. They simply (and quite rightly) reject that overarching claim in terms that your response neither adequately addresses nor refutes. As for evidence-gathering, you need to do a little more of it yourself, especially with respect to the many powerful challenges to reductionism. I don't want to spoil the fun of the search, however, so I'll leave you to escape your echo-chamber on your own, assuming that the will exists to do so--which, frankly, I doubt.
1. Omar
  March 14, 2016 at 03:32
  Why is it that the people one agrees with always have to go out of their way to appear as obnoxious as possible?
Mike Stephenson
January 26, 2013 at 13:16
We know very little about anything outside our experience; but using the discoveries of the past, the, exciting, never ending pursuit of truth goes on. The quest requires the combined strength of science and art. There is not a beginning in the past nor an end in the future; this is all we can know and understand. Mike
Martin Keaney
January 26, 2013 at 22:25
There is a word, I suggest, to describe that aspect of non-scientific understanding that Mr Monk addresses – wisdom. As we can observe, many people, usually late in life and with the accumulated experiences of life's joys, sorrows and surprises, have developed this quality. Father Zossima may be seen as an expression of this – a knowledge of the human condition and society. Science seeks to understand the natural world, wisdom offers us an understanding of the human condition. They are complementary, I think, not competing.
Tarun
January 28, 2013 at 10:13
Can one have anything but a philosophical 'understanding' of science? Is a scientific question one that has a scientific answer? Symbolic representation in language aside, don't scientism and philosophy both attempt to reduce synopses of trivial phenomenon to generalities and to symbolise this understanding?
Fox
January 29, 2013 at 11:39
Would Wittgenstein have agreed to his thought being expressed in a simplistic 'this understanding' v. 'that understanding' binary opposition? No. 'Science' is just another language game. To complain Penrose cannot help us understand ourselves better, is to misunderstand the language game in which it's being played. And obtaining your understanding from a self-help book is no more (or less) real - it's just a different language game. Wittgenstein is important for the way he 'cleared the ground' (see Peter Winch) for social constructivist theories of meaning. Where he didn't go far enough was in exploring the relationship between meaning and power; i.e. why is 'scientism' such an influential and widely played 'language game'? I think that's why Wittgenstein lacks celebrity - he doesn't speak to the issues.
susan
January 30, 2013 at 09:04
philosophy is trivial drivel. math is clarity.
1. Emanuel Galdes
  October 23, 2014 at 22:51
  Yes Susan, math is the clarity: Of the blind. (They tend to find the monochrome very comfortable.
2. Emanuel Galdes
  October 23, 2014 at 23:04
  Or perhaps you think that an ethical dilemma (ethics is a branch of philosophy) can be resolved by a mathematical formula, or indeed even stated by one, let alone be understood?
  1. Mikeg
    November 10, 2014 at 14:49
    Solving ethical dilemmas with mathematical formulae does seem to be the ambition of utilitarians. They presume to weigh the pleasures of one against the pains of another. That is scientism. Science is not a language game. Science is primarily about observation. If you make the effort it is remarkable how much you can see if you look out of your cave. As Feynmann said 'Scientists need philosophers the way birds need ornithologists". Actually do it or shut up about it. And of course mathematics is not science, it is a language.
3. River
  April 27, 2017 at 01:04
  Mm, yes. Being, thinking, experiencing, language, law, politics, ethics; all clearly trivial. Totting up digits is always more significant. *eyeroll*
4. Bill
  April 27, 2017 at 01:14
  Math is a language.
SteveDGH
February 12, 2013 at 11:35
"Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent." Ludwig Wittgenstein. If only he he had taken his own advice more to heart.
Ben Cobley
February 12, 2013 at 13:12
A lovely article. I do find it remarkable the similarities between Wittgenstein and Heidegger on the core points here, even though the two of them are meant to come from resolutely hostile opposing traditions. The conception of 'understanding' sketched out by Ray Monk here is almost a carbon copy of Heidegger's use of the word, not as a theoretical understanding but as an ability to fit it to the world around us.
1. Krishna Sundaram
  October 21, 2014 at 19:30
  Isn't Ray Monk's conception also a mirror of Max Weber's "verstehen" which involves an interpretive form of examination of a culture or a social phenomenon in order to understand it better and make sense out of it ? Just curious to know what you think. And I'm quite intrigued by the concluding sentence in the article about the humanities being institutionally obliged to pretend to be sciences. I am myself a student of geography which I studied in college in the 1970s - it was a time when some geographers were trying to apply concepts directly borrowed from the natural sciences to in an attempt to explain human activity over geographical space whether they fitted it or not. Like using D'Arcy Thomson's studies / models of the growth of the carapace of crabs to urban growth or using Snell's Law on refraction of light in a laughable attempt to explain changes of direction of transport routes (see Haggett and Chorley's "Models in Geography" 1968 for more examples). The short point is that I felt that these represented fairly hilarious attempts to confer a kind of scientific legitimacy and rigor on a subject (geography) which dealt primary with expressions of human activity over space and which simply did not lend itself to such manipulations. I still don't know whether I was right or wrong - I would love to hear what you have to say on this. Thanks in advance!
peter
February 25, 2013 at 00:23
'In the Tractatus, this clarity is achieved through a correct understanding of the logical form of language....' Oh, really? But the present author has no time or inclination to explain this to us? About all I know about this Ludwig (nothing like the creator of the late quartets!) is that he completely misunderstood what Godel had done in his work on incompeteness, stated it utterly incorrectly, and just about everybody except third-rate philosophy Ph. D. students and maybe their supervisors have ignored him since about 1935 (especially Bertrand Russell, who had been taken in rather badly more than 20 years earlier). 'In his later work, Wittgenstein abandoned the idea of logical form...' That was certainly a way of avoiding embarrassing questions about his ridiculous views concerning mathematics and science, such as the example above, very easily found in lots of places, such as the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, even articles written there by sympathizers (again, as described rather nastily by me above) Wittgenstein looks half-sensible compared to the postmodernists, but maybe that's the only thing keeping him from being laughed off the stage, except by scientists and mathematicians mostly. ' “Yes,” said Wittgenstein, “there really have been people like that, who could see directly into the souls of other people and advise them.”...' Yes, say I, but can you give me even a single convincing example, not made up by a novelist?
1. P.J. Andros
  November 3, 2014 at 16:11
  No idea why my reply to @Peter was censored, deleted. None at all. To answer his concluding question one answer is Mr. Edgar Cayce., an American doctor who lived many years in Virginia Beach and reached great fame who looked "directly into the souls of people and advised them." Quite successfully, infact.
Ramesh Raghuvanshi
March 17, 2013 at 11:46
Wittgenstein rightly wrote "Where does one find such a acute sensitive ?In one of great artists because they express their idea with deep deep unconscious mind.When we are in completely absorbed with any subject our unconscious mind upraise and we find out unique solution.Great artists expressed his idea through unconscious mind with acute sensitive way he find out truth.
joe neisser
April 2, 2013 at 08:25
Well said. The new-found historical sensibility in the analytic tradition is a good thing. But giving Wittgenstein (or Heidegger for that matter) credit for the distinction between explanation and understanding is like giving George Washington credit for "Liberty equality fraternity" ...
peter
April 2, 2013 at 18:39
So none of the Wittgen-groupies here know of any such example as I asked for above? Instead I'll ask for a single example of even one person who has made a real contribution to human knowledge in logic/math/science since Wittgenstein's death and who would give any credit at all to Wittgenstein himself having made any useful contribution of any kind to human knowledge. Not commentators, bullshit or otherwise, but actually contributors is what I'd like to know an example of, who credit Wittgenstein with anything beyond entertainment of the intellectually slothful.
1. P.J. Andros
  November 4, 2014 at 16:11
  Well, I'm far from being a groupie of any kind at my age, but you're quite incorrect to state that no one has supplied the example which you seek in your recent comments here. I have answered your bleating for a non-fictional character "who could see directly into the souls of other people and advise them." Edgar Cayce. Cayce was an American clairvoyant/medical doctor/advisor who resided in Virginia Beach. He left behind a great deal of documentation related to his advisements and his voluminous papers are now administered by a trust. He most certainly, based on empirical evidence, see into the soul of others. Other than taking a philosophical turn on this thread, I seriously wonder whether you know what the hell you're talking about.
2. David Mathers
  January 3, 2016 at 17:15
  I am not a fan of how Wittgensteinians talk and have read very little Wittgenstein, but I believe the well-known psychologist Eleanor Rosch is supposed to have credited Wittgenstein's writings on 'family resemblance' concepts, as part of the inspiration of her own work on 'prototype' theories of concepts which claim that, roughly speaking, we classify things as falling or not falling under a concept not by seeing whether or not it meets some necessary and sufficient condition for doing so, but rather by judging to what degree it resembles the 'typical' exemplar of such a concept. This work is very well regarded in psychology I think, because some predictions made using the theory have been borne out in subsequent experimental work (or so people were saying 16, 17 years ago; things move fast in a young science of course).
Blaggs
May 31, 2013 at 01:31
It’s only been in the last two or so decades that it’s been realised just what a sound grasp of the foundation of maths Wittgenstein had. Prior to that, in respect of Godel, because Wittgenstein did make a mistake in his reading of GIT, most commentators dismissed him as being “utterly incorrect”. It has now been shown that this amounted to throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Wittgenstein’s grasp of the philosophical foundation of maths, including the relevance of Godel, is thorough and sound. In particular he realised that in maths as well as in everyday language, it is too, too easy to construct seemingly well-formed propositions that seem to say something, but actually say nothing; they are nonsense. We can take a perfectly coherent English sentence; “there are four numbers, let’s label them x, y, z, n, such that x to the power of n, plus y to the power of n equals z to the power of n”. This is a meaningful, perfectly correct English sentence. It also happens to be true, though it would still be meaningful even if it were false. It’s easy to “translate” this into a mathematical formalism, but if we claim that it thus becomes a mathematical proposition, worse that it is true in a mathematical sense, then we have been seduced by language. (cf Wittgenstein, Philosophical Remarks §150) This is one of the many problems with Godel’s IT that Wittgenstein recognised. Victor Rodych has written some fine essays on his approach to Godel and to maths in general. Recommended. Math indeed has clarity, but only providing one has a firm grasp of its philosophical foundations. Without this, one runs a serious risk of creating (seemingly mathematical) nonsense; Godel being a good case in point.
Christopher
September 15, 2013 at 11:14
I think Ian Dury captured the sentiments in this string well with his song 'there ain't 'alf been some clever bastards'. Sorry, I'll get back to my Mailonline lol
B
September 16, 2013 at 22:47
I'd like to offer a triviality of my own. There is a lot of philosophy that is not 'non-theoretical', in Wittgenstein's sense.
Ray Kohn
November 23, 2013 at 07:30
As a practising musician I have always found Wittgenstein a more stimulating thinker than many of the late 20th century 'celebrities'. Language as a "game" should invoke in us the question of the game's function (and not assume, lazily, that it can all be explained under the term "communication"). Perhaps Wittgenstein did not explore this as critically as he might have.. but then the work he did provides many of the analytical tools for us to use. The 'scientism' described in this article then takes an appropriate place within a far wider panorama of understanding.
1. Paul G
  July 2, 2015 at 22:24
  Ray, You make a very thoughtful comment on Ludwig Wittgenstein I am curious what your source of information about Wittgenstein Some sources state, notably Wesley Cecil Ph.D., that Ludwig Wittgenstein as not musically inclined
Mathieu Marion
November 25, 2013 at 11:00
Dear "Peter", I'll skip your insult, given that my last three papers on Wittgenstein's philosophy of mathematics have been co-authored with a mathematician. I'll just provide here the one example as you requested: R. L. Goodstein, ‘Function Theory in an Axiom-Free Equation Calculus’, Proceedings of the London Mathematical Society, vol. 48, 1945, 401-434, in a footnote on p. 407, attributes to Wittgenstein the idea of replacing mathematical induction by a rule of uniqueness of a function defined by primitive recursion. Goodstein proved later on that such a rule implies mathematical induction for primitive recursive arithmetic (in Recursive Arithmetic, 1957, Theorem 2.8 & 3.7-3.81), thus that one can do without mathematical induction for PRA. I could elaborate more on the sources of Goodstein's equation calculus in Wittgenstein. Granted, Goodstein did the work, and he is not exactly faithful to Wittgenstein's ideas as we have them in his manuscripts, but if this is not a contribution to foundations, I don't know what is. It is difficult to see this as a contribution if one imagines it to be limited to Fregean or set-theoretic foundations, but from the point of view of category logic, the point is a valuable one, albeit of historical value. That philosophers imagine for themselves what mathematicians think is one thing, what mathematicians actually do is another matter. Category theory and category logic is certainly something done more in mathematics and departments than, say, Neo-Fregean foundations with a second-order principle of mathematical induction. As one of my teachers, incidentally a mathematician, used to say: Frege was relevant to mathematics in 1879, not 1979. (If anything, mathematicians do not care about foundations, but this is no grist to the mill of philosophers focussed on foundations.) This being said, I grant to you that Wittgenstein does not add much to foundations, that he might have misunderstood some bits (that can be discussed), and that there are inflated claims made on his behalf, but none of this justifies the bad reputation he has. It was never his intention to contribute to foundations per se, he never tried (so it is wrong to blame him for having made no contribution), but reflected on philosophical issues raised in that field, his reflections deserve at the very least a fair trial.
Dan
June 2, 2015 at 01:40
"But I may be quite incapable of describing the difference… If I were a very talented painter I might conceivably represent the genuine and simulated glance in pictures." Maybe another example Wittgenstein could have used would be that of an actor who can represent the same feigned look of love, which indeed may be impossible to describe fully in words.
Paul G
July 2, 2015 at 19:43
I was advised to read up on Ludwig Wittgenstein as described by Ray Monk as an assignment After reading this article, I still do not have a grasp on what Wittgenstein was proving So far, what I am able to impart from Ray Monk's article is that Ludwig Wittgenstein was a person that was at odds with science and 20 th century scientism. I should perhaps say that I would like to review this article closely and then post a thoughtful comment as part of the assignment as I perceive it
1. Dave
  November 4, 2015 at 04:05
  Paul, I would suggest Wittgenstein's "On Certainty." It is a short, easy, read and as it pertains to the issue of scientism, it is probably more directly on point than either of his more famous books (which are, magnificently, almost at odds with each other... and I love them both dearly. I love that at 20 he thinks he has solved philosophy, and then at 50 he dismisses his writing is useless drivel. His preface to 'Philosophical Investigations' is pretty funny as Austrian philosophers go). I never get tired of Wittgenstein.
Paul G
July 2, 2015 at 22:14
Unknown philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein He wrote a lot. Fascinating life and fascinating man. We know very little about anything outside our experience; but using the discoveries of the past, the, exciting, never ending pursuit of truth goes on. The quest requires the combined strength of science and art. There is not a beginning in the past nor an end in the future; this is all we can know and understand. Born into a rich family He only published a very slim book He wrote a lot but published very little He was born into the Wittgenstein family Probably the largest private fortune in Europe This a time when Vienna is the capital of the Hapsburg empire His world was dying while he was growing up It was a continuous series of fundamental devastations he is born into this very wealthy business class family they were almost without any political power The Austro - Hungarian aristocracy was a huge powerful political force who would not share power
Seamus
November 4, 2015 at 13:39
I got to the second paragraph and wept. Scientism? A word coined by those who advocate narcissistic anthropocentrism and are clueless about evolution. Humanities can never be sciences. Science is built upon mathematics; humanities are built upon human language. One is capable of accuracy and precision; the other is limited to common sense, which is so utterly flawed and rendered useless by the myriad cognitive biases that afflict human perception. I despair!
stilt
January 10, 2016 at 17:05
References to 'Seamus'. You have a point that the term 'scientism' does seem pejorative that of dealing with 'dead matter' in the Seventies publication of 'The Nature of Scientific Revolutions' the idea of pure objectivity in science both between the experimenter and the matter experimented is subject to human error as anything else and after the replication of experiments, development and dissemination leading in cases to commercial application to benefit humans, other animals and hopefully the environment as well does not always occur so making science more like the humanities as they in turn use objective criteria to test their hypotheses though generally more open to error because they deal with the most intractable - humans. They come together in agreement or disagreements like the difference between the brain and the mind, or conceptions on whether free will exists or not. This leads to an even more trivial contribution to the debate that of politicians who went visiting schools apart from their obvious identification with sport are keen to be photographed in laboratories and IT suites, but generally shy away from humanities' classrooms such as history. This comes from a contributor who once innovated, chaired and evaluated an event for engineers and educators to emphasise with each others professions, potential and problems.
Omar
March 14, 2016 at 03:33
Why is it that the people one agrees with are invariably the ones going out of their way to be as obnoxious as possible?
Alyson
April 18, 2016 at 17:51
What a brilliant article. It was articles like this and one on the writing of gaming software and the Indian mind, that drew me to Prospect in the first place. Wittgenstein, I think would have welcomed Penrose's concept of micro-tubules and the quantum interplay of light passing between neurones in the brain. My reductive understanding of Wittgenstein's theory of language was that he saw language as a constellation, rather than a linear pathway from one point to a destination. I sensed from his arguments that we can embrace meaning from the vibration of single points in a sentence construct, but that the longer sentence form also allows us to enter into the body posture of the writer and so experience meaning metaphorically as well as logically. The context of his social environment and the stripping away go cultural certainties at that time anticipated later post-modern challenges to the declared objectivity which science claimed was unassailable at that time.
1. john camfield
  May 31, 2016 at 15:10
  Alyson: Your paragraph is superb. So clear and meaningful to me since it sums up the very essence of Wittgenstein's thought.
john camfield
May 31, 2016 at 14:30
Ray Monk's article is, to me, a strikingly clear exposition of Wittgenstein's importance. Science has its limits and if we don't see it then we're in trouble. I have got most out of the philosophy that leads from Kierkegaard through Dostoevsky and Wittgenstein to our contemporary Meillassoux who has finally come out and said it: reason is a contingent phenomenon and we are in a world where the everything can go into hyper-chaos tomorrow. Except for mathematics which ye shall always have with you! The fact is that unreason is far more powerful than reason & we tell ourselves optimistic stories day after day like children in the dark to re-assure ourselves that good triumphs over evil when it doesn't - except in that world constructed by those who are truly religious which may or may not be true.
TK
April 27, 2017 at 10:13
There is a human perceptual basis that is a natural inclination for the formal sciences at the heart of everything. Of everything. Understanding that is understanding everything. I could tell you about it, but you probably wouldn't understand or believe me. Humans are a biological logical rationalisation machine. We have created a mental concept of the absolute that we call god, also known as infinity. This absolute is a human invention only, it exists in the conception of self, and the conception of other. Because the other and self are opposites, this two-timing absolute can never be rationalised, hence all the irrationality of the ego, which are broad attempts to rationalise this irrationality by producing mental concepts and attempting to reflect a scenario in the physical world that will create a temporary truth that allows us to believe that the absolute belongs within the conception of self and not other. This has lead to all humanity, religion, art, war, it has lead to EVERYTHING that is not a psychopathic, animal like existence. To be incomplete is to have the neurosis of consciousness. This irrationality and the inability to rationalise it creates thought loops which create consciousness. This is my theory if you want to know more about it, please contact me :)
L. Wittgenstein
April 29, 2017 at 22:44
Me thinks poor ol' Ray's got me wrong.
Paul H
May 4, 2017 at 09:31
(I realise I come as a late commentator here). There seems to be quite a bit of debate on how far Wittgenstein's reputation hangs on whether he misunderstands Gödel. I think this depends on how we read the paragraphs in question (which can readily be googled). As I understand, Gödel is making some claims about mathematical truths: what is true and provable and what they mean in that context. If we read what Wittgenstein said as a statement about mathematics then he does appear to have got it wrong: truth is, simply stated, a universal property of something, whereas a proof is a particular and limited demonstration. However, Wittgenstein in the so-called "infamous paragraphs" does not seem to be talking about mathematics, but showing that we use these words 'true/ truth" and "prove/ proof" in different ways in varying contexts. Hence he can be seen as saying that far from Gödel having provided an answer to understanding these concepts he did something far less interesting. So, was Wittgenstein misunderstanding Gödel and talking about mathematics in a somewhat confused way (he refers as his example to Russell's system and what in means to win or lose in chess and other games) or talking about our much wider usage of language? The latter seems to make more sense on any reading not intent on misinterpreting Wittgenstein. Yes, the passage does not say what Gödel thought (hence can be read if seen only as read through Gödel's lens/ a mathematics paradigm) as a gross misinterpretation, but Wittgenstein certainly seems to be far more there. I believe there is also good evidence that he understand Gödel from other sources where Wittgenstein talks about this and other stuff. Huge numbers of people still see Wittgenstein as one of the most important C20th thinkers and philosophers, so ideas that he is not influential are wrong. Sure he doesn't contribute to maths and science but his main work was in the philosophy of language - which is a different field. There he is seen as foundational for many later figures and partly for the whole way we have come to understand language and its employment today. I am certainly not a Wittgensteinian, but cannot avoid bumping into his work and influence along the way.