/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.14492024]

What is the point of Wittgenstein's Beetle on a Box argument?

[Anonymous No.14492032]

>>14492024
It's a metaphor for his homosexuality.

[Anonymous No.14492088]

>>14492024
There is no point in anything Wittgenstein wrote. His whole purpose in life was to take the title of God of the Pseuds away from Nietzsche. He failed because he wasn't able to get as much popular exposure as nihilistic mustache man.

[Anonymous No.14492113]

>>14492088
I agree. However, my professor loves him and I'm not sure what to write

[Anonymous No.14492150]

>>14492088
smallest brained post on /lit/

[Anonymous No.14492297]

>>14492024
that words are empty outside of their collective use. or said otherwise, that the meaning of a word is determined by how it is used among a defined group of speakers.

[Anonymous No.14492430]

>>14492297
woah....and this is meant to be insightful....

[Anonymous No.14492510]

>>14492430
think about the implications

[Anonymous No.14492526]

>>14492430
well, we usually think words have meaning in themselves, so realizing that it isnt so changes the whole way we experience them, even if the use of course remains the same.

it is as if a tribe that dances to rain discovered meteorology.

[Anonymous No.14493511]

>>14492297
does this have any relationship ideas presented in Deconstruction?

[Anonymous No.14493519]

>>14493511
Potentially

[Anonymous No.14493532]

>>14492430
>>14492510
>>14492526
I mean... yah it’s important, but I do not think it’s a new concept. I know Plato even talked about the difference between words as words and things in themselves. Though the particular insight of the sociological nature of word-meaning change may be more recent since Plato was anti-experiment. Same and explicitly so in Hobbes.

[Anonymous No.14493571]

>>14492150
I actually kind of like the Nietzsche comparison.
>life only has the meaning you create for it
>words only have the meaning we use them for in contexts

[Anonymous No.14493599]

>>14493511
Wittgenstein undermines the sign-referent paradigm on which deconstruction is founded.

[Anonymous No.14493677]

>>14493511
yes, to differance

[Anonymous No.14493685]

>>14493599
Wtf? The first step Derrida took in the deconstruction of Saussure's semiotics was exaclty this. Hence his "A signified is always-already in the position of a signifer". Read Derrida, anon.

[Anonymous No.14493698]

>>14492032
was he actually gay or is that all a meme

[Anonymous No.14493872]

>>14492088
He destroyed metaphysics and heavily influenced postmodern philosophy, linguistics and history with the linguistic turn.

He didn't fail at all.

[Anonymous No.14493895]

>>14493698
He was homosexual, yes. He liked the D.

[Anonymous No.14494801]

it's a metaphor for qualia
if your main takeaway from wittgenstein was "words are empty outside of their collective use" you have failed witty. that statement is more or less common sense, it's basically "language is a social construct" which is kinda the definition of language

[Anonymous No.14494828]

>>14492297
You've missed the point. You might use the word differently, you might not be talking about the exact same thing, but you can believe you are.

[Anonymous No.14495379]

>>14492024
lol beetle box

[Anonymous No.14495415]

>>14493895
so he understood aesthetics? sounds based to me

[Anonymous No.14495732]

>>14492024
Your beetle is green and mine is red but we both call it blue and that’ll just do

[Anonymous No.14495871]

>>14492024
Self referential thoughts are nonexistent, nothing is uncaused, substance dualism is retarded etc.

[Anonymous No.14496594]

>>14493872
>destroyed metaphysics
Then show me the body

[Anonymous No.14496984]

>>14492024
>Epistemology: Wittgenstein criticizes the idea that there is a sharp epistemological divide between knowledge of one’s own “inner” states and knowledge of other’s “inner” states. Descartes held that even if all he believed about the world external to his mind might be false, he could nevertheless not fail to know that he had certain sensations and thoughts and that he was consciousness. This implies that while I can know that I am in pain, I cannot know for certain of another person that she is in pain. Much of what Wittgenstein says on privacy seeks to undermine such a position. He questions whether it’s not the other way around, namely, that we do very well know when others are in pain and it is questionable in what sense I can be said to know that I am in pain. His reasons for questioning knowledge claims about one’s own pain are not easily summarized. However, they stem, in part, from observations about the differences in context and use between such claims as “I know my car is running; I just turned the key” and “I know my tooth hurts; I feel it.”
>Metaphysics and the Philosophy of Language: Wittgenstein has a general criticism of what might seem like a commonsensical view of the relationship between language and world; that is, he challenges the view that the world divides naturally into objects to which we then simply attach labels (names). One consequence of his consideration of ostensive definitions (defining/explaining a word by pointing to what it refers) is that referring to the world is only possible when a language is in place to fix the reference. Thus the foundation of a language cannot simply be a matter of looking around to see what there is and then attaching names to self-identifying objects.
>In considering our sensation language, Wittgenstein similarly criticizes the idea that sensations are “self-identifying,” providing their own criteria of identity, so that all that is required to talk about them meaningfully is to associate a name with a sensation. Because of how intimate we are with our sensations, we may believe that all it takes for the word pain to be meaningful is for us to associate the sign ‘pain’ with the sensation. The sensation is unique and self-identifying, so that the meaning of ‘pain’ is determined by the sensation. However, if Wittgenstein is right about naming and the way names and words refer, then objects and sensations do not pick themselves out as the objects and sensation that they are. Their identity is determinate only in relation to a language that can be used determinately to refer to them as conceived by the language. Sensation words are not meaningful because they refer to self-identifying, private sensations; rather, it is the public observable behavior that is the foundation for the use and meaning of sensation language.

[Anonymous No.14497011]

>>14492024
>>14496984
>P1. If a sensation is to be necessarily private, then it must not have a natural expression; for example, as pain is expressed through groans, screams, crying, and so on.
>P2. Suppose that one were to want to begin a private language and did so by making a sign, “S,” in a diary every time a particular sensation occurred.
>P3. If “S” is to be given a meaning and if there is to be a criterion of correctness for the correct application of “S” in the future, then a definition of “S” must be formulatable, or If “S” is to be given a meaning and if there is to be a criterion of correctness for the correct application of “S” in the future, then “S” must be given an ostensive definition (i.e., a definition through pointing to the thing named while saying/writing its name).
>P4. No definition for “S” can be formulated, for to do so would require the use of a public language, which would invalidate the language’s privacy.
>P5. Would it not be possible, nevertheless, ostensively to define “S” by concentrating one’s attention on the sensation while writing the sign in the diary? No! Because:
>5a. As mentioned in section 257, and defended in sections 27–37 of Philosophical Investigations, if an ostensive definition is to function, then a conceptual–linguistic context to determine the “object” of the pointing, or in this case, the concentration of one’s attention, must exist.
>5ai. Ostensive definitions cannot be used to ground meaning but, rather, act as a final step in making the already established meaning of a sign explicit.
>5aii. Without a conceptual–linguistic context with which to determine the “object” of concentration, there is no determinate “pointing” to the sensation. Is it the sensation that is concentrated on, its duration, its intensity, the body minus the sensation, and so on?
>C1. No ostensive definition is possible in the context of the private diarist (modus tollens, P5, 5a–5aii).
>5b. In the context of the private diarist, there is no existing conceptual–linguistic context.
>C2. The concentration of one’s attention on a sensation while writing a sign does not establish a meaning, private or otherwise, for the sign (modus tollens 5a, 5b).