Wittgenstein and Language-Games

[Anonymous No.18658932]

Correct me if I'm wrong, as I'm only reading through TLP and have not yet read the primary on his later work.

Wittgenstein's framework on propositions in language is fundamentally changed between TLP and later Wittgenstein. In TLP Wittgenstein atomizes language (and propositions) into elementary components that are joined together into propositions that either reflect reality (and are true) or do not (and are false) (1.2, 3.144, 4.023, 4.032). These atomic components are mutually independent (1.21). Language obscured the essentially elementary and composite nature of propositions but the nuts and bolts of thought represented (shown? 4.022) by language were as such.

Language-games, then, are Wittgenstein's more cloudy and obscure way that language is interpreted into (or "resolves into") thought. The language game can be interpreted in the general case (as it is strictly particular and context-dependent?) as a black box, into which language goes along with rules (ostensibly including context?), which then produce a meaning: meaning is a function of language and rules. Am I correct in understanding language-games this way? Would it then also be correct to state that rules (and context) act more as a lookup function in a dictionary of potential meanings rather than acting to create meaning?

[Anonymous No.18660275]

>>18658932
more like ludwig midwittgenstein

[Anonymous No.18660437]

>>18658932
The picture theory from the Tractatus means sentences have a structure that corresponds isomorphically with the structure of the world it represents. That much I know. I can't speak for PI because I haven't read it other than excerpts. I just know a version of Wittgenstein-inspired theories of meaning as use endorsed by Dummett. On that view, the analogy to games is meant to be quite literal. You can't make a chess move in isolation. If you move a piece on a table but then do nothing before and after, that doesn't mean anything, it needs to be integrated to the game of chess. And Dummett compares that to the meaning of sentences, they have to be part of language to have their significance, and their significance has somewhat to do with the sorts of behaviors they inspire, the reactions you expect given that they are made, it's again like a literal game, every move is made with the expectation of moves in response by other players, otherwise there is no game, and no meaning for each move. Now as I said this is Dummett's way of looking at it, but I have a feeling this is close enough to Wittgenstein (who influenced Dummett). In any case, I do know the PI Wittgenstein rejects the "Augustinian" conception of meaning which is closer to the picture theory. So by that time, he would reject a naive representational theory where names mean things by representing things as if by assigning the correlation to them. I know for sure he emphasizes the importance that context within the language game has for meaning. I don't think the black box/function analogy is good because it is ambiguous between a quasi-Augustinian/picture theory view that takes you from words to their worldly "meanings" out there, and one interpretation of the use theory of meaning, where there is no "out there." But I'm not a late Wittgenstein expert. I don't know to what extent he really would accept or reject a non-linguistic "out there" (metaphysical reality independent of us). My hunch is he would reject it but maybe people who know better can correct me if I'm mistaken.

[Anonymous No.18662175]

bu

[Anonymous No.18663512]

why does /lit/ suck and never reply in the good threads

[Anonymous No.18663537]

>>18658932
>meaning is a function of language and rules
Wrong, wrong, wrong. Just wrong.

Just please read his later work first before trying to come up with ideas about his fundamental concepts. Are you reading Hacker's commentary? I urge you to read his later stuff, and please start with the Blue Book before moving on to the P. Investigations.

In the BB he explicitly dispels any notion of there being a possible rulebook for language or for language games. You ought to be connecting language games to the notion of form of life. I see you're on the right track, but just drop whatever second source you're currently reading and get the Blue Book. Then read the PI up until prop. 250 more or less and reread it. If you feel comfortable with these passages, go to Remarks on the Foundations of Mathematics and try to compare his more general notions about language with his discussions about rules in mathematics. Do not fall for the Hacker trap or for the Kripe trap. Kripke is fundamentally anti-Wittgensteinian and Hacker just couldn't swallow the metaphilosophical implications of Witty's later thoughts.

[Anonymous No.18663547]

>>18660437
Dummett is a Fregean with intuitionistic notions about meaning (therefore, trying to connect proof-theoretical accounts of logic to the meanings of words). Wittgenstein discarded intuitionism and certainly discarded BHK semantics for the logical connectives. Dummett 's use of Wittgenstein is very one-sided because he was still enamored with the idea of making progress through philosophy.

[Anonymous No.18665142]

>>18663547
>Wittgenstein discarded intuitionism
You probably know best but I was under the impression Wittgenstein's mathematics was like intuitionism or at least finitist and anti-logicist. What were his views?

[Anonymous No.18665398]

>>18660437
>sentences have a structure that corresponds isomorphically with the structure of the world it represents
sounds platonistic

[Anonymous No.18665417]

>>18665398
It's the correspondence theory of truth that everyone from as early as the Presocratics down to just around the time of Wittgenstein actually universally believed. Not uniquely Platonistic, everyone believed that truth is a correspondence between language and reality, for a really long time before alternatives began being suggested.

[Anonymous No.18666054]

>>18663537
Do you think any secondary source does Wittgenstein justice?

[Anonymous No.18666073]

>>18665417
>for a really long time before alternatives began being suggested
Like what?

[Anonymous No.18666092]

how about tractatic logico philosuckadickus

Fuck

You

[Anonymous No.18667309]

>>18666054
I tend to use secondary sources as sparring practice after reading the primary text, so all of the famous ones (Hacker, Pears, McGinn, Hintikka) have value. Doing justice to Wittgenstein is hard work because he wrote one of these limitless texts to which you can always return and it still has something to say. I don’t want to disparage secondary literature on him because I think they do more good than harm. Just try to read the actual text before you let some critic form your own opinions for you.

>>18665142
He does have some points of contact with intuitionism but there are express accounts of him denying to be an intuitionist. For example, Brouwer famously believed mathematics to be a wholly language-less activity, living purely as a mental endeavor. This type of solipsism is very distant from W.’s thought in the RFM.

[Anonymous No.18667759]

*hits note on the banjo*

>language is like...
>everything... man
>just say it
>or be silent

[Anonymous No.18668177]

>>18667759
Peak retardation

[Anonymous No.18668933]

>>18666073
coherence is one alternative

[Anonymous No.18669010]

>>18667309
>For example, Brouwer famously believed mathematics to be a wholly language-less activity, living purely as a mental endeavor. This type of solipsism is very distant from W.’s thought in the RFM.
I see, that makes sense. I guess intuitionists have more kinship with psychologism, and psychologism in turn is too married to private language for Wittgenstein to view favorably. But Dummett, insofar as he's influenced not just by Wittgenstein but by Frege as well would be pretty far from psychologism, so what did he see in intuitionism that he liked so much? I'm guessing it's the proof-constructive kinship with verificationism that he's keen on (where things have meaning only if you can demonstrate them).

[Anonymous No.18669044]

>>18669010
Dummett actually hated Heyting's and Brouwer's justifications for intuitionism. If you're interested in this stuff, the best thing to read is Dummett's defence of intuitionism in his famous paper 'The Philosophical Basis of Intuitionistic Logic'. You can also try to read 'The Logical Basis of Metaphysics' where he argues that a) metaphysical questions are real; b) you can derive a method for resolving them by taking semantics and meaning theories seriously. I warn you, though, Dummett is a pain in the ass to read and this stuff is so arcane and 'out there' that unless you have some solid foundations it will just go over your head. For example, it is true that Dummett was influenced by Frege's writings about sense and reference, but also remember Frege was a hardcore platonist who truly believed the law of excluded middle, so there's a whole debate about that. I recommend that you read a paper or two, and sometimes look at the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy for some Dummett-ian philosophy, but don't get bogged down on this minutiae unless you have an extremely good reason to waste your time with these debates. It seems you're more interested in Wittgenstein anyway, so leave this crap for later.

[Anonymous No.18669302]

>>18669044
I read Dummett's Frege: Philosophy of Language recently. It's fantastic. He's definitely a harder philosopher to work with because he knows a lot, references a lot, but he's also very smart when he reconstruct other philosophers' views and then responds to those with smart arguments. I think he's great. I'm just not as familiar with his work outside this book and his paper "Realism" (the 1963 one from Truth and Other Enigmas). So I'll take any recs cause I'd love to learn more about him. I'll check out what you suggested.