I did mention that Heisenberg quote above.

I'm not convinced there are any 'smallest units of matter', as such. The entities that exist on that scale are only 'particles' by way of analogy. Paul Davies, who I mentioned above, has been writing about this for decades - Matter Myth, God and the New Physics, Goldilocks Enigma, and other such titles. Not to forget Tao of Physics, which despite it's many critics, was still a ground-breaker. — Wayfarer

Oh! So we're on a similar if not the same "wavelength". Glad to know that. I feel I'm in good company. :up: Resonance! I hear ya!

Here's the deal!

If the very small are but ideas, doesn't that mean the very big (the universe comes to mind but maybe there are things bigger than it) could also be just an idea?

Reminds me of @Devans99's argument that infinity is a nonsensical idea in re points and lines. Faer argument proceeds like so: Mathematical points are dimensionless (size 0 like many of our anorexic, malnourished super models). How can then a line, a set of such points, exist. How can a series, any series of zeros (points) add up to a line, a nonzero object? How can quarks (point particles) yield matter? Is matter an illusion?

Materialists — Wayfarer

You might be interested in the following quotes:

I think that modern physics has definitely decided in favor of Plato. In fact the smallest units of matter are not physical objects in the ordinary sense; they are forms, ideas which can be expressed unambiguously only in mathematical language. — Werner Heisenberg

Everything we call real is made of things that cannot be regarded as real. — Niels Bohr

Both, it seems, were referring to the fact that quarks, the smallest units of matter, behave like mathematical points. I got that from Marcus du Sautoy's book What We Don't Know.

The contents of this thread has little to do with Wittgenstein. It's wrong-headed. Mad has not tried to understand, but instead is content to make shite up to suit himself. Might be best to leave the topic rather than engage with this muddle. — Banno

That sucks! For me that is.

Anyhow, what about my explanation for the family resemblance phenomenon is "wrong-headed"? What's your take on it? Why do you think family resemblance exists?

There are folk who look at a Picaso and say "I could draw that".

Picaso painted like a Master while still a child, transcending that ability as he grew. Those who think his art childish have misunderstood.

Madfool has seen a Picaso and thinks he has the capacity to critique it, without doing the work of understanding the background and implications. What he is doing is not clever; it's naive. Foolish.

It's not the fact of his critique that is objectionable. It's his insistence that he has understood what he clearly has not, his unwillingness to understand his error.

He chooses not to learn.

Now all that is entirely up to him. But at the same time as he has actively sort my engagement, he has refused to pay attention to my replies.

Hence, there is nothing in this thread that might be of interest to me. — Banno

Hey! I have feelings, you know!

By the way, please go through my reply to Corvus above!

My sense is that these mundane physical considerations were not on Gödel's mind. He believed in the Platonic existence of abstract sets including large cardinals, sets far too large to be of any conceivable interest to the real world. See
2.4.4 Gödel’s view of the Axiom of Constructibility
.

I really can't say what Gödel thought about or believed, since apparently he initially thought the axiom of constructability (the claim that the constructible universe includes all sets) was true, then came to doubt it. But my sense is that he was thinking of the Platonic reality of a very large universe of sets, and was not thinking about the utility of set theory in physics. On the other hand he did do some work in relativity, so who knows. — fishfry

Way above my paygrade! Thanks though. I hope to advance my knowledge in math ASAP.

I was thinking about it, and I feel they communicate with what looks like emotional language. They definitely do communicate, but their language is not obvious, regular, versatile than humans. Even if a few uttered barks and meows or glares and wagging the tails - not sure if these can be classed as language as such. I think not. But still there seems some form of communication going on in the animals world. — Corvus

Thanks for bringing up the issue of animal language. Come to think of it, Wittgenstein is more than just relevant here, he's super-relevant ( :grin: ). Animal vocabulary is limited e.g. dogs can only growl, whimper, and howl. If they wish to communicate complex information, the same "word" (growl/whimper/howl) would have multiple meanings and disambiguation would be achieved contextually. This is more about polysemy than family resemblance but the two are close cousins, a kinship that might prove useful to the concept of language games. I'm not sure how exactly.

I think they pick up language as they grow up up to a certain level. But above that point, for writing skills, grammar and the foreign languages, they must learn and be taught. — Corvus

Coming to children and language, I noticed from being around infants and toddlers that most of the words they know are based off of ostensive definitions e.g. my 3 year old nephew (S) can point to a toy car and say "car" but there's also abstract thinking involved because he points to all toy vehicles (cars, trucks, pickups, trailers) and identifies them as cars (intensional definition) which is correct usage of the word "car" in a certain sense.

What do I mean by "...in a certain sense"? Well, this: S is focusing on similarities rather than differences - that's why a toy car, a toy truck, a toy pickup, are all cars for fae. In other words, S is looking for patterns and differences mess up patterns, they break them as it were. Had my nephew S (fae's very cute :love: ) instead looked for differences, or is attuned to distinctions, fae wouldn't have used the word "car" for all 4-wheeled toys.

What does this have to do with Wittgenstein? Simply this: Our attention is asymmetrical vis-à-vis similarities/differences i.e. similarities matter more than differences because with the former, we have a pattern (4 wheels or thereabouts for S) and patterns, knowledge about them, are/is mighty useful I hear. Thus, once a word is defined, say "chair" (4 legs, back, seat) it provides the seed for a pattern. You see a sofa, it has a seat, you think chair. You see a spinny, it has a seat, you think chair. Basically, you're focusing on what's common (similarities) and ignoring the dissimilarities - we're looking for a pattern! There is a pattern and your mind latches onto it. Hey presto!, we have on our hands Wittgenstein's family resemblance.

It needs to be borne in mind that mathematics is ultimately a system, game-like in nature, where we have complete freedom to choose our starting premises aka axioms.
— TheMadFool

This is exactly the view that Gödel opposed. He believed that mathematics is objective; that mathematical truth is something that we study, not something we make up. If the axioms don't settle a given mathematical question, that's the fault of the axioms. There is truth "out there" waiting to be discovered. — fishfry

The question then is, is math discovered or invented?

One of the reasons why some, like Gödel I suppose, believe math is discovered is how math seems to,

1. Describe nature (math models e.g. Minkowski spacetime)

2. Describe nature accurately (we can make very precise predictions to, say, the 15th decimal place)

There's a book titled "The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences." authored by Eugene Wigner. It's a book that captures this sentiment.

However, we can't/don't know beforehand which mathematical object will prove itself useful in the description of nature. Given this, we need to experiment with math which basically involves tinkering around with the axioms as arbitrarily or as whimsically as possible. The objective? Generate as many mathematical objects as possible so that we can find the one that's the best fit in re nature.

In summary, possibly true that math is a discovery (it's fundamental to nature, the universe) but to find the best possible mathematical object to capture nature's essence as it were, we need to treat math as an invention and play with the axioms. :chin:

In the case of flavors, you can simply choose the option for none of it at all. "No thanks". In the case of life, you cannot choose "no thanks" (only I "I didn't want this"). Less wholistic, you cannot say, "I don't want the option for homelessness, job, independently wealthy, free rider, etc. I just want none of those options". Is that just? — schopenhauer1

But you ask the impossible! To make a choice, one must exist. That precludes choosing nonexistence! However, ignoring the antinomy, if such were possible, some would definitely choose nothingness! :chin: Hmmmmm...

After all, the point of Camus' Sisyphus analogy is to bring to our attention that if the rock is going to roll back to where it started then did it ever roll anywhere at all. WTF? moment for me!

So you have a whole range of X, Y, Z, etc. options. You cannot select the option for no option. Is this just? Does imposing on someone the need to pick from a range of options negate the fact that the imposition leaves out never having the option to not play the game of options in the first place? — schopenhauer1

Great question!

Options to make sense must be numerically greater than 1. No options is about the number 1.

So, if you see on a menu, vanilla or chocolate, you have options but if you see only vanilla or only chocolate, you have no options. You don't select/choose/opt for "...the option for no option..." That would be a paradox!

@StreetlightX and I'm like :point:

Your thread is one such instance and apparently it's gone on for two pages, so you tell me. Figuratively speaking. — StreetlightX

You remind me of this :point:



Not a bad trick sir/madam as the case may be, not a bad trick at all!

You're so obsessed with this notion of 'misuse' that you completely overlook the fact of no use: language which has no language-game at all, or an employment of language which, although mistaken for a use, does not have one. Your convoluted rambling misses the mark. — StreetlightX

No point discussing words that are no use, right? I don't get why you open up a new bottle of wine when you haven't finished the already open one, figuratively speaking.

I've given the matter of language acquisition and animal communicatiom some thought but, luckily or not, I lack the wherewithal to conduct a proper investigation into it.

I'll say this though, children acquire language in ways that seem rather mysterious. The sound "ma" and "mama" seem to be hardwired into our brains. At other times, we need to teach children words. :chin:

Misuse happens precisely when one treats the word 'game' as univocal across all these cases. 'Misuse' is what happens when you transplant words from one language-game into another without paying attention to the specificity of each. Of course Wittgenstein did not speak of 'misuse', but simply, a lack of use tout court. The idling engine of language. — StreetlightX

It seems there are two ways of looking at misuse of language:

1. In the context of a language game (Wittgenstein): So, a word X means different things in different forms of life or different language games (contexts). Misusing a word would occur when one is oblivious to this fact and we assume that X has the same meaning across all contexts (language games or forms of life). This is your position. Too, words don't have an essence.

2. Failure to meet definitional criteria (My position): A word X is being applied to entities A, B, and C but there's nothing in common to all A, B, and C that could justify such a practice. One explanation: The logical AND operator that appears in definitions is being swapped for the logical OR operator. Words have an essence.

Would you define a dog as a wolf OR tame or as a wolf AND tame? The answer to that question should give you an idea as to why words are being misused the way I described it (AND substituted by OR).

Wittgenstein's theory of language games makes sense only if 2 (above) doesn't count as misuse (of language) i.e. there's nothing amiss with applying the word X to A, B and C simultaneously. Were this not the case, the notion of family resemblance wouldn't make sense; after all, family resemblance relies completely on the logical error being committed (OR replaces AND).

:chin:

2 (above) is a mistake, a logical one pertaining to the nature of definitions. Ergo, Wittgenstein's theory of family resemblance and language games is entirely based on misuse of language, the upshot being if language isn't misused, there would be no family resemblance; if there are no family resemblances, there would be no language games; if there are no language games, there would be no Wittgenstein! :chin:

They are, FYI, precisely what I refer to when I say anything goes.
— TheMadFool

Then you have no idea what you are talking about. — StreetlightX

Huh? If there were such a thing as misuse of language, the word "game" (Wittgenstein's favorite) couldn't be applies to chess, battle simulations (war games) and sports - there's nothing that unites these three thematically to permit the use of the same word for all. This is Wittgenstein's family resemblance and they're only possible if you violate the rules of good definitions i.e. if you use words inappropriately or, put simply, you misuse words. If, on the other hand, you're willing to ignore misuse of words (language is use), like we all do at some point, we're asking for trouble - confusion & chaos will ensue and ample evidence is available on this forum, some of that being my own.

That 'anything goes' does not follow. The full expression of 'meaning is use' is 'meaning is use in a language-game'. "Misuse" is what follows when meaning is not used in a language-game. This is Wittgenstein 101. — StreetlightX

You seem to have forgotten, an honest mistake, what language games are. They are, FYI, precisely what I refer to when I say anything goes.

For this reason, according to Gödel, there are four forms of vicious circle inside mathematics:
That also applies to metaphysics.

(1) No totality can contain members definable only in terms of this totality.

(2) No totality can contain members involving this totality.

(3) No totality can contain members presupposing this totality.

(4) Nothing defined in terms of a propositional function can be a possible argument of this function. — javi2541997

Even for someone like me, with basic training in math and logic, this makes sense.

he [Gödel] would "consider this rather as a proof that the vicious circle principle is false than that classical mathematics is false." — javi2541997

This is intriguing to say the least. Reminds me of this:

As I shared with my professors years ago when I was in college, if all the evidence in the universe turns against creationism, I would be the first to admit it, but I would still be a creationist because that is what the Word of God seems to indicate. — Kurt Patrick Wise

Reject (a principle of) logic (vicious circularity) just so that mathematicians don't lose their sleep over the weak foundations the world of numbers has been built on.

Here's something to ponder upon:

I remember reading a good book on logic about 9, 10 years ago (sorry forgot the title) and it discusses vicious circles otherwise known as circulus in probando - a premise is the conclusion.

It needs to be borne in mind that mathematics is ultimately a system, game-like in nature, where we have complete freedom to choose our starting premises aka axioms. Ergo, since math is by its own admission an axiomatic system, the problem of vicious circularity is N/A, at least not foundationally. After all, mathematicians are openly declaring the fundamental nature of math - it assumes certain propositions (axioms) to be true and builds an edifice of true (mathematical) propositions on them. Math is immune from the charge of vicious circularity.

It probably won't happen. — jamalrob

:cry: I'm an eternal optimist!

None of this has anything to do with your made up assertions about family resemblance or ideal languages. — StreetlightX

Kindly read my post just above. Thanks.

He was an aeronautical engineer and his position was validated by Russell at least initially. If you want to keep running backwards in this corn field then by all means. — Cheshire

Indeed, Wittgenstein was an aeronautical engineer. I completely forgot about his background in engineering and his relationship with Bertrand Russell. Thanks for refreshing my memory - I remember just skimming through the Wikipedia entries on him.

Coming to the point I was making, what are your thoughts about it?

If "meaning is use", the concept of misuse is N/A and anything goes but if anything goes, I could use the word "water" for fire and also for water itself. If that's the case water (water) is cold and water (fire) is not cold (hot). There's a great risk of confusion because a person who doesn't know that "water" = water = fire, the statements water is cold and water is not cold (hot) is what in logic is known as a contradiction.

It appears that there's a trade-off between memory and clarity in language. We can't have too many words because that would overburden our memory, thus we have polysemy/family resemblance but polysemy/family resemblance taken to the extreme causes confusion as demonstrated above and there would be a constant need to disambiguate words.

The memory aspect of language leads to Wittgenstein's meaning is use.

The clarity aspect of language leads to meaning as essence.

We need to strike a balance between the two.

I hope the forum adds the posts download feature soon. Thanks to all those who've commented and tried to lend a helping hand. I'll try out the few suggestions that were given. Good day.

I bet he would've said the family resemblance shouldn't figure in it i.e. it's preferrable that language isn't a game in which a given word's meaning alters with context (form of life).
— TheMadFool

He literally says that this is exactly what we shouldn't do. But sure, continue making shit up — StreetlightX

You must understand what it must be like as a philosopher which Wittgenstein was to come to the realization, discover, that people have been misusing, some would even go so far as to say abusing, language in ways that makes philosophy hard and even sometimes impossible (no essence, no philosophy :grin: ).

Attempting a bit of psychology since it seems to be a hot topic on the forum lately, Wittgenstein was actually complaining about the misuse/abuse of language rather than anything fundamentally important about the connection between language and philosophy. He wasn't aware of it of course. A pity.

My interepretation of Wittgenstein is that yes, he was onto something - that 1. words lack an essence and 2.
many issues that philosophers are racking their brains over are pseudo-problems.

1 is undeniably true but not necessarily because something's wrong with either the tool (language) or with the material (philosophy). Our beloved Wittgenstein seems to have completely missed another likelier culprit, us, the end user of language (human error) - misuse/abuse of lingo/tongue/language.

2 is also true because language has been so poorly wielded that people have f**ked up and f**ked up bad.

So, ultimately, in the finaly analysis, Wittgenstein detected the problem (words seem to lack an essence) alright but he then goes on to claim that (some) philosophical problems aren't real which, to my reckoning, is a grave error because it presupposes people aren't misusing/abusing language which they are.

Think of it, every time Wittgenstein dismisses a philosophical problem as a pseudo-problem, we can respond by saying that people have used the relevant words in the wrong way and since Wittgenstein's entire theory of language games is predicated on that being false we have successfully demonstrated that there are real philosophical problems not pseudo-problems.

Let me stop you right there. I'm going to read the rest but this is a full stop in itself. Ideal qualifying language outside of a Russian lease agreement is frankly an upsetting term. Alright, I'll give the rest due diligence and respond tomorrow. — Cheshire

Read my reply to StreetlightX.

Tell me, what do yo think the tractatus was?

Small steps. At least read a tertiary text about him before you say anything else. — Banno

Wittgenstein himself didn't read any books I'm told. Also, please go through my reply to StreetlightX.

To put differently what has already been said by others: the part of Wittgenstein's philosophy that you're looking at is built on a rejection of the search for an ideal language, so what you're doing is arguing against his whole approach. In principle that's fine, of course, but it's good to be clear about it.

By the way, the idea of a "misuse" in his later work is to show, not people need to work on improving language--which it seems to me is your own takeaway--but that philosophers have to pay attention to how language actually works. — jamalrob

In my humble opinion, Wittgenstein's "meaning is use" doesn't quite do the job it was designed/formulated to do/for. He intends to deflect our attention from the usual way we understand meaning as essence.

I remember drawing an analogy between a book and a word. A book can be used to prop up a cellphone, a book can be used to hold paper down on a windy day, a book can be used to keep a cup of hot tea on, you get the idea. Thus the meaning of the book depends on how one uses it. Words too are like that, so Wittgenstein thinks - there's no essence to a book (word), what it is (what it means) is entirely a matter of how we use it.

So far so good.

However, if "meaning is use", there can be no such thing as misuse/abuse of language. In the book analogy above a book can be anything at all i.e. we can use it for anything and everything and no one would/could say I've misused/abused the book. In terms of words, I'm free to say the word "water" is, intriguingly, fire and that "god" means devil. You couldn't object to this because the notion of word misuse/abuse is N/A. This is taking Wittgenstein's theory taken to its logical conclusion, if you plant Wittgenstein in your garden and tend to it with care and love a particulalry exotic flower will bloom. What is this flower? Total chaos, utter confusion of course.

Retracing the evolution of the Wittgenstein flower of chaos and confusion back to its seed - language games/family resemblance - we can conclude with a certainty unbecoming of a philosopher that Wittgenstein's theory of language games and family resemblance boils down to, is ultimately about, chaos & confusion in language and by extension philosophy.

What is chaos and confusion in re language? Even a child knows that both happen in the absence of rules or if there are rules, not observing them (misuse)! This thread is about the latter - misuse of language!

@Banno

Words don't have an essence;
— Cheshire
How so? My explanation is able to account, albeit only in a simple way, for the linguistic entity Wittgenstein calls family resemblance.
— TheMadFool
I'm thinking about the context of poetry which couldn't exist without the open ability to manipulate words meanings subject to the other words that are surrounding them.
— Cheshire

Ergo, the lack of essence allowed us the ability to assign words to things. Did we sit around guessing the animals name until we were presented with the essence sounding word for a goat? It isn't obvious if it is true. It is obvious if it is a goat; which is goatist falsification.

my explanation is the best one among others if such exist.
— TheMadFool
If I ever say this; then I guarantee what ever follows will be wrong. — Cheshire

I'll try and explain this again as I've gained some more insights into the issue (Wittgenstein's language game theory).

We must make a distinction between how language is (ordinary language) and how language should be (ideal language).

Wittgenstein's language game/family resemblance is a feature of ordinary language but were we to ask him about his views on an ideal language, I bet he would've said the family resemblance shouldn't figure in it i.e. it's preferrable that language isn't a game in which a given word's meaning alters with context (form of life).

In other words, Wittgenstein probably would've been happier but less famous if it were the case that words had/have an essence to them.

What does this mean?

Simply that ordinary language is imperfect/flawed and it needs a lot of work (to become an ideal language). A number of possibilities as to why family resemblance is an aspect of ordinary language:

1. There's something inherent in language that prevents attempts to give words an essence. Analyzing this is above my paygrade.

2. People are careless with language. As described in the OP, substituting AND with OR is an instance of this.

3. Limitations of the brain. If words had an essence, even the slightest of differences will necessitate a new word. For example if I'm very strict about what flying means, say I define it as flapping of two wings, a dragonfly (has four wings) would need another word to describe its locomotion and so would a plane/glider (not flapping its wings). You get the idea. This would be a huge burden on our memory - there would be just too many words to remember. Thus, we assign different meanings to the same word (pun/polysemy) and if there's some overlap in meaning i.e. there's a family resemblance, the word rises to prominence in Wittgenstein's theory of language games.

Perhaps the absence of an essence to words is due to one or more or all of the above posited reasons.

Another thing is a word's essence can be viewed in two distinct ways:

1. An essence within a language game: For example when I use the word "god" in a christian context, it has a specific meaning, i.e. it has an essence viz. an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-good being. This kind of essence (to words) exists. So if I encounter beings X, Y, and Z (sancte trinitatis) and all of them are the christian god then I know all of them are all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-good (essences of "god")

2. An essence between language games: The word "god" means different things if you consider all religions and beliefs. The deistic god is not the same as the pantheistic god which has very little in common with the christian god. This kind of essence (to words) doesn't exist.

You are accusing him of putting a foot on the scale of (not)essence by using an unrealistic standard for maintaining it and yet acknowledging a more open standard in a tangential matter? Words don't have an essence; they have community usage and agreed upon translations. As well as their particular appearance in a game. Which I maintain is a clumsy word for context until either clearly refuted or I begin to make sense of this black book I purchased in misplaced optimism that I understood the English language; many years ago. — Cheshire

:chin: How so? My explanation is able to account, albeit only in a simple way, for the linguistic entity Wittgenstein calls family resemblance. In fact I feel more confident after discussing the matter with you and others that my explanation is the best one among others if such exist. The logical connective AND that links all the properties that go into essence-based definitions is being swapped with the logical connective OR by non-philosophers i.e. almost all people, statistically speaking. It's as simple as that. This, as you know, is bad philosophy. Ergo, my contention that Wittgenstein has converted bad philosophy into philosophy. Sacré blue!

That said, it would indeed be a grave error to ignore Wittgenstein's views on how language and philosophy affect each other. For instance, it would be the heights of stupidity to look for games' essence. We already know "none exist" but that comes with a caveat - this is a situation that occurs not because essence itself is meaningless but because people not exposed to the rigors of logic and definition use words with complete disregard for philosophical rules.

This problem has its roots in the beginnings of language. Back then no one had established criteria for real thinking, logic & philosophy were in their infancy and couldn't be brought to bear on the issue. Heck, just having words for water, food, danger, basic necessities to be precise was so empowering that very no/little attention was given to using words properly (focus on essence) in a philosophically acceptable manner.

This defect was exposed by none other than the father of Western philosophy, dear ol' but deceased Socrates - I have a feeling that his whole life was spent agonizing over the lack/absence of essences to words. Every conversation he had with randoms didn't end well at all. Nothing happened that could be described as a breakthrough, all Socrates discovered was words lacked an essence, no definition for ideas like virtue or justice satisfied all parties.

What does this mean?

Socrates anticipated Wittgenstein but the latter misconstrued word misuse (nonphilosophical) as implying that words were missing an essence. The former, on the other hand, realized correctly in my humble opinion that the first order of business for philosophers was/is/will be to, not look for essences, something Socrates himself was deeply concerned with, as none can be found. Au contraire, Socrates' mission, if we could refer to philosophizing as that, was to demand change - we are to employ the two greatest tools humans posses (logic & language) with utmost care and precision and all will be well.

My two cents worth!

Excuse the tone. I'm a bit pissed at the "Wittgenstein is wrong 'cause I haven't read him" posts. — Banno

My humble apologies. I know you're a Wittgenstein fanboy and it might please you to know this thread was written with you in mind. You, however, haven't critiqued my views as expressed herein to my satisfaction. That's unfortunate because I was hoping to be proven wrong since I'm sympathetic to Wittgenstein's idea that philosophy may be hostage to language i.e. some features of language may generate what Wittgenstein calls pseudo-problems - issues that seem to be philosophical but are in fact like the dents/small depressions around nail heads in wood, more about the tool, the hammer (here language) than about nails or wood (here philosophy). I suppose I got the analogy right but I'm still quite unsure what Wittgenstein really wants to say. Some help, anyone?

Socratic method — Cuthbert

In explaining a concept one approach is to look for necessary and sufficient conditions of its application. — Cuthbert

vagueness — Cuthbert

As explained in the OP and subsequent comments, I want to understand why people use words (Wittgenstein) in ways that result in the linguistic phenomenon which Wittgenstein calls family resemblance. One reason, among probably many others, for this is if people misunderstand what meaning/definition is. They erroneously believe that definitions are disjunctions (OR) of essential properties of the class of objects being defined instead of their conjunctions (AND). How else could I refer to, say, a naval exercise in the Pacific ocean as a war "game" and also children's hide-and-seek as also a "game".

If what I say is true and it seems likely that it is, Wittgenstein's family resemblance is all said and done language misused i.e. to continue with the hammer-nail (see my reply to Banno) analogy, we have on our hands a bad carpenter (human error) and not a tool (language) issue. On this view, Wittgenstein's theory of langusge games, family resemblance and all, boils down to making a philosophy of bad philosophy. It's like laying the blame for a poorly constructed chair, clearly due to an untrained carpenter (nonphilosopher), on the tool (language). The bottom line is this - Wittgenstein has made a philosophy of linguistic and, some might even say, logical mistakes made by ordinary people. Isn't that like logician building a logical system based entirely on fallacies, formal and informal? :chin: Hmmmm.

It's a common misunderstanding that Witty is an advocate for 'vagueness' or somesuch. Rather, he reckons that we continually or often look for 'exactitude' in the wrong place. My favoute example he gives is of someone saying 'wait for me roughly there'. And then he has some hypothetical idiot trying to specify exactly where 'there' is: its boundary, how far 'roughly' should extend from the point that is specified and so on. But of course, the non-idiot will know very well that when someone says 'wait for me roughly there', the idea is that one waits where they can be found again without too much hassle. The idiot here is the philosopher (or a particular kind of philosopher, I'd rather say). As Witty puts it, there's nothing vague about it. It's only when we have a false idea of 'the exact' that his take on language seems to brook the 'vague'.

PI §87: "The signpost is in order a if, under normal circumstances, it fulfils its purpose"; §88. "If I tell someone “Stay roughly here” - may this explanation not work perfectly?"; §98: "On the one hand, it is clear that every sentence in our language ‘is in order as it is’. That is to say, we are not striving after an ideal, as if our ordinary vague sentences had not yet got a quite unexceptionable sense, and a perfect language still had to be constructed by us. - On the other hand, it seems clear that where there is sense, there must be perfect order. —– So there must be perfect order even in the vaguest sentence".

There's a mathematical analogy to be drawn here. The idea is that language does not function as a well-ordered set. Every use of language is a matter of partial ordering: §97: "We are under the illusion that what is peculiar, profound and essential to us in our investigation resides in its trying to grasp the incomparable essence of language. That is, the order existing between the concepts of proposition, word, inference, truth, experience, and so forth. This order is a super-order between - so to speak - super-concepts". But concepts and words are singular. they respond to, and arise from, particular lived situations. And words and meanings cannot be mapped onto some trans-historical order that could be clarified once and for all. In every case it must be asked: does that word fulfil its purpose? And if so, it's exact as it can be. — StreetlightX

:joke:

I'll need some time to process what you said. Muchas gracias though!

No, he isn't. "Context"? FFS. — Banno

Context matters in re ambiguity i.e. a given word has more than one distinct meaning e.g. "beam" in the two different contexts, one structural engineering and the other sunlight, don't mean the same thing. Note here that word ambiguity doesn't imply the absence of an essence. There's an essence to a light beam and a wooden beam.

However, Wittgenstein's family resemblance is a different animal. It implies there's no essence to words. Context in this case refers to the form of life - the language game - a word participates in. So, for example, taking Wittgenstein's own example, the word "game" is not necessarily disambiguated when I use it for chess or solitaire. The word "game", Wittgenstein claims, has the same meaning and this underpins the idea of family resemblance - there's a, intriguingly, fragmented/partial essence.

As you can see, context is a notion that's integral to both ambiguity and family resemblance although they refer to different things. In ambiguity (puns?), a context disambiguates a word. In family resemblance this doesn't happen.

Where Cheshire and you concur and what I have an issue with is that both of you rely on the notion of context albeit not in the same sense. Needless to say Cheshire is referring to context as it applies to family resemblance as described above. About this, I've already made my thoughts as clear as I could in the preceding paragraphs.

No, he isn't. "Context"? FFS. — Banno

:ok: We can stop the discussion for now. I'll post if I can think of anything interesting. Merci beaucoup for your comments!

A touching tale of a child's boundless curiosity and how it, in question form, tests the limits/boundaries of so-called adult (grown-up) views, knowledge, presuppositions, and so on. However, rekindling this exact childlike hunger for answers you mention here in me, I ask you, "what's in it for the child?" Should we have children just to discover the flaws, big and small, adults have?

Have you ever considered actually reading Wittgenstein instead of creating innumerable treads on him based on your quarter baked wiki-gleaned understanding of him?

The reduction of 'family resemblance' down to a series of propositional clauses is so far away from what Witty had in mind the only thing to say about the OP is that, as with every thread you've made on Witty, you've simply made shit up and pretended like what you've said has anything at all to do with him. — StreetlightX

Hi StreetlightX. Long time no see. You haven't changed a bit! :up:

↪Cheshire doesn't seem to be even on the same cricket pitch, let alone playing the same game — Banno

Why? Cheshire is saying exactly what you're saying - language games are real and so is family resemblance. However, as I explained, this isn't so. Family resemblance is an artifact of bad philosophy, the precise error being committed being loose terminology as becomes possible when logical elements of definitions are overlooked, glossed over. The logical boo-boo people make is substituing AND with OR. Once we understand as we have here that family resemblance is simply misuse of words, a cardinal sin in philosophy, we can rest easy. After all, in the simplest sense, why found a philosophy on a mistake?

The original Wiki article I wrote. — Banno

:up: Great article! Well written!

So we've both hit upon the same idea (AND replaced by OR in definitions), I'm honored, but you remain unconvinced that this violation of definitional criteria is the real culprit that causes words to be used in such a fashion that no common thread (essence) is found to run through all the ways in a particular word is used.

I don't see why you object to my "explanation" for the linguistic phenomenon of family resemblance. If I say the oit (hypothetical word) is defined in terms of the properties A OR B then anytime I see either A OR B, I'll think oit. This is the only logical explanation for family resemblance, no?

It means Wittgenstein is correct that words mean things in a context. Which is why we string them together in different ways. Expecting to isolate a word and some how extract every possible way it could exist in a context is an irrational activity. Was some one doing this at some point? — Cheshire

While you're spot on regarding the importance of context to meaning (ambiguity of a word's meaning is resolved by looking at the context in which they appear), I don't think language game or family resemblance has anything to do with context

Wittgenstein is quite clear about where he stands on the notion of essence, an integral aspect of definitions outside his universe. He claims that words lack essence but for that to be true, the properties that are part of the definiens of a word must be taken together as a logical conjunction but family resemblance can only ever be if the logical conjunction is erroneously replaced with a logical disjunction.

You see the problem, right?

When Wittgenstein studies words for their essence, he uses the standard criteria of good definitions which requires the logical conjunction (AND) but when he develops the concept of family resemblance, he relies on the logical disjunction (OR). Double standards if there ever was one. Family resemblance is an actual linguistic feature only with logical disjunction (OR) but that breaks the standard meaning of definitions which employs logical conjunction (AND).

...rubbish. — Banno

Can you have a look at my reply to Cheshire. Much obliged.

You just wanted to use the word infinity here for dramatic flare. Phenomena that are cyclical and self-sustaining are just that.

We've got a little plastic sterling engine(?) snowman in the window sill, who moves his hands all day long if he is exposed to enough light. Put it somewhere where it's always exposed to enough light and there is gaseous temperature gradient as a means for cycling the mechanism it would never stop... until a dog got a hold of it, or some other environmental change, or the wearing of friction.

The dog eating the sterling engine is sort of like the Sun absorbing the Earth. Just have to wait. — Nils Loc

:up: I was just wondering about so-called perpetual motion machines. People, including the best of scientists, seem obsessed about actual perpetual motion machines and since such machines are impossible on pain of violating the laws of nature, they (scientists) have given up in utter frustration.

Why don't we lower the bar a little and simply use solar energy to drive such pseudo-perpetual motion machines. Since it's believed that the sun will last another coupla billion years, we can for the moment consider it an infinite source of (solar) energy, no?

You know what I mean, right? If an particular machine generates its own energy and uses that energy to drive itself, it's indistinguishable from a machine that gets its energy from a virtually infinite source of energy ( "perpetual").

(1) Daodejing, Laozi
(2) Ping fa, Sunzi
(3) De Rerum Natura, Lucretius^
(4) Outlines of Pyrrhonism, Sextus Empiricus
(5) Enchiridion of Epictetus, ed. Arrian
— 180 Proof

Can you please summarize all of these books in one or two sentences?
— TheMadFool
It's probably unwise, Fool, to spoon-feed (i.e. "summarize") what you can easily find yourself by searching Google, SEP & wikipedia. That said, and given I'm not wise myself, I'll say only what each book has meant to me:

1. 'to flow with the complementarities of nature'
2. 'high stakes strategic thinking & preparation'
3. 'an immanent way of reducing misery'
4. 'the undecidability of philosophical (& religious) statements'
5. 'exercises in equanimity' — 180 Proof

A gazillion thanks 180 Proof, a gazillion thanks! :up: :fire:

Aristole & Newton Puzzle

A very astute person, sorry I forgot faer name, once posted a comment to the effect that we could develop formulae for motion such that friction doesn't appear as a force but would be automatically part of the equations of motion. In this case, Aristotle's physics would be right on the money - objects need a constant force applied to it to stay in motion.

Newton overturned Aristotelian physics by claiming that friction is a force that slows down and stops moving objects and in its absence, objects move in a straight line at constant velocity.

Can we then revive Aristotelian physics and remove friction as a force and assume that a constant force needs to be applied to objects to keep them in motion? The task then is to search for this mysterious force. This isn't quite as crazy as it sounds - the physics community is all abuzz about so-called dark energy, the putative energy that drives cosmic inflation. In other words, physicists are of the view that some kinda energy (force) is necessary to explain the expansion of the universe. Yes, the actual reason is rather dull - acceleration of cosmic expansion which in Newtonian mechanics implies a force (energy, dark energy). However, such a point of view doesn't necessarily mean constant force isn't necessary to keep bodies in motion, right? My highschool level physics doesn't allow me to further analyze this rather interesting possibility.

Actually I think carbon dioxide was first, and more natural to the planet. It took many years of plant forms producing O2 through photosynthesis before there was sufficient free oxygen for the ozone layer, and higher life forms. — Metaphysician Undercover

I had an inkling of that but I'm not sure how CO2 can form without O2 coming first? :chin: Interesting nonetheless.

So I don't think your depiction of a cyclical dependence is very accurate — Metaphysician Undercover

I had to ignore some truths like the earth not being a closed system, the "invisible" hand being our dear ol' sun but the all-important point I was trying to make was a cyclical process with each component of that process rejuvenating the other could be the answer to many of our problems. If nature can do it, there must be a way to do it. If there's a way to do it, humans can learn it. If humans can learn it, humans can do it. If humans can do it... :chin:

:ok: Jack Cummins.

balanced approach — Jack Cummins

Goldilocks.

Environmentalism is the position that what we think is use (of the planet's resources) is actually abuse, this grave state of affairs compounded by the fact that we misuse (resources). The response is to take the position that not all use is misuse/abuse. To think so is to be confused. Nevertheless this ticking time bomb must be defused. Some have refused and that has left many amused and bemused.

I pray that if I had to be to be born then let it be that I'm born

1. Without eyes so that I won't be able to see prey.

2. Without ears so that I won't be able to hear prey.

3. Without a tongue so that I won't be able to taste prey.

4. Without a nose so that I won't be able to smell prey.

5. Without skin so that I won't be able to sense prey.

6. Without hands so that I won't be able to strike prey.

7. Without legs so that I won't be able to run after prey.

8. Without a brain so that I won't be able to plan how to capture prey.

I suppose what I actually want is not to be born! Sorry for beating around the (George) Bush!

Paints an entirely different picture of congenital birth defects, abortion, and stillbirths! The good don't want to be born and if they must be born, they would prefer to be disabled in ways that are beyond conceivable!

I am glad for your response and I do think that ' perspectives' is important. However, I do believe that if no one other than you responds to my thread it may suggest that the 'nature' is not seen as important at all.I believe that nature is often seen as unimportant in Western culture, as something which we can and should exploit for human benefit.

My own view is that this is not possible. For example, in medical science, we make progress, but even medicines come with side effects. I am not in any way against medical advances. but I am suggesting that sometimes nature seeks vengeance. Also, we are very far from being in control. For example, we cannot turn off, or turn on, the rain at the present time. — Jack Cummins

Christian's use!
Jains say it's abuse! (Kudos to Indians, all 3,832,190,623 of them!)
Let's compromise: use but don't abuse!
For nuance let's use but not abuse/misuse!
Yes, yes, bemuse but don't confuse!
I refuse to use/misuse/abuse!
Me amused amuse!

Daodejing, Laozi
• Ping fa, Sunzi
• De Rerum Natura, Lucretius^
• Outlines of Pyrrhonism, Sextus Empiricus
• Enchiridion of Epictetus, ed. Arrian — 180 Proof

Can you please summarize all of these books in one or two sentences? E.g.

1. Daodejing: The way to live is to know how to die! :chin: This is just my own interpretation of Daoism. Yours will be different of course!

Pleaaaaasssseee! :smile:

If I read you correctly, your intent seems to be to not make the mistake of throwing the baby out with the bathwater. A commendable sentiment by all accounts - many have paid the price for making this rather silly mistake.

However, for better or worse, theists prevent such nuanced and subtle approaches to religion. Their stance is as simple as idiotic - ALL or NONE! Given this ultimatum as it were, atheists have no option but to reject all of religion, including the good parts that so obviously stand out like a gorgeous goddess of a woman in a crowd of plain Janes.

It's a dilemma I tell you. On the one hand, accept the girl of your dreams with her annoying parents (accept all of religion so that you may benefit from what's good in it) or reject the annoying parents and lose the girl of your dreams (reject all of religion and sacrifice the good that's in it).