Kant doesn't know anything you don't know about 'time'. How do you know what you know about it? — Dan Langlois

Firstly,

It's nice to meet you. Secondly, I appreciate this sentiment, in particular. Thirdly, I read the entire post three times now, and while I find it interesting, I can't make heads or tails about what you're trying to get at lol that could be on me, however.

Wittgenstein himself grew disillusioned about trying to 'clarify objects in Wittgenstein's Tractatus'. — Dan Langlois

While I'm familiar with the belief, I have yet to find any hard textual or historical evidence for it. Counter to some popular belief, Witt does clarify what he means by "objects" in his Tractatus. Refer to 4.24 of the work.

Thank you.

I actually did stumble across that topic while browsing...truthfully, I've found that larger topics are more difficult for me to follow. I can process more and try to respond with as much clarity as I can muster when its fewer folks. Otherwise, I get busy for a day or two, and then I come back and its like there is so much to read and process and to read back and remember where I even left in the conversation...honestly, at that point its difficult for me to re-engage with the conversation.

The real question, is why given the fact that you agree that by taking atomic propositions to represent the general logical form of proper propositions, one eliminates your colour problem, and given the fact that such a reading seems consistent with what else Witt says, do you resist the urge to interpret what's written as such?

Referring to Wittgenstein's Some Remarks on Logical Form, as he writes that any given proposition is the logical sum of simpler propositions, eventually arriving at the atomic proposition, this means that an atomic proposition is still a proposition — RussellA

This is an assumption you're making, and one which I think isn't necessarily the case. Firstly, there seems to be a clear category difference between propositions on the one hand, and atomic proposition on the other. Why have a distinct word for them otherwise? Propositions are made up of simpler propositions, but eventually we arrive at atomic propositions which are merely kernels of all other propositions, Witt says. They are not, propositions in and of themselves. Secondly, Witt spends a great deal of time talking about the differences of propositions proper and atomic propositions...if they are the same, or rather, if an atomic proposition is a proper proposition, why do you suppose Witt spent so much time saying what a proposition is and what an atomic proposition is, despite the latter simply being among the former?

He also writes "a proposition about it, e.g., P is red, by the symbol [6-9, 3-8] R"

So we have the proposition "the patch is red", which may also be written as either "Is red (the patch)" or [6-9, 3-8] R. — RussellA

With that snippet it does seem that way, however, reading the whole statement:

"A simple example [ of an atomic proposition containing a number]...would be the representation of a patch P by the expression " [6-9, 3---8]" and of a proposition about it, e.g., P is red, by the symbol " [6-9, 3--8] R ", where " R " is yet an unanalyzed term (" 6--9 " and " 3-8- " stand for the continuous interval between the respective numbers)".

He says, we have

1. An expression: "[6-9, 3---8]"
2. A proposition: "P is red"
3. A symbol: "[6-9, 3--8] R"

We know from the Tractatus, that a symbol is what's contained within the propositional "sign"...an expression is itself a symbol...these are what the proposition shows aka its logical form...also known as an elementary proposition.

"The sign is the part of the symbol perceptible by the senses. Two different symbols can therefore have the sign (the written sign or the sound sign) in common they then signify in different ways" (3.32 - 3.321)

We can see from 3 why at the beginning of some remarks on logical form, Witt says:

"If we try to analyze any given propositions we shall find in general that they are logical sums, products or other truth functions of simpler propositions. But our analysis, if carried far enough, must come to the point where it reaches propositional forms which are not themselves composed of simpler propositional forms. We must eventually reach the ultimate connection of the terms, the immediate connection which cannot be broken without destroying the propositional form as such".

3, is an immediate connection of terms, unlike the proposition "P is red" which is connected by the copula.

As every proposition has content and form, and as any given proposition is the sum of atomic propositions, atomic propositions must also have content and form. — RussellA

And here's where I disagree. Witt says:

"Every proposition has a content and a form. We get the picture of the pure form if we abstract from the meaning of the single words, or symbols (so far as they have independent meanings). That is to say, if we substitute variables for the constants of the proposition." (1).

Once we are able to successfully substitute the words of a proposition for variables to we get the "pure form of the proposition, but he does not say that we have the content. The material and subject are tied to the form, but the content is provided by its use as an actual proposition. He never says that atomic propositions have content; only that they have form.

"They, then, are the kernels of every proposition, they contain the material, and all the rest is only a development of this material" (2).

The development, I take it, being furnishing content to the elementary "parts".

Imagine I were to present you with the expression:

"F(x)"

What would you say is the form and subject matter of this? Clearly a functional relation where x is being taken as argument; we might say in ordinary language of some object falling under some concept. X is falling within the domain of F.

But, now I tell you:

"The square is red"

You immediately have a proposition with form and content. The atomic proposition and the proposition share the same form, but only the proposition has content.

Therefore the expression - Is red (the patch) - may be replaced by - Is red [6-9, 3-8] - or as he writes [6-9, 3-8] R — RussellA

This would imply that one elementary proposition could be replaced by another that is somehow equal, would it not? Witt says in the Tract that there is only one correct analysis (into atomic proposition) of a proposition:

"There is one and only one complete analysis of the proposition" (3.25).

Therefore the expression [6-9, 3-8] R is a proposition — RussellA

Witt clearly is offering this up as an example of an atomic proposition, not a proposition. He starts by saying that he believed that one needed to introduce numbers into atomic propositions, and that he would provide an example of what he means, which was the square example with [6-9, 3-8] R as the elementary proposition:

"And here I wish to make my first definite remark on the logical analysis of actual phenomena: it is this, that for their representation numbers (rational and irrational) must enter into the structure of the atomic propositions themselves" (4).

In Some Remarks on Logical Form, Witt deals closely with the problems of color. In it, he says:

"Every proposition has a content and a form. We get the picture of the pure form if we abstract from the meaning of the single words, or symbols (so far as they have independent meanings).

That is to say, if we substitute variables for the constants of the proposition. The rules of
syntax which applied to the constants must apply to the variables also" (1).

The analysis of proposition into elementary proposition - replacing of the words of the proposition with variables is intended to show the form of the proposition.

He goes on to describe how one might analyze the proposition: "The square is red" into the elementary propsition: " [6-9, 3--8] R ", where the square is put on a grid with increasing numbers along the x and y axis which are of equal distance from each point. "3-8 signifies a position along the x axis where the point goes from white to red, and 6-9 the same along the y axis.

"A simple example would be the representation of a patch P by the expression " [6-9, 3---8] " and of a proposition about it, e.g., P is red, by the symbol " [6-9, 3--8] R ", where " R " is yet an unanalyzed term (" 6--9 " and " 3-8- " stand for the continuous interval between the respective numbers)" (4-5).

If Witt truly thought that "X is red" was an elementary proposition, why would he attempt to construct an analysis into " [6-9, 3--8] R " in Some Remarks on Logical Form?

Monk, while suggesting that Frank Ramsay was one influence on the PI, he thinks Sraffa's challenges were the real root. He cites journal entries after Ramsay and Witts weekly discussions wherein Witt says that Ramsay's critiques were shallow.

Hopefully my question is not too far removed from the OP, the history of the Tractatus. — RussellA

Ha! Like my last thread, we've gotten into tangents concerning the main point, however, since I am the OP and I think its important to work out the tangential points, I have no issue whatsoever discussing other aspects of the work. Also, I haven't had the time to put any serious work into expanding on the OP...hopefully once I have more time. With that being said, this does have a bit of history in it concerning the work....

However, Wittgenstein later began to realise that the logical atomism of the Tractatus was incapable of dealing with the colour incompatibility problem (aka colour exclusion problem). — RussellA

... then why did Wittgenstein turn away from the logical atomism of the Tractatus because of the colour exclusion problem? — RussellA

Truthfully, I've never heard the position that this supposed problem was one of if not the reason why Witt wrote the PI.

In Duty of a Genius, Monk details two sources for Witt "changing" some of his views from the Tract...the discussions Wittgenstein had with Frank Ramsay and Pierro Sraffa, after he returned to Cambridge in 1929.

Monk specifically suggests that it was Sraffa's influence, noting a comment Witt made to Rush Rhees which identified Sraffa's anthropological method, as being particularly influential in the "forms of life" which are kind of cultural couches we frame our statements within.

Monk also notes an encounter Sraffa had with Witt wherein the former asked what the "logical form" of a physical gesture could possibly be, despite the gesture clearing displaying meaning.

Many simple colour propositions, such as "this car is red" and "this car is blue" fail the truth-functional combinations of elementary propositions, in that "this car" cannot be both red and blue simultaneously. — RussellA

I don't see how it fails...or rather, I don't quite take your point. Isn't this the case with, for example:

1. The ball is large
2. The ball is tiny

1. The apple is delicious
2. The apple is disgusting

Witt's points with his remarks on a point only being capable of one color, has nothing to do with this supposed color exclusion problem that you're talking about. Again, it only seems to crop up in an atomic theory akin to Russel's...Witt's seems to have elementary props as logical form of propositions, as I've noted above.

A proposition is a statement capable of carrying a truth value. Examples like:

"The car is red."
"The apple is ripe and delicious."

Elementary propositions are the logical form of the proposition, which is shown in its use.

"The sign determines a logical form only together with its logical syntactic application" (3.327).

Witt is clear, that elementary propositions, as he imagines them, are for example:

"The elementary proposition I write as function of the names, in the form 'fx', 'ϕ(x, y)', etc..." (4.24).

So, the elementary propositions from the above would be:

'F(x)' and '∃x: F(x)^G(x)'

This is why elementary propositions are independent from one another. 'F(x)' is just the general logical form; a function within the words of the proposition. I cannot, for example, infer the other elementary proposition:

'ϕ(x, y)'

This is the point about elementary propositions. An elementary proposition is not

"The car is red"

This is a proposition capable of being true or false and depending on its veracity or falsity we can infer other propositions from it.

I'll do my best to address some of the points you make...

You say:

If your claim is "The world is what are the facts", this is either of the following:

1) A truism- something everyone pretty much holds in everyday life.
2) A profound philosophical insight- in which case it must give the context for which it is set against, what notion it is overturning or contradicting — schopenhauer1

As it turns out, what amounts to the second sentence of any philosophical work is rarely, if ever, meant to be a "...profound philosophical insight"; like any argument, the first statements are meant as premises for the conclusion to follow. Typically, these premises are meant to be fairly uncontestable (less we run the risk of being challenged immediately on soundness).

With that being said, it's hardly a truism, either; especially at a time when there was a rich history of identifying base reality with physical objects having properties. Witt is saying instead that physical objects as we know them cannot exist with their properties independent of the facts; It is at the level of fact that properties are allocated. This is something we can all reasonably agree to, especially now in our modern times, but was certainly something the positivists would have also agreed to, hence why its at the beginning of the text.

If Wittgenstein isn't explaining why a proposition cannot be true, why should we care if the broader claim, "The world consists of true propositions or independent facts," is correct? Again, it's a truism that means nothing without a mechanism to determine what is actually true or not. — schopenhauer1

A proposition being taken as true requires a couple of things:

1. Understanding

"To understand a proposition means to know what is the case, if
it is true. (One can therefore understand it without knowing whether it is true or not.)" 4.024

2. isomorphism between proposition and reality its meant to represent

"In the proposition there must be exactly as many things distinguishable as there are in the state of affairs, which it represents.

They must both possess the same logical (mathematical)
multiplicity (cf. Hertz's Mechanics, on Dynamic Models)" (4.04).

"The propositions show the logical form of reality.
They exhibit it" (4.121).

This is simply to say, that if we understand a proposition, we understand its "sense" which illustrates the necessary logical form and multiplicity with the reality we are comparing it against.

"The proposition shows its sense" (4.022).

With this understanding, we can construct a world in our mind to compare against reality. If there appears to us to be an isomorphism such that to each element of the proposition there coincides an element of reality, and the relations pictured in the one seem to model the relations we witness in reality, we cannot help but judge the one as true of the other.

"The proposition constructs a world with the help of a logical
scaffolding, and therefore one can actually see in the proposition
all the logical features possessed by reality if it is true. One can draw conclusions from a false proposition" (4.023).

His philosophy implicitly relies on VERIFICATION for making distinctions yet the case would have to be made why empirically verifiable statements are more meaningful, especially if it can be the case that NON-VERIFIABLE propositions CAN BE true. — schopenhauer1

Verification, or the truth conditions of a proposition is only necessary for understanding. If, for example, you could not say what would have to be true for something to occur, then you simply do not understand it, despite it obviously being a possibility. This happens all the time obviously since we don't understand everything that occurs around us. But, notice that whenever you lack understanding, you also seem to lack truth conditions.

If the evaporator coil for your air conditioner freezes up, and I ask you why it happened, unless you know the possible causes, such as lack of airflow, being low on refrigerant, or a fault with the metering device, you quite clearly lack any frame of reference regarding understanding the phenomena despite one, or all, of them being true. And if you understand why each of these can cause the issue, then you better understand the phenomena in question.

I agree with a lot of what you've said in your posts...specifically regarding the broader scope of the work,. However, I found myself disagreeing here and there regarding the details. You mention the supposed colour incompatibility problem, but to my understanding, this issue only crops up if you take the work to operate in a manner similar to Russell. His understanding of complex propositions, as opposed to elementary propositions was, I take it, not the same as Witt's and is one crucial reason that Russell never understood the work (according to Witt), despite Russell developing his own logical atomism based on the work.

Suppose you have the proposition:

"The car is red and the car is on the road"

This is clearly a complex proposition...but, "the car is red" and "the car is on the road" are not elementary propositions, but still complex propositions. Hence why, by saying "The car is red" you know it cannot be "blue", despite the fact that the truth of one elementary proposition cannot determine the truth of another.

No, the elementary proposition is: "F(x)" and "G(x)" with "x" being a formal or pseudo concept (a wittgensteinian object), which is taken as argument for the functions "is red" and "is on the road", which mean nothing in and of themselves. They are as Frege would say, unsaturated.

You can, of course say something of the sort:

"God created the universe"

and this is perfectly meaningful. "God" is taken as the object or argument for the function "created the universe".

No, genuine metaphysical talk about "God" or "ethics" isn't a problem because some resignation that "silence" is required regarding certain "things" that are somehow determined to be "not substance" (This would simply be begging the question...like, who made Witt the determiner of such a delineation? Also, he never seems to draw that line out...). We ought to remain silent where we cannot speak clearly...and we can only speak clearly about things closer to our experience.

Witt talks about his issue with ethics in his Lecture on Ethics, and his position is far more nuanced than some arbitrary line drawn between substance and lack thereof...whatever that could mean. "God" insofar as we have a conceptual understand, or model of the "object" can, of course be meaningfully talked about. But, to suppose that one could ever develop a "science" of ethics, or of "God" is totally nonsensical. To say something is "ethically good" or "absolutely good" is to say, no matter what the circumstances or facts surrounding the action, it is always "good" to do "x". This is a tautology. But, Witt doesn't think that insofar as it is a tautology, that it is meaningless. He, actually, believes that ethics IS tautological in nature. We cannot help but feel that, for example, "tourchering and murdering adorable puppies for fun" is wrong....Witt calls it a genuine paradox because on the one hand, if we analyze the sentence it simply pictures facts, with no ethical element...no ethical "atoms" exist, so to speak....but, none the less, we cannot help but determine that no matter what, "x" is wrong. Since, clear language can only justify something by providing other facts as support, but no matter how many auxiliary facts we provide we cannot help but determine "x" to be wrong (there is no justification)..."ethical" terms "overflow" their usage...but, of course, since this is a tautology. That's what tautologies do...they are unyielding to any other states of affairs.

At any rate....I need more time to digest your comments, before providing a more well put response. But, like I said, I agree on a lot of the general themes, as well as a lot of the thrust of the work...but, not so much the details...but that will require more time to tease out. Hopefully this suffices for now.

Yes, if the modeling, which logical positivists were interested in, is about a true state of affairs (facts), then how can they account for complex relationships where differing parts of mechanisms render a theory or scientific discovery as true? — Shawn

1. Logical positivists were not proponents of "modeling". For a logical positivist, the meaning of a proposition is its method of verification.

2. Positivists, proper, were less interested in language but moreso theorizing; they considered "economical" theories, to be those that were based on our senses.

3. Witt's picture theory, I think, accounts for this by recognizing the simple fact that we can, and do, meaningfully talk about those complex relationships. The picture theory states that meaningful language pictures a possible state of affairs...that is to say, a logically possible state of affairs. This is to say, that unlike the logical positivists that thought all metaphysics was meaningless, Witt thought that if it is a logical possibility based on experience, that it too must be meaningful. How else could we understand it otherwise? We build models of objects in our mind by adding and subtracting possibilities we've gleaned from experience.

I believe, in the sense that if one were to try (like many scientists do) and encompass a theory to be explanatory for the whole frame, then I believe that picturing relations in the atomistic sense is something that can't attempt to do. — Shawn

The atomistic element of the work is simply to say that there are logically distinct categories that we utilize in building up a proposition. They are logical atoms, so to speak.

I want to talk about the mechanist, picture theory of meaning. — Shawn

Could you be more clear? :sweat: I am only somewhat familiar with the mechanist theory as it pertains to folks like Descartes and the revival of early atomism...but you say picture theory of meaning.

This is where the picture theory of meaning, simply can't zoom out and broaden its scope to account for new parts of the whole to describe. — Shawn

In what sense?

Taking the above into account, certain concepts may be helpful in working through the Tractatus. — RussellA

This was quite helpful :)

Adding to what you said, though... The debate which took place during the end of the 1800s and the beginning of the 1900s was a debate amongst indirect realists. Positivists, following after Hume, Comte, Kant, Mach, etc responded to our inaccessibility to reality by giving up metaphysical postulating, in favor of analyzing experience into elements, while Helmholtz, Boltzmann, Hertz thought there must be some uniformity between our experience and reality (or as you put it, between cause and effect). I only add this because, while it may be true that contemporaneously indirect realists are proponents of models, and the like, historically it is precisely this "in fighting" that was of fundamental importance to understanding the culture surrounding the Vienna circle and the like.


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"Voltage is the pressure from an electrical circuit's power source that pushes charged electrons (current) through a conducting loop, enabling them to do work such as illuminating a light. In brief, voltage = pressure, and it is measured in volts" (www.fluke.com) - in what sense does voltage = pressure. — RussellA

This is a prime example of using a metaphor to get across a particular picture of what's occurring - namely, that voltage is kind of like pressure. But, as you've pointed out, no model is ever quite right, and that's the point (and in part what I take Witt's point to be). A voltage is quite literally, not a pressure.

As you point out:

In the Merriam Webster dictionary, the word "pressure" has several meanings, including "the action of a force against an opposing force" and "voltage" as "potential difference expressed in volts". — RussellA

We seem to have a synonym of sorts, based on the definition; but the definition merely reports usage (again, as you point out), and its no surprise that people do, in fact, use the words in that manner...but, it's precisely because that particular picture is so engrained in colloquial understanding that of course that's how people use the word.

But, our modern laws presented in differential equations for things like volts, clearly seem to suggest that "pressure" is only a suitable understanding of what voltage "accomplishes" at the macroscopic level (which is why we use the metaphor), but fundamentally, it's merely the amount of energy delivered by 1 coulomb (or a set amount of electrons). It's more like if you had three 12 oz bottles; 1 filled with water, 1 with Pedialyte, and one with juice. A volt is how hydrating the 12 oz bottle is.

However, this then takes us to Donald Davidson and his article What Metaphors Mean, where he argues that metaphors mean what their words literally mean and that there is no hidden metaphorical meaning. — RussellA

I take it he means only in scientific applications, yes? :P Either way, I personally find this view unintelligible at face value.

I more or less agree with this; it's basically the direction my thoughts have been headed, lately.

With that being said, the only this you say that I overtly disagree with is:

Once I am able to metaphorically picture a voltage as a pressure, the metaphor becomes redundant. in that I now understand voltage as pressure. Not that voltage is like a pressure but rather voltage is a pressure. — RussellA

Voltage is not pressure; we are using one mode of thinking to facilitate another.

------

So, since we have similar thoughts...I've been mauling over recently if this is, perhaps, a re-envisioning of Maxwell's use of physical analogy in science, with the added concern of how to better adapt thought to those analogies in order to eliminate supposed "pseudo-problems".

Also, I've read a paper by John Preston regarding the similarities between Mach, Hertz, Boltzmann, and Wittgenstein's treatment of "pseudo-problems" and how specifically Hertz and Boltzmann were proponents of the idea that these "problems" were illusions that would ultimately vanish once we've adopted the proper expressions for the phenomena we are attempting to elucidate via analogy. Boltzmann specifically was very focused on this just before his death, and gave some lectures which sound surprisingly Wittgensteinian on the topic.

Isn't this proposal subject to criticisms of 'correspondence theory of truth'? — Wayfarer

Hertz, Boltzmann, and I take Wittgenstein held that the problem never arrives, because all that is meant by "truth" is the correspondence, and whether or not there is such a correspondence, reality will tell us.

"In order that this requirement may be satisfied, there must be a certain conformity between nature and our thought. Experience teaches us that the requirement can be satisfied, and hence that such a conformity does in fact exist" (Hertz, Intro).

As you rightly point out, the correspondence theory of truth is that P is true iff what P says corresponds with reality in the right way. But, then one can ask, in what sense can P, a proposition made up of words, correspond with reality made up of objects?

Also, it seems circular in its reasoning in that you could always ask how one is certain that what P says, in fact, conforms in the right manner to reality.

But, these three thinkers didn't think any of our "pictures", "models", "propositions" could be literally said to be True, with a capital "T", they are only more or less similar to what they are meant to depict.

It's like if I had a map of Boston...I can have several different styles and variations of that map showing different information, landmarks, territories, etc and the shapes could be different depending on the scale and what not.

What if we ask, "well which map is true"?

None of them, really. To be a true "map" of Boston, I'd need a map the same size as Boston that's identical to Boston in every way. The map isn't a "true" representation of Boston but each map I look at has some of the correspondences with Boston and those correspondences might be "true" while others not. Reality is what tells you whether or not this is the case.

The same is the case with my example above regarding pressures/volts amps/currents.

Is a volt a pressure? No, but certain similarities in one manner of thinking correspond to the other and can help to elucidate the other. But, it is not true that voltage is a pressure. Voltage is far more complicated but there is an isomorphism in how the two dynamic systems behave such that one can be meaningfully mapped to the other in an informative way.

So there must be more to Wittgenstein than he says of himself — RussellA

While I take your point, I don't necessarily agree that this must be the case.

With that being said...I tend to take Witt at his word when he says that all he's ever done is brought the ideas of others into closer proximity in order to see the similarities between them.

But, I think you're exactly right when you say:

Monet's originality was not in the marks he made but in the relationship between the marks he made. Similarly, as with a simile, the originality is in the comparison between two things, not the things themselves. — RussellA

So we know Wittgenstein may well have borrowed ideas from both the empiricist and metaphysician, but where in the Tractatus is hidden his unique insight into the relationship between the empiricist and the metaphysical? — RussellA

This is exactly the question I am searching after; if there is such a thing.

With that being said, I pointed out my disagreement with the original bit I quoted simply because I suspect part of Witt's influence is, in part, due to him "borrowing" so much from sources that typically disagree. Because of this, it held a certain position for each new generation of thinkers. Since the original interpretation was positivistic during Witt's life, it held a certain influence for some time among the prominent positivists, and then it was reinterpreted as being elucidatory, and that held prominence for some time before the "supposed" new reading came along championed by folks like Conant, which supposes the work is a proponent of there being only austere nonsense. Due to the diversity of its "sources" there's "something for everyone" so to speak, perhaps.

But, I think that's only part of it. I do believe that there is something unique in what he was doing in precisely the manner you point out regarding Monet. But, just as art is relevant to an age, I do wonder what if anything Witt can tell us today - even if I am correct that he did have something relevant to say to his contemporaries.

Hertz wrote the principles of mechanics, and died in 1894 in his 30s. Boltzmann died in 1906...Hertz said relatively little about his "picture" theory in The Principles of Mechanics, only saying that the images formed needed to not be contradictory, and needed to produce another image representative of the necessary consequents of the thing being pictured - namely, reality.

But, that's about it.

Even still, positivism was the prominent view amongst scientists and philosophers after the death of these two, and when the Tractatus was written in 1918.

I tend to wonder if Witt was trying to show how one can set up the positivism of Mach with the new logical methods of Frege's work and arrive at a Hertzian and Boltzmann like view, which allows of metaphysical pictures. This is to say that the manner in which Hertz envisioned it, when likewise furnished with Frege's work, draws a bridge between the two views - they share a logical bridge, so to speak.

At the time, this idea would have been relevant, but if this is the case, I wonder how it would be relevant today. Since the atomic view was proven right, scientists have cozied up to making metaphysical pictures of reality, that only loosely correspond to what its meant to picture. Examples are utilized all the time for teaching purposes, with the stipulation that "this isn't quite exactly how so and so looks" - the elucidation is, like Wittgenstein says, to be "thrown away" as it was only meant to be used as a heuristic to get the right picture. We employ a similar methodology when we talk about the characteristics of current in a conductor being isomorphic to water within a pipe. Pressures and currents correspond to voltages and amps, despite energy not being transmitted in any similar regard whatsoever. It's to be thrown away, once what you understand from it is gained. It makes the way for a fuller understanding.

If my thinking is even somewhat correct, in some ways we may have already taken a lot of the insights that perhaps Witt thought his contemporaries needed to make.

But on the other hand, in order to analyse them and incorporate them in theory, we are highly dependent on theoretical constructs which in some important sense (as Einstein said) dictate what it is we are seeing. — Wayfarer

Yes, I believe this is the problem of theory ladeness, right? That is, that our theory in some sense precedes our experience of the phenomena as such. This is why as Kuhn states our paradigms shift, as though we are seeing the same phenomenon through different lenses, so to speak. But, I take the problem of theory ladeness to not imply that objective reality is in any sense dependent upon our observation; rather, it is our understanding that hinges on our theory.

So, I wonder if real numbers are either subjective or objective. I mean, they're not to be found anywhere in the world, as such. Nor are they products of the mind, as they are the same for all who can count. — Wayfarer

Yea, this was a huge debate in mathematics (and still is to a lesser degree today) in the 1900s...formalism vs platonism....I've thought about it a bit myself, and while I haven't come down on either side of the topic, I do tend to wonder how intractable the problem truly is. I mean, it's as you say, why should we suppose that either options of the dichotomy are correct.

When, for example, scientists articulate that force is equal to the mass times the acceleration of some object, and plug in the numbers, in what sense do the numbers correspond to reality? They, certainly, give us information...Well, assuming two things:

1. Reality exists as it does regardless of experience
2. Reality is uniform (Things like energy are conserved)

You can imagine that if you develop a uniform system of fine enough granularity that you could compare reality to, since they are both uniform systems, the granularity of one is informative if superimposed onto the other.

If, I pour water into a jug, and measure how much water is in there, I can measure it in liters, or ounces, or weight and regardless of the differing "numbers" which represent the amount of water, that amount never changed. The trick is, we only get information relative to what we apply the system to. So the information gained is in some sense due to an intermingling between real and subjective.

Massimo Pigliucci, a philosopher at the City University of New York, was initially attracted to Platonism—but has since come to see it as problematic. If something doesn’t have a physical existence, he asks, then what kind of existence could it possibly have? “If one ‘goes Platonic’ with math,” writes Pigliucci, empiricism “goes out the window.” (If the proof of the Pythagorean theorem exists outside of space and time, why not the “golden rule,” or even the divinity of Jesus Christ?)

I believe I know of Pigliucci...I read the first quarter of his book Answers for Aristotle awhile ago. I'm pretty sure I've listened to some debates he's been involved in...regarding this quote, I don't quite agree that its as slippery as that slope, but I can appreciate his point and where he's coming from. But, my point is there feels like there is an equivocation going on between the question:

1. Did we invent math
2. Is the information gained by applying math invented?

The difference is the system and the information gained from the application of that system. The latter relies on reality existing as it does to furnish any information. We didn't invent the length, so to speak, but we did invent the ruler.

Witt says:

“My propositions are elucidatory in this way: he who understands me finally recognizes them as nonsense, when he has climbed out through them, on them, over them. (He must so to speak throw away the ladder, after he has climbed up on it.) He must surmount these propositions; then he sees the world rightly” (6.54).

He also says:

“The object of philosophy is the logical clarification of thoughts. Philosophy is not a theory but an activity. A philosophical work consists essentially of elucidations. The result of philosophy is not a number of philosophical propositions, but to make propositions clear” (4.112).

Elucidations comes to us from Frege and serve a pragmatic role:

“Definitions proper must be distinguished from elucidations. In the first stages of any discipline we cannot avoid the use of ordinary words. But these words are, for the most part, not really appropriate for scientific purposes, because they are not precise enough and flucuate in their use. Science needs technical terms that have precise and fixed meanings and in order to come to and understanding about these meanings and exclude possible misunderstandings, we give elucidations of their use”

Frege admits:

“Theoretically, one might never achieve one’s goal this way. In practice, however, we do manage to come to and understanding about the meanings of words. Of course we have to be able to count on a meeting of minds, on others guessing what we have in mind. But, all this precedes construction of a system and does not belong within the system”.

Witt never says that Philosophy is meaningless; he says philosophy is elucidatory...it attempts to clarify thoughts and ideas, in order to mitigate misunderstanding.

Which is why he says:

“The right method of philosophy would be this. To say nothing except what can be said [clearly], i.e. the propositions of natural science, i.e. something that has nothing to do with philosophy: and then always, when someone else wished to say something metaphysical, to demonstrate to him that he had given no meaning to certain signs in his propositions…” (6.53).

Notice how he says that the propositions of natural science have nothing to do with philosophy, simply that the proper way to engage in the problems philosophy is concerned with, is by using the propositions of science.

This isn’t to say much more than when engaging in metaphysics, use only expressions that can be tied back to reality (even as possibilities).

This is why Witt says:

“Philosophers constantly see the method of science before their eyes, and are irresistibly tempted to ask and answer in the way science does. This tendency is the real source of metaphysics, and leads the philosopher into complete darkness. I want to say here that it can never be our job to reduce anything to anything, or to explain anything. Philosophy really is ‘purely descriptive.’”

Philosophy doesn’t tell us what there is out there in the world, but it can help us understand what must be the case given a certain set of assumptions.

An example, I think, of what Witt has in mind can perhaps be seen in Einstein’s work on general relativity. In analyzing the concept of space and time, E gives several thought experiments, sometimes of impossible situations like trains going the speed of light. At the end of his work, he doesn’t accomplish anything scientific, so to speak – nothing was proven. But, he used the propositions of science, and descriptions we can all understand and agree to, in order to paint a new picture of space and time that made sense, and explained more than previous “vague” notions like absolute space and absolute time…. Only later did the “theory” get scientifically confirmed, and explained thereby changing our whole picture of reality.

I actually, personally, agree with you in terms of overall thesis. I think Aristotle's application of reason was both insightful and also not entirely wrongheaded.

I was struck about a year ago when I cracked open the physics and metaphysics for the first time since undergrad, and saw within the texts a thinker working through many similar problems as we are today. The notion of love and strife being elementary aspects of reality as equally but opposed interactions isn't so far off from how we think things work - its simply a difference usage of terms, and understandings, but ultimately they accomplish similar work.

I also agree that as I read the history of science, I am rarely confronted with ideas that are wholly wrong or wholly "right". Rather, I see thinkers taking this aspect and that aspect and reworking this and throwing out that...so many concepts come into fashion and are considered in one way, and then lose popular opinion only to reemerge with a new paint job considering contemporaneous information. That was my point regarding the atomic theory, not that the exact literal same ideas of corpuscles of differing shapes and sizes mechanically clumping together due to shape is right, but rather a more modern conception involving elementary particles. The bones of the idea were always strong, so to speak.

Neutrons decay with about a 13 minute half-life into a proton — Dfpolis

Well, neutrons are made up of quarks, and its the quarks being transformed into either up or down and what not that induces the "decay" of the proton into that of a neutron. So, again, it's not so much "decaying" as the constituents of the proton spontaneously becoming another elementary constituent.

Still, it does not matter, philosophically. What matters is the combination of potentiality and actuality that impermanence implies. Things are not only what they are (form), but a determinate tendency to become what they will be (hyle). (They can't become just anything). That is the meaning of hylomorphism. — Dfpolis

Yes, they cannot become just anything, they can only take on some certain predetermined forms. It's like if I had a quantum "die" that could "roll" any number between 1-10. While the form is indeterminant until it becomes one of the forms, those forms along with the potential to be any one of them constitutes the "die's" actuality. If we are disagreeing, I don't see exactly where.

Since "elementary particles" are not immutable, but can interact and decay to form other particles, they themselves are a combination of form — Dfpolis

We have to be careful, though. The use of the word "decay" isn't being used in the traditional sense of say a uranium atom decaying and releasing an alpha particle or something of the sort. When elementary particles decay, they transform into other elementary particles, like an up quark becoming a down quark. There is no internal relation shifting or loss of constituents in the process. It's merely a potential transition into another actuality.

See my article, "A New Reading of Aristotle's Hyle" — Dfpolis

I downloaded it! I'll work through it here and there. :smile:

In June of 1911 an institution was founded known as the Bridge. It was in part funded using the Nobel prize money of chemist and physicist Wilhelm Ostwald. Its purpose was to organize society under one common – scientific – worldview. It meant to do this by being a central hub for knowledge - A place where one could go and find answers or information regarding any question which science could provide. The bridge was not meant to simply be a giant library of sorts, but rather, it would standardize the information and organize it, with the aim being to provide this information to all other institutions, thereby promoting intellectual unity. By increasing the efficiency of science through standardization and organization, society could more effectively establish a common worldview which took seriously the immense scientific progress from the previous century. The Bridge, however, closed its doors in 1913, never seeing its goal accomplished, but its purpose lived on.

The project drew the attention of a number of its contemporary scientists, including the attention of theoretical physicist Ernst Mach. Mach, like Ostwald was a positivist. They both believed that bringing society under a common scientific worldview, was necessary to bring human reason into the next phase of its development. This required that science be reformulated to only allow within its explanations, facts which were built from experience, and experience alone. Because of this, Mach agreed with Ostwald on another point - that the atomic theory postulated by thinkers such as Helmholtz and Boltzmann, while useful perhaps on paper, was dangerous to the rigor of science. The theory violated what Mach took to be a fundamental tenet of science, that one should never theorize past experience – doing so was not only unnecessary, but dangerous to ‘the economy of thought’.

“One and the same view underlies both my epistemologicophysical writings and my present attempt to deal with the physiology of the senses – the view, namely, that all metaphysical elements are to be eliminated as superfluous and destructive to the economy of science” (AS, IX).

In 1912, a public manifesto was released by Mach; signed by 32 other thinkers, such as Einstein, Freud, Hilbert, Loeb, etc the document essentially called for precisely the vision Ostwald had put forth. Asking all interested scientists and philosophers to help establish a common worldview for society, by drawing upon all knowledge within the special sciences which can be derived from ‘the facts of experience’. Positive facts, as they were called, the positivism which Mach called for, influenced a number of like minded thinkers. Mach’s thinking would continue to influence the intellectuals in Vienna past the first world war. So, when Moritz Schlick, took over the position as chair of philosophy of science (a position previously held by Mach and Boltzmann), in 1922, he began having weekly structured group meetings intending to set the human pursuit of knowledge on proper footing. This group would eventually become known as the Vienna Circle, including members such as Rudolf Carnap, Otto Neurath, and Friedrich Weismann, and in 1929 they would release their own manifesto (written by Carnap, Hans Hahn, and Otto Neurath) citing as their aim the unify science, developing a language where every word refers to something real, not metaphysical – the position known as logical positivism. The group discussed in great detail Wittgenstein’s Tractatus, and saw within it a verification principle of meaning, much like their own work, but Wittgenstein was rarely compelled to join the meetings, and when he did, he would read Tagore’s poetry to them aloud with his back turned.

Ludwig Boltzmann stood opposed to energetisicm of Ostwald, and the anti-metaphysical agenda of Mach. Throughout the late 1800s/early 1900s most physicists were still against the atomic theory, and the influence of Mach on the sciences saw metaphysics as dangerous to the “economy of thought” insofar as it was useless metaphysics.

Boltzmann saw great utility in the use of models in his work, seeing them as inventions of the human mind which prove their value insofar as they prove useful.

“Models in the mathematical, physical and mechanical sciences are of the greatest importance. Long ago philosophy perceived the essence of our process of thought to lie in the fact that we attach to the various real objects around us particular physical attributes – our concepts – and by means of these try to represent the objects to our minds. Such views were formerly regarded by mathematicians and physicists as nothing more than unfertile speculations, but in more recent times they have been brought by J. C. Maxwell, H. v. Helmholtz, E. Mach, H. Hertz and many others into intimate relation with the whole body of mathematical and physical theory. On this view our thoughts stand to things in the same relation as models to the objects they represent. The essence of the process is the attachment of one concept having a definite content to each thing, but without implying complete similarity between thing and thought; for naturally we can know but little of the resemblance of our thoughts to the things to which we attach them. What resemblance there is, lies principally in the nature of the connexion [sic], the correlation being analogous to that which obtains between thought and language, language and writing. (…) Here, of course, the symbolization of the thing is the important point, though, where feasible, the utmost possible correspondence is sought between the two (…) we are simply extending and continuing the principle by means of which we comprehend objects in thought and represent them in language or “ (Boltzmann 1974a, 213).


Boltzmann, like Hertz, Mach, and Helmholtz agreed that the representations we make ought not
be said to share a complete similarity with the objects represented, but disagreeing with Mach,
Boltzmann believed that such metaphysical speculation could be fruitful.

“(…) Hertz makes physicists properly aware of something philosophers had no doubt long since stated, namely that no theory can be objective, actually coinciding with nature, but rather that each theory is only a mental picture of phenomena, related to them as sign is to designatum. (…) From this it follows that it cannot be our task to find an absolutely correct theory but rather a picture that is as simple as possible and that represents phenomena as accurately as possible. One might even conceive of two quite different theories both equally simple and equally congruent with phenomena, which therefore in spite of their difference are equally correct. The assertion that a given theory is the only correct one can only express our subjective conviction that there could not be another equally simple and fitting image” (Boltzmann 1974b, 90-91).

In order to explain, for example, the transference of heat, Boltzmann posited atoms whose motion transferred energy. Boltzmann says that “...the fact that this cannot be demonstrated quite so clearly is due only to the difficulties of computing molecular motion”. The atomistic view of the world, didn’t rely on experiences of atoms, but Boltzmann saw them as furnishing our understanding such that he thought: “...contemporary atomistics gives a fully adequate picture of all mechanical phenomena”; even if they have yet to prove them via experience, he says “...we shall hardly expect to find the phenomena that will not fit into the frame of the picture”, since, “...all essential facts are found in the features of our picture”. Adopting the term ‘bilder’ or ‘pictures’ from physicist Heinrich Hertz, Boltzmann essentially thought the models we make within the mind, are a kind of picture. Mach, however, thought them merely mathematical fictions, only proving useful on paper, but not truly grasping the matter. In fact, in 1910 Mach wrote: “If the belief in the reality of atoms is so essential for you, I forsake the physical way of thinking, I do not want to be a real physicist...I thank you very much for the community of believers. For I prefer the freedom of thought”.

Hertz owed much of his thought to his teacher Helmholtz, who posited a theory meant to explain how we form images of reality. Helmholtz, similar to Mach, believed that objective events in nature are the causes for our sensations – which he called signs -translated via our organs. These signs bear no resemblance to reality, they are, however, “...still signs of something – something existing or something taking place” (FP). Unlike signs, the images we form from them must, “...be similar in some respect to the object of which it is an image” (FP). He thought this a necessity in accounting for our ability to “... discover the lawful regularities in the processes of the external world” (FP). But, in what sense exactly they are to be seen as resembling one another isn’t immediately clear. In an earlier text, Helmholtz had written that: “Our representation of things can be nothing else at all except symbols, naturally given signs for things, that we learn to use for the regulation of our motions and actions...comparison between representation and things not only fails to exist in actuality...but any other kind of comparison is in no way thinkable and has no sense at all (1857).

In the Principles of Mechanics, Hertz says that in trying to predict future events,

“We form for ourselves images or symbols of external objects”...

In order that this requirement may be satisfied, there must be a certain conformity between nature and our thought.” (The Principles of Mechanics, 2)


Hertz believed that experience proves whether this conformity exists, insofar as our images are useful. Unlike Helmholtz, Hertz believed that you can form many different images for the same object, and they might differ in fundamental ways. They must all, however, adhere, Hertz thought, to two principles. These were:

“The form which we give them is such that the necessary consequents of the images in thought are always the images of the necessary consequents in nature of the things pictured.

And
All pictures must conform to logic

In picking between two (or more) images, Hertz said we ought to pick the more ‘appropriate’, that is, the one which pictures more essential relations and which has the fewest superfluous relations (2). But, we cannot avoid “empty relations” altogether Hertz thought, “they enter into the images because they are simply images, - images produced by our mind and necessarily affected by the characteristics of its mode of portrayal” (2). The pictures we form, can display their utility to us, thereby proving their conformity to reality without needing to suppose or supply any further conformity. “For our purposes it is not necessary that they should be I conformity with the things in any other respect” (PM,1). Hertz believed logic fully capable of disallowing inadmissible images into our mind, and paired with the first principle which disallows images which fail to conform to the essential relations of things experienced, our images could be both useful in science and improve in accuracy (3).
“What enters into the images for the sake of correctness is contained in the results of experience, from which the images are built up. What enters into the images, in order that they may be permissible, is given by the nature of our mind” (3).

Hertz ultimately thought:
“To the question whether an image is permissible or not, we can without ambiguity answer yes or no ; and our decision will hold good for all time. And equally without ambiguity we can decide whether an image is correct or not ;. but only according to the state of our present experience, and permitting an appeal to later and riper experience. Bat we cannot decide without ambiguity whether an image is appropriate or not ; as to this differences of opinion may arise. One image may be more suitable for one purpose, another for another ;. only by gradually testing many images can we finally succeed in obtaining the most appropriate.”




-----------------

Now, thinks back to Wittgenstein. Recall, that a thought is a logical picture of a fact (3); whether it is true or not requires us to compare it to reality. But, remember, meaningful language can present false facts; elements combined in a way which simply isn’t true.
“An atomic fact is thinkable means: we can imagine it” (3).


This is because, in thought, we can imagine states of affairs which simply turn out false. Wittgenstein combines Hertz’ two principles, stating that a pictures (a thought) is a picture insofar as it has a logical form. That is, every picture is permissible by logic – an illogical picture is not a picture - and its unique logical form is what it has in common with reality such that it can picture it.

Wittgenstein tells us “...everything in logic is permitted”. This is because “...we cannot think illogically” (5.473). It is therefore impossible “...to present in language anything which ‘contradicts logic’” (3.032). If the form of the thought is such that it pictures the essential relations of the thing being pictured, then the thought is true. It is therefore logic which limits the usage of meaningful language. While Wittgenstein indeed thought that the aim of science is a true picture of the world, he didn’t think that there was just one picture of the world.

“Let us imagine a white surface with irregular black spots. We now say: Whatever kind of picture these make I can always get as near as I like to its description, if I cover the surface with a sufficiently fine square network and now say of every square that it is white or black. In this way I shall have brought the description of the surface to a unified form. This form is arbitrary, because I could have applied with equal success a net with a triangular or hexagonal mesh. It can happen that the description would have been simpler with the aid of a triangular mesh; that is to say we might have described the surface more accurately with a triangular, and coarser, than with the finer square mesh, or vice versa, and so on. To the different networks correspond different systems of describing the world” (6.431).

The squares of the fine square mesh, or the triangles or hexagons of the other two, would be the objects with which we form atomic propositions; they merely have a form, and when connected with the other object which otherwise merely gives a colorlessness, we get a black or white shape. This is how science reaches its goal; by bringing experience into a unified whole, through the application of different pictures which are coherent to us, and furnish our understanding. But, Wittgenstein thought these pictures didn’t actually tell us anything about reality.

“(We could construct the network out of figures of different kinds, as out of triangles and hexagons together.) That a picture like that instanced above can be described by a network of a given form asserts nothing about the picture”.

This is why Wittgenstein believes that Newtonian mechanics merely brought “...the description of the universe to a unified form”, not that it literally describes how things exist. “ …the fact that it can be described by Newtonian mechanics asserts nothing about the world; but this asserts something, namely, that it can be described in that particular way in which it is described, as is indeed the case” (6.342). Wittgenstein, like Hertz and Boltzmann, thought that our pictures don’t literally picture the world, they merely furnish our understanding by giving us an intelligible picture that is useful. A picture is intelligible to us if there is a ‘uniformity’ present; that is, all elements are balanced and make sense relative to one another.

“In the terminology of Hertz we might say: Only uniform connexions are thinkable” (6.361).

We can only posit additional elements when there is an ‘asymmetry’ present in the picture.

"When, for example, we say that neither of two events (which mutually exclude one another) can occur, because there is no cause why the one should occur rather than the other, it is really a matter of our being unable to describe one of the two events unless there is some sort of asymmetry. And if there is such an asymmetry, we can regard this as the cause of the occurrence of the one and of the non-occurrence of the other"


Laws are not out in the world, and our utilization of the concept of law is only one mesh we can apply to the world. That the objects and laws which govern them are accurately pictured in science is an illusion according to Wittgenstein (6.371). Whatever mesh we apply to reality, we must not forget that we could equally and rightly apply another mesh as well. There is no riddle between the idealist and realist conception of the world, each are merely one mesh which essentially states “...Whatever building thou wouldst erect, thou shalt construct it in some manner with these bricks and these alone” (6.341). Helmholtz reached a similar position at the end of The Facts of Perceptions wherein he wrote:

“It is always well to keep this in mind in order not to infer from the facts more than can rightly be inferred from them. The various idealistic and realistic interpretations are metaphysical hypotheses which, as long as they are recognized as such, are scientifically completely justified. They may become dangerous, however, if they are presented as dogmas or as alleged necessities of thought. Science must consider thoroughly all admissible hypotheses in order to obtain a complete picture of all possible modes of explanation. Furthermore, hypotheses are necessary to someone doing research, for one cannot always wait until a reliable scientific conclusion has been reached; one must sometimes make judgments according to either probability or aesthetic or moral feelings. Metaphysical hypotheses are not to be objected to here either. A thinker is unworthy of science, however, if he forgets the hypothetical origin of his assertions. The arrogance and vehemence with which such hidden hypotheses are sometimes defended are usually the result of a lack of confidence which their advocates feel in the hidden depths of their minds about the qualifications of their claims.“ (The facts of Perception, 1878)


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More to come

As it happens, the very first post I entered on the predecessor forum to this one, was about what I now understand to be Platonic realism, i.e. that abstracta (in that case numbers), are real but not materially existent. I've discussed and debated the issue many times but I find that it's neither well understood nor widely supported - principally because it is obviously incompatible with physicalism. — Wayfarer

This is very interesting...

I've heard a line of reasoning that reminds me of this....I think it might have been Searle? Well, regardless...they made a case that there are things that are:

1. Epistemically objective
2. Epistemically subjective

3. Ontologically objective
4. Ontologically subjective

Something could be ontologically subjective which has a different mode of existence than ontologically objective things. But, this is not to say that they cannot also be epistemically objective.

I don't know if this helps or is similar to your line of thinking, but it reminded me of it, and thought it might help.


As for the rest of the post...I’ll admit, it’s a bit out of my element, but from what I gather, I’m interested, or at least have been doing a lot of thinking, on a tangential problem myself. What I mean is, it seems like in part aspects of the debate you pointed out are focused on the gutting of traditional metaphysics starting from around the time of Ockham, Bacon, and Descartes, which came to a head around the end of the 1800s, reducing metaphysics to nonsense, and our access to reality almost nonexistent.
But, interestingly enough, I believe that the metaphysicians won that debate... I think the general population simply hasn’t caught up yet so to speak. There is always a tidal effect as knowledge populates through a population, and words change meanings. Classical conceptions need to be updated, but it’s difficult to see how something thought of in one fashion could be intuitively and defensibly wrong, but in another acceptable and informative.

But, truthfully, I think a modern notion of forms is defensible. The forms are simply the arrangement of quarks, leptons, and bosons that make up protons and neutrons, or the form that a carbon atom takes, etc

I've always found the parallels between Socrates' treatment of "the good" and Wittgenstein's fascinating; it's actually what got me interested in Wittgenstein in the first place.

Both consider the term indefinable, but not to say irrelevant or unimportant in any sense of the word.

We know that historically, Wittgenstein read very few philosophers, but he was said to have read and enjoyed Plato.

While I agree, recall that modern culture is generally nominalist and empiricist. There are still advocates of scholastic realism and hylomorphism but they're mainly Catholic philosophers or specialised academics. (See this index.) As far as the mainstream of philosophy is concerned, Aristotelian metaphysics was retired pretty well around the same time as Aristotelian physics, with the scientific revolution and the abandonment of geocentrism. — Wayfarer

Indeed they were, but that's not to say that there is nothing that can be learned from Aristotle. I don't think he's wrong here...universal knowledge, which draws many particulars under a single concept is what we are after; that's what Newton did with his laws of motion, and what we continue to do by articulating laws. But, its even what we do when we understand something, in general. But, anyways, his notion of the actual primary causes, and what they entail is totally outdated; but the reasoning has always seemed sound to me (everything isn't made of fire, water, earth, air for example).

This is a theme I have been pursuing but I'm woefully under-prepared to really tackle it. But it's based on my belief that the decline of scholastic metaphysics was a momentous and generally calamitous change in Western culture. I'm always harking back to the supposedly spiritual elements of Greek philosophy but they get pretty short shrift on this forum and elsewhere. — Wayfarer

I'd be interested to hear more. Do you say this because you think that something was lost in the transition?

Those opinions, as he goes on to discuss, vary. They cannot all be his opinions. We should not take any of them to be his opinion in more than a tentative and preliminary way, subject to further consideration. — Fooloso4

Yes, but immediately following that he says:

"Such in kind [20] and in number are the opinions which we hold with regard to Wisdom and the wise. Of the qualities there described the knowledge of everything must necessarily belong to him who in the highest degree possesses knowledge of the universal, because he knows in a sense all the particulars which it comprises."

Notice how he says "Of the qualities described..."... it seems to be that he is articulating what he takes to be the essential aspect of the qualities previously described. It's like if I were to say, "people say a "good general" is brave, intelligent, and loyal; its therefore necessary that a good general be a good person". Idk I admit I could be misreading it, but that's how I always took it.

Metaphysics is the question of being, or ousia. Being is not a universal. — Fooloso4

Yes, but as he says:

"It is clear that we must obtain knowledge of the primary causes, because it is when we think that we understand its primary cause that we claim to know each particular thing. Now there are four recognized kinds of cause. Of these we hold that one is the essence or essential nature of the thing (since the "reason why" of a thing is ultimately reducible to its formula, and the ultimate "reason why" is a cause and principle); another is the matter or substrate; the third is the source of motion; and the fourth is the cause which is opposite to this, namely the purpose or "good";for this is the end of every generative or motive process. We have investigated these sufficiently in the Physics".

To obtain knowledge of a universal or to know each particular that falls under it without need of experience, we must know primary causes. Aristotle lists four, one of which is matter.

Your translation is slightly different than mine :razz:

But, in the quote you reference, I take Aristotle to be saying:

"We say wise people have qualities x,y,z...of these qualities y is the most crucial"

Namely, knowledge of universals or what is common to all particular instances.

It seems as though Aristotle is telling us what he takes wisdom to consist in.

If it is not worthy, just ignore it. — Paine

Every objection is worthy, my friend :smile:



So, from 4.001 we know that the entirety of language is simply every possible proposition.

This makes sense, given that to a proposition corresponds a possible state of affairs.

From 4.11, we know that the language of natural science is all true propositions.

So, we know that all the propositions of natural science are a subset of all possible propositions.

Okay, so where does this leave metaphysics? Well, since we know from 4.111 that philosophy is not one of the sciences, we know that it isn't confined to only true propositions, but can and does use possibly true propositions. Thought experiments are a good example, as are intuition pumps.

This distinction between philosophy and science draws clear limits on what metaphysics can accomplish, however, it does not outrightly reject its possibility. Philosophy cannot, for example, tell us whether any of our metaphysical speculation is accurate - it does not produce true propositions, like science which Witt points out in 4.112

Rather, it elucidates, or clarifies things by offering mental pictures that we can imagine.

Where does he say all propositions are language? — Paine

"The totality of propositions is the language" (4.001) — 013zen

But your reading of "domains" is not in the text. — Paine

What would a better word be?

Did you want a quote that said that word for word?

He says all propositions are language and all true propositions are science, therefore language is a larger domain and science is a smaller within that domain.

Hmmm...maybe you're right. I'll have to respond once I've spent a little more time re-reading a bit of the metaphysics.

But then it what sense can we call some person wise, as Aristotle does?

Which statements support this interpretation? — Paine

Without having to dig out the quotes that explain that a proposition is a possible state of affairs, I hope this helps:

"The totality of propositions is the language" (4.001)

"The totality of true propositions is the total natural science (or the totality of the natural sciences)" (4.11) — 013zen

I think it might be fair to say of the "anti-metaphysical movement," more broadly that it was the most dogmatic since late scholasticism, or at least that it had the greatest combination of ability and desire to enforce its dogma. People weren't put on trial for heresy, but people in the natural sciences were hounded out of their careers or threatened with this fate for violating the established orthodoxy. You see this in the history of quantum foundations up through the late 1990s and you still see it today with the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis controversy in biology. — Count Timothy von Icarus

It was, and its precisely under this climate that Wittgenstein grew up. The second wave of positivism as characterized by Ernst Mach would eventually influence the Vienna circle and the logical positivists/empiricists, with Russell adopting Mach's position coined as neutral monism.

But, there was a tension between Mach and his contemporary Ludwig Boltzmann, who defended the use of the atomic model within science, despite it being a metaphysical claim. Boltzmann appealed to another thinker, Heinrich Hertz that articulated what was called a "picture theory", which essentially said that science can provide understanding, and furnish a cohesive picture of the world, despite being speculative, or metaphysical. Boltzmann ultimately committed suicide, in a climate wholly hostile to his explaining the expansion of gases by appealing to an atomic model. It's unfortunate, because not long after the atomic principle would ultimately be adopted.

Wittgenstein knew of Boltzmann and Hertz from their work on mechanics (They wrote the books on mechanics) which Witt studied when he was an engineering student, before he met Frege and Russell. He is quoted as saying his work was highly derived from Hertz, Boltzmann, and Frege (and a few others...i'll have to find the quote).

So, I find it interesting that Witt's own writings involve a picture theory in the same spirit of Hertz and Boltzmann, but borrows heavily from Frege's work to develop the logic.

In the Principles of Mechanics, Hertz says very little saying pretty much that a picture in the manner he is thinking is a permissible only insofar as it is logically possible. I get the sense that Witt was defending this view, and therefore is against this antimetaphysical movement. Hence, why he admonished Russell's and the LP camp's interpretation of the work.

Given Wittgenstein's logic about what can be said within the limits of the world of facts, anything that goes beyond the world of facts (beyond the propositions of natural science) is metaphysical and outside the limit of what can be said. — Sam26

Witt says:

"The totality of true propositions is the total natural science (or the totality of the natural sciences)" (4.11)

But, language can convey possible states of affairs that are not true. Witt does not limit what can be said to the domain of science, but rather science is a smaller domain within the larger domain of possible natural language.

For example, philosophy doesn't simply seclude itself to true facts like science does. Which is why Witt says:

"Philosophy is not one of the natural sciences.
(The word 'philosophy' must mean something which stands above or below, but not beside the natural sciences.)" (4.111)

Philosophy does not discover which propositions are true, or engage in simply reiterating scientific propositions.... it only clarifies what can be said.

"The object of philosophy is the logical clarification of thoughts.
Philosophy is not a theory but an activity.
A philosophical work consists essentially of elucidations.
The result of philosophy is not a number of "philosophical propositions", but to make propositions clear.
Philosophy should make clear and delimit sharply the thoughts which otherwise are, as it were, opaque and blurred" (4.112).

It is only whereof we cannot speak clearly thereof we must remain silent, and philosophy's aim is to clarify and make clear what is said, not to put forward true statements like science. Metaphysical speculation, if tethered to reality in some fashion, could be one manner of clarification, I think.

Speculation about first things is not knowledge. The reason is simple. We have no experience of the beginning or origins. Knowledge begins with the senses, aided by memory in some animals, and by art and reasoning in the case of human beings. Knowledge and art result from experience. (981a) — Fooloso4

Speculation about first things is not knowledge. — Fooloso4

Knowledge does begin with the senses, but it does not end there. As Aristotle says:

"Such and so many are the notions, then, which we have about Wisdom and the wise. Now of these characteristics that of knowing all things must belong to him who has in the highest degree universal knowledge; for he knows in a sense all the instances that fall under the universal. And these things, the most universal, are on the whole the hardest for men to know; for they are farthest from the senses. And the most exact of the sciences are those which deal most with first principles; for those which involve fewer principles are more exact than those which involve additional principles, e.g. arithmetic than geometry. But the science which investigates causes is also instructive, in a higher degree, for the people who instruct us are those who tell the causes of each thing. And understanding and knowledge pursued for their own sake are found most in the knowledge of that which is most knowable (for he who chooses to know for the sake of knowing will choose most readily that which is most truly knowledge, and such is the knowledge of that which is most knowable); and the first principles and the causes are most knowable; for by reason of these, and from these, all other things come to be known, and not these by means of the things subordinate to them. And the science which knows to what end each thing must be done is the most authoritative of the sciences, and more authoritative than any ancillary science; and this end is the good of that thing, and in general the supreme good in the whole of nature. Judged by all the tests we have mentioned, then, the name in question falls to the same science; this must be a science that investigates the first principles and causes; for the good, i.e. the end, is one of the causes."

Wisdom is the knowledge of universals, which are the furthest from the senses and therefore hardest to know.

But, knowledge of first principles and causes, Aristotle says are most knowable.

Democritus gave a more plausible account of material causes but Aristotle's inquiry extends to the good of each thing and the whole of nature. (982b) A full account should not only address the good of each thing and the whole, but it should be good, that is, beneficial to human beings. Even if the account fails to satisfy the former it can aim to satisfy the latter. — Fooloso4

I also quoted that passage because, you're right, Aristotle does classify the "good" as something tangible, accounting for reality to some degree. But, one should wonder if a metaphysical account of reality ought to include any account of the "good" in our times. Obviously, it's still relevant and insightful to work in ethics.

All kinds of knowledge, then, are more necessary than this one, but none is better.
(983a)

Between these statements he questions whether such knowledge is appropriate for human beings. It is divine knowledge, both in the sense that it is knowledge of the divine as cause and knowledge that a god alone or most of all would have. Above the entryway to the temple of Apollo are inscribed the words "know thyself". One way in which this was understood is that man should know his place. He is not a god and does not possess knowledge of the gods in the double sense of knowing the gods and knowing what the gods know. Knowledge of the source and cause of the whole is not something that human beings possess. We do not even know if the divine is a cause or if the divine knows the cause.This should be kept in mind when Aristotle turns to theology. — Fooloso4

Yea, this is a good point, and one that I didn't notice before. It's weird then because immediately after saying this, he goes into what wisemen have speculated the first causes are. So, does he believe that knowledge of such things is or isn't suitable for the human mind to comprehend?

Well, he begins by saying a few things:

1. Humans have an innate desire to know
2. This knowledge takes different forms
3. Regardless of the form, knowledge begins from the senses

According to Aristotle, philosophy begins when we look at the world around us with a sense of wonder. This sense of wonder he characterized as a desire to know ‘why’ things happen as they do, and not simply ‘how’ things happen. The latter of these two forms of knowledge is, according to Aristotle, primarily concerned with utility, and is given to us through the senses. We see how things occur, and over time, through the use of our memory, we can say how they will likely occur in the future. With this knowledge, we can predict and manipulate future events by recreating past conditions. Knowledge of ‘why’ things occur is ancillary in some sense, contributing little in terms of utility. Therefore, this form of knowledge, which Aristotle called ‘wisdom’ was only sought once humans had afforded themselves comfort and security from the harshness of nature. Knowing ‘why’ a seed grows into a tree isn’t required to know that it will, and you only need the latter to grow an orchard.

This kind of knowledge, Aristotle calls “connected experience”, which is when we call many experiences under a single theory, and form a judgment regarding a class of objects, as opposed to an individual object, and attempts to explain why they occur by appealing to causes and principles.

He then notes the differing thoughts philosophers (or wise men) have held regarding the first cause and principles of reality.

He notes that the “first philosophers” thought that these principles were only matter; that is, there was an original matter that changes and modifies itself through time and eventually became all we see today. They thought the universe was eternal, and had within it all the matter already, with no more being created or destroyed.

He then notes that despite various opinions of this sort, none agree on exactly how many “original causes” there are. Some thought there was “one”, others that there must be “two” primary types of matter that became everything we see now...others thought “four” and folks like Democratus that thought the primary matter was “atoms” of differing shapes and sizes that connect together to form macroscopic objects thought there was countess primary atoms.

Aristotle then criticizes each of these and offers his own take on the number and nature of the original causes or principles that lead to macroscopic reality.

-----

This raises several questions regarding wisdom and the possible limits of what is and can be known. — Fooloso4

But, you're right given the historical evidence. We know that Aristotle was wrong, and an idea more akin to Democratus' was more right...there is serious concern regarding the method Aristotle employs to reach "metaphysical knowledge". He uses reason to try and challenge other ideas, and furnish his own account, and it lead us in the wrong direction for generations until folks like Descartes, Bacon, Newton began challenging Aristotle's ideas and considering the atomic mechanical principle of his predecessors.

I have thoughts on Aristotle's metaphysics, but I don't believe that I fully understand the issue that you're trying to articulate in the OP.

Would you be willing to try and clarify it a bit?

I am not well acquainted with the entirety of the text, by any means...but, I am familiar with the first few bits as it relates to another interest. This might be a good opportunity to dig into it a bit more.

Where he does not make a distinction must be looked at in light of where he does. The text hangs together as a whole. — Fooloso4

While, I agree with the second part...the first part I don't catch your meaning. I have cited several examples where it does seem as though Witt is making a distinction.

How are we to understand this? Clearly the world does not literally cease to exist. Wittgenstein is dead. The world has not ceased to exist. There is more to this than can be seen by focusing on a part to the exclusion of the whole. — Fooloso4

Exactly right - how are we to understand this? Was Witt an idiot? I think not. By pointing out that Witt is using the word "world" in a stipulative sense which sets itself apart from how he's using the word "reality", and justifying it by citing examples where we see him say one thing about the world and another about reality, the confusion vanishes. No longer is it something which seems contradictory.

One way, which I am advocating for is that insofar as the world is made up of pictures that furnish the playing field of logical space in my mind, the world does cease when I die, despite reality continuing.

It does not supplant what is said, it attempts to explain it in light of what else is said, that is, with regard to its place in the whole of the text. It is not as if he is rejecting what he said previously about the world being the totality of facts. — Fooloso4

Certainly not, and I'd hope that it wouldn't supplant what you'll eventually say. I don't take him to be rejecting it, I take him to be building on and clarifying it with latter statements.

The totality of facts determine the world, but only insofar as the world is made up of pictures of facts.

That "the world is my world" means that the world of the metaphysical subject ends when the metaphysical subject does. — Fooloso4

That the metaphysical subjects ends...when it ends? I'm guessing this is a typo, because, well, yea.

It is like the eye and the visual field. It does not alter what is in the world, but rather the ability of the metaphysical subject to see it, to experience it, to live it. — Fooloso4

See, this is what I mean when I say:

Again, I'd like to reiterate that it seems that you and I agree on many of the salient points, and I think draw similar conclusions — 013zen

This I agree with, but the only change I would make is that I would say:

It is like the eye and the visual field. It does not alter what is in [reality], but rather the ability of the metaphysical subject to see it...[which determines the world they see] — Fooloso4

As Witt says:

"(A proposition can, indeed, be an incomplete picture of a certain state of affairs, but it is always a complete picture)" (5156).

and insofar as:

"In the proposition the thought is expressed..." (3.1).

The sum total of our thoughts, which are pictures of the facts we have acquired, despite being incomplete insofar as we are limited in what we can experience, still form a cohesive whole "world". When Witt says that the world is determined by the facts and by them being all the facts, what he means is those are all the facts we have access to. Each instance of a world is a limited but complete picture of reality. Everything still makes sense to us according to our world. If this wasn't the case, we couldn't make sense of anything unless we had every piece of the puzzle already given to us by reality.

Wittgenstein wants us to be silent about the propositions of metaphysics. — Sam26

I would say that, perhaps, he wants us to be silent about certain kinds of metaphysics. Like Hume before him which said to "cast into the fire" all metaphysics devoid of quantification or qualification, this reduces the sphere substantially. Hume didn't, for example, consider folks like Newton wrong in their metaphysics that investigated space, time, and force. I don't know if Witt would disparage this manner of metaphysics, but most would inevitably be thrown to the wayside.

These propositions include, but are not limited to, religion (praying for e.g.), poetry, music, and art, so there are many ways to express the inexpressible. — Sam26

Have you read Witt's "Lecture on Ethics"? It's very short, only like 7 pages. I think it would help you flesh this out a bit. Witt's views regarding ethics were, I think, more robust than simply somehow through, say praying, we are able to show what we cannot express clearly. But, this is certainly, I think, part of it. The question is, what does it show?

After all, he says in the Preface that the truth of the propositions outlined in the Tractatus is unassailable and definitive — Sam26

Consider why he said this, especially in light of what else he says in the preface:

"Here I am conscious that I have fallen far short of the possible. Simply
because my powers are insufficient to cope with the task. May others
come and do it better".

He says:

"...the truth of the thoughts communicated here seems to me unassailable and definitive"

He says that to him the thoughts seem unassailable and definitive, not that they simply ARE such.

Just as each of us has certain beliefs which seem definitive to us, but we'd admit might not be, I think Witt is being humble here and simply saying, "This is the best I could do, and I can't make sense of it any other way".

That's just my take, though.

I can see you no longer want to focus on the quotes wherein Witt does not make a distinction between the world, and "my world". Where he literally says, when death occurs THE world ceases to exist. As well as where despite reality being the same, THE world is quite another - waxing and waning, as he says.

I appreciate you directing me to another post, but truthfully if you can't admit how your interpretation requires you to supplant what's literally said with slight modifications in order to maintain it, that's indicative that - while you might be right in many regards - that your theory needs reworking.

An interpretation is only viable if it can account for what is said...this is why the positivistic interpretation fell to the way side, because while in isolation some quotes seem to suggest a pro-positivism inclination, but taken as a whole, it runs into difficulties.

Again, I'd like to reiterate that it seems that you and I agree on many of the salient points, and I think draw similar conclusions, so when I say I don't see the "work" your interpretation of this area of the text does, what I mean is, it's hard for me to see how it isn't superfluous to try and maintain the point given the fact that I can maintain seemingly similar views to yours despite disagreeing on this point.

The propositions ‘p’ and ‘∼p’ have opposite sense, but there corresponds to them one and the same reality.
(4.0621)

If 'p' exists in the world then 'not p' does not. If If 'p' exists in reality then 'not p' does not. That 'not p' does not exist is a negative fact. It is true that 'not p' does not exist. — Fooloso4

Okay, so a couple of things...

Your example is not so much an example of a negative fact, as simply a tautology...which is Witt's point.

But, a negative fact would be something like:

"The moon is not made of cheese".

This would still be portrayed as "P"

While, perhaps, seemingly silly, there was serious debate at the time regarding the status of negative facts. Like:

"There is not an elephant atop the Eiffel tower".

If traditionally how we think of a positive fact, like: "The earth is fairly round in shape" is that something obtains in this case. To this fact corresponds a reality. But, this got folks like Russell wondering, what exactly corresponds to negative facts?

Even supposing your example, despite being a tautology, we can see that

If P then not P and visa versa, depending on what obtains, either P or not P will have to be true at some point in many instances. Imagine the fact:

"It is raining in Manhattan"

If it turns out to not be raining, then not P is true. But, what exactly obtains here? Russell said a negative fact "It is not raining in Manhattan" is a negative fact which corresponds with reality in the true way or the false way if it turns out to be false.

This is what Witt is critiquing here...right before the part you quote, he says:

"One could then, for example, say that "p" signifies in the true way what "∼p" signifies in the false way, etc".

He's saying that the solution is found in applying Frege's notion of sense and refence. Both P and not P are pictures with different senses, but to each corresponds the same reality, regardless of whether true or false. If not P turns out true, then a negative fact does obtain, and its the same facts as the positive fact, just in opposite senses.

They do not differ with regard to the facts of the world. In both cases the facts remain the same. — Fooloso4

Correct - the same reality, despite the worlds being "quite another" entirely.

“In brief, the world must thereby become quite another. It must so to speak wax or wane as a whole. The world of the happy is quite another than that of the unhappy” (6.43). — 013zen

He makes a distinction between the world and my world. — Fooloso4

No, you do.

He says:

"The world and life are one" (5.621).

Which is why:

"As in death, too, the world does not change, but ceases" (6.431).

I’ll try again...Witt says,

“The totality of existent atomic facts [(states of affairs)] is the world” (2.04).

in 2.06, he then goes on to say:

“The existence and non-existence of atomic facts [(states of affairs)] is the reality. (The existence of atomic facts we also call a positive fact, their non-existence a negative fact.)”

The world is the totality of positive facts, while reality is the totality of positive and negative facts.

Without going into it further, for the moment...consider that other comments in the text also seem to suggest that there must be a distinction between the world and reality. How else could the world of the happy man be different from the world of the sad man? On Witt account they are, despite them being pictures of the same reality.

“In brief, the world must thereby become quite another. It must so to speak wax or wane as a whole. The world of the happy is quite another than that of the unhappy” (6.43).

This is because I am my world. Which is why:

“...In death, too, the world does not change, but ceases” (6.431).

The world...my world, is in my mind and is made up of pictures of reality.