Wittgenstein returns to the question. "What is the object of a thought?" (e.g. when we say, "I think that King's College is on fire"). (Page 34)
This is, he says, typically metaphysical, because “an unclarity about the grammar of words” is expressed “in the form of a scientific (he has physics in mind) question”.

He identifies four “origins” of the question, which I think are intended to be confusions expressed in it. (Page 35)

1.. ‘One of the origins of our question is the use of "I think/expect" and “I think/expect” in two distinct ways. “I expect him” and “I expect that he will come”. We then compare “I expect him” to “I shoot him”.
He turns his attention to the shadows:-
2 a) Two different sentences can have the same sense, which becomes a shadowy being (unless perhaps it is a material object).
2 b) Shadowy sense to “be a picture” that “cannot be questioned”; it doesn’t need any interpretation.
3) Sometimes a sentence brings images before our mind's eye. These images are “translations” into pictorial language. But they must be similar to, copies of, what they are pictures of.

i) A map of all or part of our planet, he says, is not a picture by similarity or a copy in this sense. (Page 36)
ii) A picture of someone’s face projected it “in such a way that no one would normally call the projection ‘a good portrait of so-and-so’ because it would not look a bit like him”. This is, let us say, a bit complicated.

This gets him to where he wants to be. The sentence itself can do the work of the shadow, and so no shadow is needed. We can explain what the sentence means, perhaps, by an ostensive definition. That’s how words and things can be connected.

He can now go back and correct the path that he started down. (Page 37) The idea of the shadow is deeply rooted, but it is not what we really want to say. What we want to say is that “the fact which we wish for must be present in our wish”. Well, the answer just above cited ostensive definition to explain what “King’s College is on fire”. That works for expectation and wishing, too – after the event. But I could have given a similar explanation before it, as well.

At this point, a summary. How do our thoughts “connect” with the things they are about? The connection is made by means of ostensive definition. Ordinary language makes it seem that the connection must have been made during the act of thinking. But that’s not the case.
He gives us examples that could be taken to mean that thinking or meaning can be regarded as a mental activity, and so leading us to feel that something has been explained and no further questions are appropriate.

Now he returns to imagining and King’s College (Page 38) and subjects this to a cross-examination. I take it that links back to the rather unsatisfactory discussion of imagining earlier. But here, he concludes that our mistake is to think that images and experiences of all sorts, must be present in our mind at the same time.

Finally, a metaphor (Page 39) , - pulling a string of beads being pulled out of a box through a hole in the lid, to persuade us that “We easily overlook the distinction between stating a conscious mental event, and making a hypothesis about what one might call the mechanism of the mind.”

You speak as if “the color system” guarantees a metaphysical space for redness, as though the system enforces an ontological necessity. But the necessity is grammatical, not metaphysical. It comes from how we use color words, not from a hidden structure of reality. — Joshs

I get your point. But eventually realized that the peculiarity of this discussion is precisely that it is conducted, to put it this way, de re and not de dicto. If he asked whether we could abolish the concept of redness, that would have been one question. But he doesn't. He asks whether we could abolish redness, and compares it to destroying a watch. That comparison is a nonsense, to start with.

I keeping reaching for a key that will make all this fall in to place. But it still elude me. The discussion later on page 38 is all very well, but I don't see it clarifies this passage.

@Joshs

Sec 11 Our words’ connection to the world (p. 35-39)

The sentence itself can do the work of the shadow, and so no shadow is needed. We can explain what the sentence means, perhaps, by an ostensive definition. That’s how words and things can be connected. — Ludwig V

Nice work; my thoughts are along the same lines. He is showing us examples** of how we can correct the connection of word and world, as you say, by ostensive definition, or, alternatively, by explanation, demonstration, being an example, by force, etc., but words and the world don’t (usually) need to be (re-)connected because, by default, they just are connected (as you say, “no shadow is needed”). “…the interpolation of a shadow between the sentence and “reality” loses all point” (p.37) [my quote marks]. In the PI he will talk of this as there being no space “to get between pain and its expression”. (#245)

Philosophy imagines we make that connection every time (say, to “our understanding”). But there are events (in time, place) where “language” and the world actually do have a disconnect (along our criteria for judgment), but philosophy interprets the sheer possibility of disconnection, and the difficulty of reconnecting, as if the “problem” is in the activity of (always) connecting which is then just a puzzle to “know”, like a “a queer mechanism” (cue some neuroscience).

But in practice we fall back on the many separate ways we have for straightening things out. Philosophy needs to be shown any of these examples of means of reconnection—shown that language and the world “can be” reconnected—to realize the exception means that the word and world are not always mitigated by some object like “perception” or data, or other “shadow” But it then also follows that there is no “object” for there to be a “fact” of it to communicate. There are not certain, fixed, ever-present objects, as if part of “me”, like, “my understanding”, that I simply put into words.

The best juxtaposition is the difference between “…a thing I am thinking about, not 'that [thing] which I am thinking'.” (P.38) In the first, we are perhaps in a discussion (with ourselves even) considering, remarking on, analyzing, etc. a thing/object. Thinking in the second case is just the description of a thing/object which I have, “my thought”, which I take as a fact (as complete and without any need for context). But, like with the Napoleon example, there is no singular fact that is a certain, unique criteria (there, for identification).

Most importantly, understanding is not “present” during communication. Understanding happens after expression, in coming back to it, e.g., when you have demonstrated that you haven’t understood how to do something, or how to continue a series as expected, or that your expression makes it clear that you do not understand what I was trying to say (apart from disagreeing, etc.). We mostly say things that have already been said in situations similar enough to ours that it doesn’t need more elaboration (mostly). This public nature of language is because it is a record of our history, that “The connection between these words and [the world] was, perhaps, made at another time.” (P. 39)


**Sometimes I feel like his examples here are just terrible. I mean is it just me or waaaaay too unnecessarily esoteric for the point he is trying to make, except that he seems to feel he needs to chase the rabbit all the way down the hole to cover as many senses/analogies in which philosophy might frame our thinking as objects, etc.

Sometimes I feel like his examples here are just terrible. I mean is it just me or waaaaay too unnecessarily esoteric for the point he is trying to make, except that he seems to feel he needs to chase the rabbit all the way down the hole to cover as many senses/analogies in which philosophy might frame our thinking as objects, etc. — Antony Nickles

I'm glad you mention that. I agree with you, and there should not be a problem about recognizing that Homer sometimes nods. I still have no way of shifting my feeling that something has gone wrong in the discussion of imagination and the question whether we can imagine the abolition of redness.

Most importantly, understanding is not “present” during communication. Understanding happens after expression, in coming back to it, .... — Antony Nickles

Yes. I think that W is right to point to the importance of explanations after the event. But it seems odd to say that understanding is not "present" during communication. Surely understanding is expressed in communication and in even in non-communicative action. In any normal action, there is a huge amount of complexity and we may be unable to resolve various ambiguities simply of the basis of a single action. Then we need to clarify after the event. But a great deal of that complexity can be expressed in the processes of planning and preparation, before the action.

philosophy interprets the sheer possibility of disconnection, and the difficulty of reconnecting, as if the “problem” is in the activity of (always) connecting which is then just a puzzle to “know”, like a “a queer mechanism” (cue some neuroscience). — Antony Nickles

Philosophy wants to construct a logical structure of the action and then turn it into an actual structure "in the mind". It's like insisting that all arguments be expressed in formal logical format, even when we actually utter a short version, trading on shared assumptions and attitudes.

. I think that W is right to point to the importance of explanations after the event. But it seems odd to say that understanding is not "present" during communication. Surely understanding is expressed in communication and in even in non-communicative action. In any normal action, there is a huge amount of complexity and we may be unable to resolve various ambiguities simply of the basis of a single action. Then we need to clarify after the event. But a great deal of that complexity can be expressed in the processes of planning and preparation, before the action. — Ludwig V

I read W as making a distinction between what phenomenologists call the mode of givenness of an object and the object taken in a theoretical sense. It’s not that a mode of givenness doesn’t give us to understand a thing, but that what we are given to understand is a contextual sense of an object that cannot be swallowed up within a more general categorical definition on it. The particular givenness doesn’t imply the more general concept. On the contrary, the general meaning is secondary to and derivative of the particular sense.

But it seems odd to say that understanding is not "present" during communication. — Ludwig V

I believe he would say that understanding is not a quality or thing—that is present or not; it is that picture/analogy which leads to the feeling of oddness. I think understanding is more appropriately thought of as a process (not a mental mechanism, but: clarification, explication, distinction, etc.) I only mentioned the “after” version, but of course there is the “before” process as well; e.g., “Tell me your understanding?” or: trying to understand.

Yes, there can be a multiplicity of meaning and complexity “in” communication (the wording here is also misleading), but we are only aware of the need to explain or clarify before or after the expression. Sometimes there is no “understanding”; we don’t speak of it when I ask you to pass the salt, as you say, “trading on shared assumptions and attitudes.”

what we are given to understand is a contextual sense of an object that cannot be swallowed up within a more general categorical definition on it. — Joshs

Broadly, that's ok with me.

The particular givenness doesn’t imply the more general concept. On the contrary, the general meaning is secondary to and derivative of the particular sense. — Joshs

I'm a bit puzzled about what "swallowed up" means here. We only ever encounter particular houses and particular people. Even though they are particular, they can be described in terms of generalities.

we are only aware of the need to explain or clarify before or after the expression. Sometimes there is no “understanding”; we don’t speak of it when I ask you to pass the salt, as you say, “trading on shared assumptions and attitudes.” — Antony Nickles

Yes. There's an interplay between what we are aware of, what W calls a mechanism of the mind - I think of it as the unconscious. Understanding seems to occur in both ways. But perhaps we need a third category - our ability to explain ourselves, to answer questions. A disposition is odd. It manifests in certain circumstances and not in others. In between manifestations, there's nothing - except counter-factuals about what I would do or what might manifest itself in a different context.

There's an interplay between what we are aware of, what W calls a mechanism of the mind - I think of it as the unconscious. — Ludwig V

I take his point to be that we create the idea of a mechanism. We try to internalize the processes of thinking, understanding, and meaning to imagine we control what the words that we say do (or do not) mean, as if we could avoid the responsibility to make ourselves understood, or not have to answer for what we say.

And the “unconscious” aspect of meaning I would offer is that words have a history and are subject to circumstances, which are either so pedestrian that they operate without our doing (being conscious of) anything, or that at times their possibilities of meaning outstrip our ability to encompass and/or control (be conscious of) how they will come off in a particular (even novel) context.

@Joshs @Ludwig V

Sec. 12 Expression and its accompaniments—memory, judgment, thinking (p. 40-43)

the experience of thinking may just be the experience of saying, or may consist of this experience plus others which accompany it. — After “Let us sum up”, p. 43

And so we are adding layers back in, and I think we’re left to contemplate rather than being told, what “others”? Obviously we do many things along with saying things (Austin would even say “in” saying them), and it is just a matter of not getting caught in the old traps while looking into them.

At p. 40 I take him to be differentiating my “expression”, in the sense of “by me”, from me describing a mental object that I have. The analogous “tune”, which he divorces from the mechanism of the phonograph, is from the world (before us) and is not “kept, stored, before we express it”. We perform the tune, as we go. Now beforehand, or when that retelling is interrupted, we may search our memory, but not necessarily, as we may just start off (or continue).

We might exhibit pain or describe a vision because these are actual—though not necessarily unique—physical states. But I would venture that expecting is just the label for a judgment we make from the evidence of our response to anticipation (fear of the past, in the case of a gunshot). The answer to: “Why are you tense, steadying yourself, holding your breath?” is not: “I have an expectation.”

As well, I see “groping for a word” not as putting a word to something “already expressed” internally (p. 41), but as an activity (though perhaps just passive waiting). In this sense, the expression is only in having found the word, in the saying of it (to you or myself).

I see his use of “expression” as meant to capture the event of that initial introduction of a thought, hope, or wish to the world, to, as he says, “existence” (p. 40), without the need for any “independent” process or thing in a “peculiar medium” (p. 43). The “sentence” is “reality”. (p. 37, 41)

This, of course, doesn't mean that we have shown that peculiar acts of consciousness do not accompany the expressions of our thoughts! Only we no longer say that they must accompany them. — p. 42

(The power of this “must” I take as very important to why all the forced analogies and “fixed standards” (p.43), but so far he only goes so far as to blame our forms of speech—not yet seeing the need driving it).

I think it is worth noting that he wants to add back in a sense of “private” thinking and experiences, as I take all this here (and in the PI) to be for much more than just a conclusion about “private language”. Here he acknowledges certain senses of privacy, such as being hidden from others, like a secret we tell to ourselves in an aside; as we could reveal (and thus hide) the “muscular, visual, tactile sensations” of my body, in the sense of bringing attention to (like admitting) the fact that I have them.

His method allows us perspective on thinking as the assumption that we just speak our “thoughts” (not in the sense of voicing our inner dialogue), by asking “what do we say if we have no thought?” and then pointing out the sense of speaking thoughtlessly as simply not considering beforehand the consequences of saying something in a particular context.

Next, personal experiences, I think.

The particular givenness doesn’t imply the more general concept. On the contrary, the general meaning is secondary to and derivative of the particular sense.
— Joshs
I'm a bit puzzled about what "swallowed up" means here. We only ever encounter particular houses and particular people. Even though they are particular, they can be described in terms of generalities — Ludwig V

Yes, but each time we invoke the same generality we mean a particular sense that wasn’t already present in the generality. So it’s never the ‘same’ generality being used each time.

The answer to: “Why are you tense, steadying yourself, holding your breath?” is not: “I have an expectation.” — Antony Nickles

The answer to idealism, in a nutshell.

As well, I see “groping for a word” not as putting a word to something “already expressed” internally (p. 41), but as an activity (though perhaps just passive waiting). In this sense, the expression is only in having found the word, in the saying of it (to you or myself). — Antony Nickles

I think of it, not as a repetition of something stored, but as a recreation, in which each element is added because it "fits" with the previous one. Or, the metaphor of the pearls being drawn out of a box, but are not stored in the box, but (re-)created at the moment that it is needed.

(The power of this “must” I take as very important to why all the forced analogies and “fixed standards” (p.43), but so far he only goes so far as to blame our forms of speech—not yet seeing the need driving it). — Antony Nickles

That's a nice example of how a new position can generate the next question.

I think it is worth noting that he wants to add back in a sense of “private” thinking and experiences, — Antony Nickles

Perhaps this passage should be quoted more often in debates about the PLA.

I have been trying in all this to remove the temptation to think that there 'must be' what is called a mental process of thinking, hoping, wishing, believing, etc., independent of the process of expressing a thought, a hope, a wish, etc. — p. 41

It is striking, at least to me, that what he means by a mental process is a conscious process, which we can become aware of if we pay attention what we are conscious of from moment to moment. It's an effective tactic, even if it smacks more of phenomenology than logic. But I am puzzled about the mental processes posited by congitive science. I have the impression that these writing do not pay attention to the difference between conscious and unconscious processes. That allows the argument that the must be certain processes going on that we are not aware of - i.e. unconscious processes. (No doubt this is not intended in a dualistic sense, but is based on the assumption that a physical substrate will be identified in due course.

Yes, but each time we invoke the same generality we mean a particular sense that wasn’t already present in the generality. So it’s never the ‘same’ generality being used each time. — Joshs

Yes, you get that result if you think of same in the light of the logical axiom that A=A is the paradigm of sameness. Actually, for me, it is the limiting case of sameness and is the point at which it is deprived of all real meaniing. Obviously, any generalization must be applicable to a range of particular cases, which may will likely not be identical in all respects, as required by our paradigm. But the concept of a paradigm allows for differences. In short, your argument suggests that generality is, strictly speaking, impossible. That may not be a reductio ad absurdum but it is certainly a reduction to pointlessness.

Yes, but each time we invoke the same generality we mean a particular sense that wasn’t already present in the generality. So it’s never the ‘same’ generality being used each time.
— Joshs
Yes, you get that result if you think of same in the light of the logical axiom that A=A is the paradigm of sameness. Actually, for me, it is the limiting case of sameness and is the point at which it is deprived of all real meaniing. Obviously, any generalization must be applicable to a range of particular cases, which may will likely not be identical in all respects, as required by our paradigm. But the concept of a paradigm allows for differences. In short, your argument suggests that generality is, strictly speaking, impossible. That may not be a reductio ad absurdum but it is certainly a reduction to pointlessness — Ludwig V

Generality is possible whenever we use that word. But what is the difference in what we are doing when we think the endless possibilities of grammatical use of a word like paradigm, general or game, and the uses of a word like particular? Is Wittgenstein invoking a theory of generality (“the concept of a paradigm allows for differences”), or would he eschew the search for the essence of generality and instead look at the various ways we use words like “same,” “general,” and “particular”? Would you agree that if there is no essence of meaning of any word , then there is no essence of meaning of ‘particular’, and likewise no essence of meaning of ‘general’, paradigm, game, category, etc?

Would you agree that if there is no essence of meaning of any word , then there is no essence of meaning of ‘particular’, and likewise no essence of meaning of ‘general’, paradigm, game, category, etc? — Joshs

Yes. But you seem to me to be laying down an essence of "same" and using that as a rule which outlaws the ways in which we actually use "general" and "generality".

Yes. But you seem to me to be laying down an essence of "same" and using that as a rule which outlaws the ways in which we actually use "general" and "generality". — Ludwig V

Do you mean that I am using “same” as a rule which outlaws beforehand certain ways among others that we may use general and generality, or that general and generality are exclusively associated with specific ways of use (“the” ways we actually use them, versus a potential infinity of possible uses)?

What I was trying to do was not outlaw any particular use of “same” , but to point to a use of same which relies on the consultation of a picture. If we say that two photos of an object depict the same object, or we stare repeatedly at an object and report that our perception continues to be of the same object, should we say that the sense of ‘object’ here is unique to the specific context and instant of use, or that what we mean by object here is something (i.e. general category) whose sense transcends the instant and context of its use? If the latter, then it would seem to tie ‘same’ to the consultation of a categorical picture.

I have the impression that these writing do not pay attention to the difference between conscious and unconscious processes. That allows the argument that there must be certain processes going on that we are not aware of - i.e. unconscious processes. — Ludwig V

I don’t take this work as an argument for a conclusion, such as that there are no processes of the brain of which we are not conscious. He implicitly acknowledges (p.6) that our brain is, of course, unconsciously doing all the things it does do (remembering, focusing, deciding, using language) while we are thinking or understanding. But I take him to be examining thinking, understanding, and meaning because these are examples that are just not independent mental mechanisms of the brain (but activities we work through; judgments we come to). The point of drawing out how they work is not to prove that (or prove that there are no unconscious brain processes), but to learn why we nevertheless want to force that framework on them, why we want to require the issue be a problem.

Similarly, his consideration of the possibility of a private language in the PI is superficially taken as just an argument against it (that the point, elsewhere, is that there are simply no “beetles” in us). As here, I take that section as an investigation of why we would want a private language (and that he finds reasons).

@Joshs@Ludwig V

Sec. 13 Personal experience and skepticism (p. 45-48]

At a certain point in the next section (“It seems to us… p. 47 ), he lands on the question of whether it is possible for a machine to think, and he submits that it is “not really that we don’t yet know”, because the question is mistakenly framed from our desire for personal experience to be “the very basis of all that we say with any sense about [being a human]” (p. 48). He also says we are “tempted to say that these personal experiences are the material of which reality consists.” (p. 45)

Of course Descartes will want to rely on our certainty in ourselves to justify the world, but, with Wittgenstein’s ordering, we seem to put ourselves first, perhaps out of self-preservation; that if anything needs to be certain, it’s “me”, even as a product of our doubt about others. “There is a temptation for me to say that only my own experience is real: ‘I know that I see, hear, feel pains, etc., but not that anyone else does. I can't know this, because I am I and they are they.’” (p. 46)

Ironically, our confidence in our personal experience leaves us without a shared world, only “a lot of separate personal experiences of different individuals”, which gives us a sense of “general uncertainty” (radical skepticism), and a belief that we need a “firm hold”, e.g., “How could I even have come by the idea of another's experience if there is no possibility of any evidence for it?” (My emphasis) I take this desire for “reliability, and solidity” to be the motivation for a (certain) solution to this “problem”, analogous to an object or biological mechanism.

If we are right to say we have been looking for a why to our forcing the analogy of objects, this seems to be the start of an answer.

Do you mean that I am using “same” as a rule which outlaws beforehand certain ways among others that we may use general and generality, — Joshs

That is what I was suggesting.

or that general and generality are exclusively associated with specific ways of use (“the” ways we actually use them, versus a potential infinity of possible uses)? — Joshs

Not quite that. It would be incautious of me to deny the possibiity of non-standard uses of "general" and "generality". All I was saying was the standard logical definition of "same" (A=A) makes standard uses of "general" and "generality" pointless or reduces standard uses to sloppy versions of the strict or pure use that logicians prefer. For me, it is A=A that is non-standard - not wrong, exactly, but a limiting case.

What I was trying to do was not outlaw any particular use of “same” , but to point to a use of same which relies on the consultation of a picture. — Joshs

That is very helpful.

If we say that two photos of an object depict the same object, or we stare repeatedly at an object and report that our perception continues to be of the same object, should we say that the sense of ‘object’ here is unique to the specific context and instant of use, or that what we mean by object here is something (i.e. general category) whose sense transcends the instant and context of its use? If the latter, then it would seem to tie ‘same’ to the consultation of a categorical picture. — Joshs

Two pictures of my car - one in London and one in Edinburgh, say - are two pictures of the same object. Clearly that object transcends the instant and context of each picture - in some sense of "transcend". (Actually, the idea of an object that exists only at an instant or in a specific context is - let's say - a bit odd, or perhaps specialized. I mean that part of the point of the concept of an object is that it persists through a variety of contexts.)