I never said anything about "more real".

[Nevermind. Don't want to interrupt.]

I never said anything about "more real". — Luke

So what were you meaning by using the term "verify" then. You have two measures, your tape and the Standard Metre. You're saying that to verify your tape, you'd compare it to the Standard Metre, and you're saying you'd know which one to trust because of some property of the Standard Metre which renders its authority. I'm using the term "more real" to describe what I think you're thinking that property is. We could give that property another label if you'd prefer. The point I'm making is that the property by which the Standard Metre obtains is authority in the real world (whatever you want to call it), is not the same as the property that the word 'metre' has in any given language game. You seem to want to draw some normative conclusion from the discussion about the Standard Metre where there is none to be had (unless it is the impact on how you conduct philosophical investigations).

Do you know why we're discussing the standard metre?

No. I'm having to guess that. As I said right at the beginning, no one has actually specified what it is they're trying to do here yet. I'm guessing you're trying to determine the status of 'a metre' in language as you seem to be suggesting that there is some determination that can be made over the question of to what the term refers.

Although if you're asking me honestly I suspect the reason why you're discussing it is because you're all trying to say things which indicate you've read and understood Wittgenstein at some level which sets you sufficiently apart from others to confer membership of a social group to which you wish to belong. But perhaps that's not entirely what you meant by the question.

Have you even read the book? If you'd like to join in, then follow along. If all you have to offer are grand pronouncements about the book as a whole, then nobody's interested - at least, not yet. We're currently up to about section 50 where Wittgenstein talks about the standard metre, among other things, in case you have anything relevant to say about that. We didn't have a discussion beforehand about how we're going to discuss it, so I can't help you there.

What happened to your latest post?

I wasn't satisfied with it. Tweaking it a bit before reposting :)

Have you even read the book? — Luke

I thought we were trying to avoid crass personal denigrations. What is that I've said so far that would justify your fake incredulity, that I don't agree with your line of enquiry?

We're currently up to about section 50 where Wittgenstein talks about the standard metre, among other things, in case you have anything relevant to say about that. — Luke

What do you think I've just been discussing for the last dozen posts? Are you having trouble spotting the words 'Standard Metre' and 'Wittgenstein' in my posts, or are you so arrogantly assured of your own understanding that anyone discussing things from a different angle simply 'must' be irrelevant?

We didn't have a discussion beforehand about how we're going to discuss it, so I can't help you there. — Luke

Yes, I noticed. So how are you determining what's relevant? The term seems to have done quite a lot of considering.

Stop pretending then. What do you think Wittgenstein means when he says that the standard metre is the one thing of which we can say neither that it is, nor that it is not, one metre long?

Pretending what? Are you intending that an invitation to comment preceeded by a insult is actually taken to be genuine? I've written what it is that I want to say on the matter. If I had the slightest impression that you actually wanted to hear what I thought Wittgenstein meant in this instance, I might say, but I'm not sure I see the gain for me in responding to an obvious attempt to get me give a response specifically set up so you can dismiss it as uninformed.

...but that is because my mind works so phenomenally fast, and I am at a rough estimate thirty billion times more intelligent than you. Let me give you an example. Think of a number, any number."

"Er, five," said the mattress.

"Wrong," said Marvin. "You see?"

The mattress was impressed by this and realized that it was in the presence of a not unremarkable mind.

Life, the Universe and Everything Chapter 7

§50 (Part 2)

Witty's reflections on the meter rule in Paris have been the cause for alot of confusion, but I think alot can be cleared up by simply placing the comments in context: Witty's revision of the themes in the Theaetatus passage. Let's first recall §49, where Witty grants that (something that grammatically counts as) a simple plays no explanatory/descriptive role: such a grammatical element can only named, and to name something, is not to explain anything. Next, recall his further point that "naming and describing do not stand on the same level", and that naming prepares the way for describing.

Now, if one treats the meter rule as having the same role as a name, the comment becomes relatively clear: the meter rule in Paris is that which 'explains' what counts as a meter (it is a means of representation), and is not something that is itself to be 'explained' (is not something that is represented). Witty makes this particular connection explicit:

§50: "The same applies to an element in language-game (§48) when we give it a name by uttering the word “R” - in so doing we have given that object a role in our language-game; it is now a means of representation".

There are at least two interesting points to make here. The first has to do with the disparateness of the examples, and what unites them. Consider: what allows Witty to analogize between a physical object (a metal rod in Paris), and a kind of word (name)? - Two seemingly very different things. Well, what they share is a role in a particular game - a 'game of measuring' in one, as Witty says, and a 'language-game' in another. It is the role of each element in the game particular to it that allows that element to carry the burden of explanatory work.

Unlike a Socrates, who would attribute to each element an ontological standing, having to do with it's being-a-simple tout court, Witty attributes to each only a relative grammatical standing, whose role in explanation is derivative or parasitic upon our use-in-a-game. Here, once again, is the substation of ontology for grammar that I mentioned in previous post: language-games as a condition of sense, including the sense of existence itself, which is here sucked dry of it's metaphysical grandeur and indexed simply to... grammar:

§50: "And to say “If it did not exist, it could have no name” is to say as much and as little as: if this thing did not exist, we could not use it in our language-game".

The second thing I want to make explicit is that the fact that elements can have roles also implies the contingency of those roles. A word can play one role in one instance, and another role in the next; the metal rod in Paris might be replaced down the line and no longer be the paradigmatic meter: in both cases neither the word nor the rod changes 'in itself' - only its role. So not only do roles relativize what can be said of a particular thing (were the rod in Paris just any other ordinary rod, presumably we could ask whether it were a meter or not), but so too can roles themselves change (the paradigmatic rod in Paris may become just another rod). Ontology is here doubly 'de-substantialized'.

(Finally, note that this mirrors again the discussion in §49 which comments on how words and sentences (simple and complexes) can change roles "depending on the situation in which it is uttered or written").

Side note: the meter rule discussion has some really interesting parallels with the discussion that opens On Certainty, where Witty similarly trashes the idea of either assenting or denying a certain kind of statement:

OC §10: "I know that a sick man is lying here? Nonsense! I am sitting at his bedside, I am looking attentively into his face . -So I don't know, then, that there is a sick man lying here? Neither the question nor the assertion makes sense. Any more than the assertion "I am here", which I might yet use at any moment, if suitable occasion presented itself."

It would be a cool exercise to trace the connections between these two lines of thought, but that'd be for another thread.

Also, I had a thread on here a while back about the meter, although approached from a very different angle, if it might interest anyone to read: https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/1114/the-example-or-wittgensteins-undecidable-meter (please don't reply to it, it'd be zombieing a very dead thread).

Wittgenstein is simply using the actual Standard Metre as a way of showing how such confusions arise, not making normative claims about what we can and can't say. — Ciaran

There is a normative claim being made here by Wittgenstein though, and that's the whole point. He's not referring to a stick, or a bar, or any such object, he is referring to "the standard metre". His point is that this object which is named the standard metre is itself a normative claim. The object itself is claiming to be the standard, the norm, as 'the means of representation". You might say that the standard metre is saying "this is one metre". Therefore to be correct when I say "this is one metre", I must maintain consistency with what the standard is saying.

What do you think Wittgenstein means when he says that the standard metre is the one thing of which we can say neither that it is, nor that it is not, one metre long? — Luke

It's not so much that we cannot say this, because clearly we can, but Wittgenstein is saying that it doesn't make any sense to say this, because the standard metre is itself saying "this is one metre".

Then it will make no sense to say of this sample either that
it is of this colour or that it is not.

We can put it like this: This sample is an instrument of the language
used in ascriptions of colour. In this language-game it is not something
that is represented, but is a means of representation.

...the metal rod in Paris might be replaced down the line and no longer be the paradigmatic meter.. — StreetlightX

Actually it already has. Wikipedia tells me that "a metre" was redefined in 1983 in this way:

The metre is the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of 1/299792458 second.

Kripke had no problem with contingent necessities. A metre is a rigid designator, as I understand him, and hence the same in all possible worlds. It's the name of a length, not the name of a stick. SO it remains possible that the stick might not have been a metre long. — Banno

Right, so doesn't Kripke's solution require a fixed referent? It seems to me the scary thing about Wittgenstein's point - the 'it hurts my brain' part of it - is that there's no referent outside of our practices. The meter is a length and a process and etc. We can't boil down its intelligibility into something we can point to across possible worlds. So getting at how normativity and truth can function through human practices without reference to a natural or empirical meta-vocabulary would then be one of the major concerns of the book.

(I know this is said in the form of a statement but I mean it in the form of a question - 'What am I missing'? Enlighten me dear Banno.)

The metre is the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of 1/299792458 second. — Metaphysician Undercover

Maybe errata, but that's exactly the same target length as the meter was before. The changing of meter standards over the years follows a pattern of increasing ease of practical reproducibility and increasing precision of measurement.

If something which serves as the canonical representation of a size of a unit can have a well founded measurement uncertainty associated with it, treating it simply as an arbitrary definition seems to me precluded; if it were arbitrary in all ways, there'd be no quantification of error.

Maybe errata, but that's exactly the same target length as the meter was before. The changing of meter standards over the years follows a pattern of increasing ease of practical reproducibility and increasing precision of measurement. — fdrake

The fact that the "standard" changes by human intervention is the first indication that Wittgenstein's description of a "standard" here is not realistic. It is not an accurate description to say that the object which plays the role of "the standard" is itself the "means of representation". Rather, it is a better description to say that human beings use the object as the means of representation. That is because means only exist in relation to ends, so to leave the intention out of a description of means, is to provide an incomplete description.

It is not an accurate description to say that the object which plays the role of "the standard" is itself the "means of representation". Rather, it is a better description to say that human beings use the object as the means of representation. — Metaphysician Undercover

"In this game, it is not something that is represented, but is a means of representation [...] we have given that object a role in our language game..."

Human beings use the object as the means of representation within a language game, no? So isn't he accounting perfectly well for the point you want to make? Or am I missing something about your objection?

I'm reading both N&N and this thread, and for the first time have noticed how important this metre rule is for Kripke. I don't have the answer, but feel the need to play with Kripke's approach in order to get a good feel for how it works.

SO I am in the process of challenging Wittgenstein in my own thinking. For that reason I'm going to leave this hanging here and continue with the N&N thread to see exactly how it plasy out.

Then I think this topic deserves its own thread.

Then I think this topic deserves its own thread. — Banno

Please start one. I haven't let my CPU enough time to process through that insight.

Not yet. After Kripke.

Not yet. After Kripke. — Banno

But, but, I want it now!

Patience, Grasshopper.

So two roles, one linguistic and one practical, that come together to form a language game. The game is where the language makes contact with the world.

Is that about right for you?

In this game, it is not something that is represented, but is a means of representation [...] we have given that object a role in our language game..."

Human beings use the object as the means of representation within a language game, no? So isn't he accounting perfectly well for the point you want to make? Or am I missing something about your objection? — John Doe

Here's the point I'm making. "Human beings use the object as a means of representation" is the proper description. "The object is a means of representation" is the incomplete description. The former mentions "human beings", and this accounts for the intention which is implied by "means".

Wittgenstein's description has the object, which is the standard metre, saying "I am a metre". But objects don't really speak, and in reality human beings are saying "this object represents a metre". It's a simple extension of his description of ostensive definition, except now he has removed the human act of pointing to the object, so that now, the object represents the word without the need for the human act of pointing.

So two roles, one linguistic and one practical, that come together to form a language game. The game is where the language makes contact with the world.

Is that about right for you? — Banno

Hmm, but it's all linguistic. And all practical. Language is always-already in contact with the world: it is worldy qua activity - qua practice.

I reckon pushing onto 50 is best.

Given that the holiday season is pressing in on us I am looking to reread up to around the 100 mark by new year and then to 200 by end of January - just so you know. — I like sushi

We've made 50, let's move on.

At 51 Wittgenstein asks what does it mean for an element to correspond with a sign. And, what does it mean to be mistaken, in the sense of using the wrong name, like using "R" to label the black square when black squares should be labeled "B". What does "R" standing for red squares consist of?