Why is it impossible for the teacher to know "all there is about justice"? Surely they can know enough to teach a student what the word "justice" means (i.e. how to use the word "justice"). After all, didn't someone teach you what "justice" means? And couldn't you teach the meaning of the word to someone else? — Luke

I can give a definition of justice, which I take as what you are referring to when you say "teach a student what the word 'justice' means", but does a definition contain "all there is"? You've also fallen back on teaching "how to use the word" justice, but do we teach how to use words? I will claim again that this a misunderstanding; that Witt would say there is a use of a concept, as in its sense (one among possible others). "What use of justice are we talking about?" morally right? lawful judgment? fairness? to appreciate properly? And that these are not "teachable" with a definition in the sense Witt is getting at with our aligned lives. We see examples of being fair, we experience injustice, we know the law, we do justice to our father's memory... Again, the "meaning" of a word is taken apart in PI, as a bit of knowledge, and turned about towards the grammar of a concept which shows us what is meaningful about one use compared to another, why we make such a distinction, yada yada.

I don't believe that #426 is typically regarded to be in the rule-following section of PI, but we could look at 218-221 instead.
* * *
That's all very possible; it's just not what I see as being the point of Wittgenstein's remarks on rule-following, or anything he's actually talking about. — Luke

I think maybe I need more than not "typically regarded" or "just not what [you] see" to feel this is a rational critique rather than just feeling you've only gone as far as you want into the text.

You seem to think that Wittgenstein genuinely holds that "All the steps are really already taken" (219). I read him, instead, as saying that we should not become captivated by, or fear, this misleading picture. As he says at 221, this is "really a mythological description of the use of a rule." — Luke

To say that he should have said it strikes him that the "steps are taken" is not to say it's not true (nor saying that it is "mythological") that they are already taken, but just that they are not "steps", we don't "follow" the line the rule "traces". All of this stepping, following traces, is how things look (from our desire to be caused along the way) against the way we (logically) "blindly" follow a rule; we do not have our eyes open, looking, intending, choosing each step.

Even with all that, I think we agree that it is not an internal determination of the rule, which is all I mean to say: that rules are (logically, i.e., that's what they're for; they function) to be obeyed, but not all grammar functions in that way. Rules take "us" out of the equation (math pun intended), but our ordinary, non-mathematical, grammar for learning, justice, sitting in a chair, are not based on, to be understood as, rules.

that the line does not nod, or whisper, or tell us (#223); that we do not follow along it as a path "on tenterhooks", anxious each second about society's moral judgment (our intention, what we "mean").
— Antony Nickles

I don't know why you bring "society's moral judgment" into it. This is simply another description to reinforce the point that rules are not privately determined. — Luke

That's a small take-away; can't we even grant that Witt learns why we want them to be? Much less that if we imagine ourselves, as Kripke does, just confidently acting on rules we've been "taught", the only possibility is for correction because you didn't follow the rule (thus the anxiety).

I see [ #217 ] more in accordance with his remark at #1: "Explanations come to an end somewhere." — Luke

Yes, everything breaks down in the first paragraph, hmm. But maybe this statement is not easily-understood, is unclear, not straightforward, ambiguous; maybe we need the rest of the book to understand why? where do they end? where do they come from? does something else happen that may not end?

"[ No explanation ] stands in need of another — unless we require it to avoid a misunderstanding. One might say: an explanation serves to remove or to prevent a misunderstanding —– one, that is, that would arise if not for the explanation, but not every misunderstanding that I can imagine." #87

Explanations avoid, remove, or prevent a certain type of misunderstanding. But there are other misunderstandings we could imagine, perhaps as examples in a book, that explanations cannot avoid, remove, or prevent. There are some misunderstanding we must face, stay with, allow, encourage, that we must resist our inclination to give up on.

I can give a definition of justice, which I take as what you are referring to when you say "teach a student what the word 'justice' means", but does a definition contain "all there is"? — Antony Nickles

For a particular meaning/use of the word, yes. It is both possible for the teacher to know "all there is about justice" and for the definition that is taught to contain "all there is". See §75, for instance.

You've also fallen back on teaching "how to use the word" justice, but do we teach how to use words? — Antony Nickles

Yes, obviously we teach how to use words. How else do we learn their meanings?

I will claim again that this a misunderstanding; that Witt would say there is a use of a concept, as in its sense (one among possible others). — Antony Nickles

Its sense is its meaning, and "the meaning of a word is its use in the language" (§43).

"What use of justice are we talking about?" morally right? lawful judgment? fairness? to appreciate properly? — Antony Nickles

You tell me. It was your claim that the teacher cannot possibly know "all there is about justice". Which use/meaning of justice is it impossible to know?

And that these are not "teachable" with a definition in the sense Witt is getting at with our aligned lives. — Antony Nickles

Then how can we possibly acquire or learn the sense (meaning) of a concept?

We see examples of being fair, we experience injustice, we know the law, we do justice to our father's memory... Again, the "meaning" of a word is taken apart in PI, as a bit of knowledge, and turned about towards the grammar of a concept which shows us what is meaningful about one use compared to another, why we make such a distinction, yada yada. — Antony Nickles

Perhaps, but he never says that a teacher (or anybody else) cannot know "all there is about justice" or that we don't teach the meanings of words. It's unclear whether you are trying to say that justice is a family resemblance concept or referring to something outside of concepts/language altogether.

I think maybe I need more than not "typically regarded" or "just not what [you] see" to feel this is a rational critique rather than just feeling you've only gone as far as you want into the text. — Antony Nickles

The SEP article gives the following account:

Directly following the rule-following sections in PI, and therefore easily thought to be the upshot of the discussion, are those sections called by interpreters “the private-language argument”. Whether it be a veritable argument or not (and Wittgenstein never labeled it as such), these sections point out that for an utterance to be meaningful it must be possible in principle to subject it to public standards and criteria of correctness. For this reason, a private-language, in which “words … are to refer to what only the speaker can know—to his immediate private sensations …” (PI 243), is not a genuine, meaningful, rule-governed language. The signs in language can only function when there is a possibility of judging the correctness of their use, “so the use of [a] word stands in need of a justification which everybody understands” (PI 261). — SEP

If the rule following sections in PI are "directly follow"ed by the private language argument - which the article positions somewhere around §243-261 - then the rule following sections must be just prior to §243, and so not at §426. I could cite more references to support what is "typically regarded" as the rule following section if you like.

Moreover, you have provided zero textual evidence to support your assertion that Wittgenstein says (or implies) anything remotely in the vicinity of "the student has taught the teacher something, in this instance by extending the concept into a new context...something about justice in a new world."

The onus is on you to support your claim that Wittgenstein's remarks on rule following in the PI are about morality or ethics. By your own admission, this is an unorthodox reading. I have already provided several quotes and references to show that you are reading something into the text that is not there.

To say that he should have said it strikes him that the "steps are taken" is not to say it's not true (nor saying that it is "mythological") that they are already taken... — Antony Nickles

Yes, it is "to say it's not true that they are already taken". That is Wittgenstein's entire point here.

219. “All the steps are really already taken” means: I no longer have any choice. The rule, once stamped with a particular meaning, traces the lines along which it is to be followed through the whole of space. —– But if something of this sort really were the case, how would it help me?
No; my description made sense only if it was to be understood symbolically. — I should say: This is how it strikes me.

221. My symbolical expression was really a mythological description of the use of a rule. — LW

"If something of this sort really were the case, how would it help me?"
With this question, Wittgenstein clearly implies that something of this sort (i.e. that all the steps are already taken) really is not the case.

We do follow the rule blindly, in the sense that we follow it with complete confidence and without reflection. It is only in this "symbolic" sense that "I do not choose". This is merely "how it strikes me" when I follow a rule - as if there is no choice. But this should not be mistaken with the mythological idea that I actually have no choice and that all the steps are already taken in advance. I can move my knight from one end of the board to the other if I so choose, but that wouldn't be following the rule. Baker and Hacker provide the following exegesis of these sections:

"we misunderstand the nature of following rules if we think that ‘having no choice’ in this context means that in some medium the rule traces out its own applications in advance of being applied, and hence one has no choice. For if something like that were the case, how would it help one to make the transition to action?"

"Hence the description ‘All the steps are really already taken’ only makes sense if understood figuratively (like the wings on Father Time). So understood, it signifies the fact that I do not choose. For once having understood the rule, I am bound in what I do further, not in the sense of being compelled, but ‘I am bound in my judgement about what is in accord with the rule and what not’ (RFM 328f.). Hence, if I want to follow the rule, ‘then only doing this will correspond to it’ (RFM 332). So I follow the rule blindly: not like a machine, but with the blindness of complete assurance." — Baker and Hacker, Wittgenstein: Rules, Grammar and Necessity: Volume 2 of an Analytical Commentary on the Philosophical Investigations, Essays and Exegesis §§185-242, p. 197

...but just that they are not "steps", we don't "follow" the line the rule "traces". All of this stepping, following traces, is how things look (from our desire to be caused along the way) against the way we (logically) "blindly" follow a rule; we do not have our eyes open, looking, intending, choosing each step. — Antony Nickles

I don't understand this. Are you saying we don't follow rules?

On a generous reading, it looks like you might be in agreement with Baker and Hacker's exegesis above, but then why would you also assert (via double negative) that Wittgenstein is saying or agreeing that "All the steps are really already taken"?

Even with all that, I think we agree that it is not an internal determination of the rule, which is all I mean to say: that rules are (logically, i.e., that's what they're for; they function) to be obeyed, but not all grammar functions in that way. Rules take "us" out of the equation (math pun intended), but our ordinary, non-mathematical, grammar for learning, justice, sitting in a chair, are not based on, to be understood as, rules. — Antony Nickles

I still don't know what you mean by the "grammar" of (or "for") these things. (The grammar for sitting in a chair?) It remains to be shown that there can be grammar without rules.

that the line does not nod, or whisper, or tell us (#223); that we do not follow along it as a path "on tenterhooks", anxious each second about society's moral judgment (our intention, what we "mean").
— Antony Nickles

I don't know why you bring "society's moral judgment" into it. This is simply another description to reinforce the point that rules are not privately determined.
— Luke

That's a small take-away; can't we even grant that Witt learns why we want them to be? Much less that if we imagine ourselves, as Kripke does, just confidently acting on rules we've been "taught", the only possibility is for correction because you didn't follow the rule (thus the anxiety). — Antony Nickles

"Witt learns why we want" what to be what?

In the quote above, you were talking about the anxiety of society's moral judgment. You now seem to be talking about a different anxiety relating to not following the rule? What Witt actually says at §223 is that we do not have to wait upon the nod of the rule and that we are not on tenterhooks about what it will tell us next. So there is no anxiety here. §223 is not about learning the rule, but assumes the rule has already been learnt.

"[ No explanation ] stands in need of another — unless we require it to avoid a misunderstanding. One might say: an explanation serves to remove or to prevent a misunderstanding —– one, that is, that would arise if not for the explanation, but not every misunderstanding that I can imagine." #87

Explanations avoid, remove, or prevent a certain type of misunderstanding. But there are other misunderstandings we could imagine... — Antony Nickles

No, he says "but not every misunderstanding that I can imagine."

@Banno (your thoughts as well, please)

For a particular meaning/use of the word [justice], yes. It is both possible for the teacher to know "all there is about justice" and for the definition that is taught to contain "all there is". See §75, for instance. — Luke

The concept of justice was picked as an example of when sometimes we don't/won't know how a concept will matter, what criteria will have what importance and to whom--its criteria make its grammar a different type than concepts with mathematical criteria. When the (grammatical) edges are so blurred that "Anything--and nothing--is right. This is the position you are in if you look for a definition corresponding to our concepts in aesthetics and ethics." #77. That this is different then the certainty (lack of disagreement) we have in math. p. 192. And asking if my knowledge is completely expressed by the explanations I could give (#75), describes that my unconscious familiarity can be made exhaustively explicit, but does not say that a concept is finite, complete in advance, learned by saying X (#75 is not about definitions, but explanations); and there is no limit to the explanations that I might have to give (to the student), and it is I who might become exhausted, our relation break down, rather than we have tidy all-encompassing rules justified to begin with, and the student is either right or wrong.

A concept can also be brought into new, unexpected contexts, extended Witt will say at #67, or he uses the analogy of continuing a series. As in "being inclined" in our beginning quote, when making a mistake in continuing a series, we are tempted to say that the student has understood wrong #143, as Kripke's society would judge, as if we have a complete list of how things can go wrong. But we say only that the student has "mastered the system" (#145) "followed the series as I do" But "we cannot state a limit" on when we have a right to say that. "Our pupil's capacity to learn may come to an end." #143. This is my claim that it is "impossible" to nail everything down for all time in any situation. In the extension of non-mathematical concepts we do not have the ability to say " 'and so on', in order to reach infinity." #229 But "we expect this, and are surprised by that. But the chain of reasons has an end." This is where Cavell's student and teacher begin.

[="Luke;576556"]Yes, obviously we teach how to use words. How else do we learn their meanings?
Its sense is its meaning, and "the meaning of a word is its use in the language" (§43).[/quote]

Well, I don't want to get lost in the weeds on a sub-topic, but you say we teach how to "use" words, but that seems different than Witt's point that, in teaching meaning, we teach the use of a word in the language (it's sense/place in a concept)--we "teach" how to apologize (mostly indirectly, in living--just through seeing examples and taking correction) and than an expression can be an apology, though it can also be (at the same) in its use as self-aggrandizing, claiming to be a victim. We don't show how to, say, wield the word, but show the word's place(s) in our world, how it is meaningful in our lives. So teaching is not about conveying a fixed "meaning" (which vanishes; Cavell p. 80; PI #118) through definitions and explanations, but connecting our world, in all its distinctions and patterns, with the senses in which a word is used e.g.: knowing as facts, knowing as acknowledging the other, knowing as having a skill--the uses of "I know", which are the possibilities of how concepts (their expressions) can be meaningful.

[="Luke;576556"]We do follow the rule blindly, in the sense that we follow it with complete confidence and without reflection.

‘I am bound in my judgement about what is in accord with the rule and what not’ (RFM 328f.). Hence, if I want to follow the rule, ‘then only doing this will correspond to it’ (RFM 332). So I follow the rule blindly: not like a machine, but with the blindness of complete assurance."
— Baker and Hacker[/quote]

This idea of blindness as being completely "assured" or "confident" of being right harkens back to pp. 69-70 of the Cavell essay, where Kripke says we follow our "confident inclination". I was trying to point out that, if we are to have been said to have obeyed a rule, then not choosing any further and continuing blindly is a logical distinction of how it plays out once we have chosen to submit ourselves to the rule. Cavell, p. 71.

[="Luke;576556"]§223 is not about learning the rule, but assumes the rule has already been learnt.[/quote]

Sure, but learning the rule does not ensure correctness, nor that, even if correct, that there would be the same justification (if any need for one). I am not unreflectively "confident" or "assured" of following the rule correctly (granting myself authority); I give over my responsibility to the rule, no longer needing to make anymore decisions (further steps--a myth is not a lie or wrong; the picture, though not literal, still strikes: see p. 180). In obeying the rule (not myself) I can be "blind" to the consequences, not responsible. I do not "judge" as Hacker claims (#222). The justifications for obeying the rule are different than the explanation (afterwards) for having followed it incorrectly.

[="Luke;576556"]the line does not nod, or whisper, or tell us (#223); that we do not follow along it as a path "on tenterhooks", anxious each second about society's moral judgment (our intention, what we "mean").
— Antony Nickles

I don't know why you bring "society's moral judgment" into it. This is simply another description to reinforce the point that rules are not privately determined.[/quote]

Cavell is claiming Witt goes farther than enforcing the public nature of our lives which inform our grammar, their criteria; to ask why (see below). Additionally, if an actor's "confidence" is part of their act, as Hacker claims, they can be anxious; their "complete assurance" is subject to uncertainty. And if they are acting from an internal/individual assessment (their "judgment") of what is in accord ("right")(even if that was as you claim, only in learning it), they are subject to the correction of society when they are wrong--their fear of exclusion is their desire for criteria (a rule I can know, be assured of) that will ensure that does not happen.

[="Luke;576556"]This is simply another description to reinforce the point that rules are not privately determined.
— Luke

-can't we even grant that Witt learns why we want them to be? - Atony Nickles

"Witt learns why we want" what to be what?[/quote]

He is investigating why we want "obeying rules" (meaning; knowledge of the other) to be "privately determined", reliant on us individually (say, our confidence). Why he keeps trying to make sense of the interlocutor's obsession, fixation. This is not just an argument for a different picture (or a confusion to be alleviated), it is an investigation into the human condition, our desire to not have to rely on the human.

[="Luke;576556"]I still don't know what you mean by the "grammar" of (or "for") these things. (The grammar for sitting in a chair?) It remains to be shown that there can be grammar without rules.[/quote]

Well I got confused saying an example was sitting in a chair (I think I was thinking of Cavell's discussion of sitting at a table, p. 93; part of the criteria of a table is that we sit at it in certain ways). Anyway, the type of grammar of an action/concept will differ depending on the concept. And the way we measure whether a concept's grammar has been met is through criteria for having done them, not rules--though, as I said before, some criteria involve being said to have followed rules; math being one. Sometimes the criteria are categorical, definitive of identity, as to whether you have an opinion #573; some are looser, such as having been said to remember right #56 or having offered an excuse (Austin)--the criteria for a game being all over the place, the criteria for justice being subject to disagreement; these are the ways (the grammar) in which we see what matters to us in each concept. Thus the criteria is the expression of what is important to us (essential) for a concept to be a certain type of thing. #371 #373 Mathematical criteria makes the grammar (rules) of those concepts categorically different than the grammar of concepts with ordinary (non-mathematical) criteria.

The concept of justice was picked as an example of when sometimes we don't/won't know how a concept will matter, what criteria will have what importance and to whom--its criteria make its grammar a different type than concepts with mathematical criteria. — Antony Nickles

You are speaking in the future tense. We can say that the rules are in constant flux, such that there is no ultimate, final, "all-encompassing" rules or criteria. But if that is your requirement for a rule, then there are effectively no rules at any point in time. However, clearly there are rules that we follow; games and sports being an obvious example. If your point is that mathematical rules/criteria are more enduring and perhaps more clearly defined than other rules/criteria, then I take your point.

"Anything--and nothing--is right. This is the position you are in if you look for a definition corresponding to our concepts in aesthetics and ethics." #77. That this is different then the certainty (lack of disagreement) we have in math. p. 192. And asking if my knowledge is completely expressed by the explanations I could give (#75), describes that my unconscious familiarity can be made exhaustively explicit, but does not say that a concept is finite, complete in advance, learned by saying X (#75 is not about definitions, but explanations) — Antony Nickles

You're right. I may have confused or conflated definitions with explanations. However, the larger point, of Wittgenstein's, is that concepts are still "usable" (and, therefore, teachable) even if they have "blurred edges" (see §69). W's point at §77 seems to me to be that some concepts are simply resistant to sharper definition.

and there is no limit to the explanations that I might have to give (to the student), and it is I who might become exhausted, our relation break down, rather than we have tidy all-encompassing rules justified to begin with, and the student is either right or wrong. — Antony Nickles

Does this imply that there is no right or wrong (if there is a "limit to the explanations")? Or what does it mean for rules to be "all-encompassing" and "justified to begin with"?

A concept can also be brought into new, unexpected contexts, extended Witt will say at #67, or he uses the analogy of continuing a series. — Antony Nickles

I take "extend" at §67 in the sense of what is included or what falls under the concept of "number", rather than the concept's use in "new, unexpected contexts". You can possibly read that into it, but Wittgenstein is concerned with description not theory (§109).

or he uses the analogy of continuing a series. As in "being inclined" in our beginning quote, when making a mistake in continuing a series, we are tempted to say that the student has understood wrong #143, as Kripke's society would judge, as if we have a complete list of how things can go wrong. But we say only that the student has "mastered the system" (#145) "followed the series as I do" But "we cannot state a limit" on when we have a right to say that. "Our pupil's capacity to learn may come to an end." #143. This is my claim that it is "impossible" to nail everything down for all time in any situation. — Antony Nickles

Wittgenstein's intent with these remarks is not to demonstrate that it is impossible to "nail everything down for all time", although this kind of "preconception of crystalline purity" is one of his targets in the book. §143 deals with understanding, rule following, being guided by a rule, and normal/abnormal reactions.

In the extension of non-mathematical concepts we do not have the ability to say " 'and so on', in order to reach infinity." — Antony Nickles

I'm not sure I understand the analogy. Wittgenstein reminds us that, normally, students do learn and are able to go on to use the mathematical and non-mathematical concepts they are taught. Anyway, the real lesson of the student/teacher scenarios is that understanding and rule following are less about the student's inner thoughts/feelings and more about the student's actual behaviour. "Just for once, don’t think of understanding as a ‘mental process’ at all!" (§154)

This is where Cavell's student and teacher begin. — Antony Nickles

But this is where Wittgenstein's student and teacher end. Likewise, Wittgenstein's turned spade is not an invitation for further explanation (see §87 again).

you say we teach how to "use" words, but that seems different than Witt's point that, in teaching meaning, we teach the use of a word in the language — Antony Nickles

I say that we teach how to use words, but Witt's point is that we teach how to use words in the language? This is a distinction without a difference. At least you are no longer questioning whether we teach how to use words.

We don't show how to, say, wield the word, but show the word's place(s) in our world, how it is meaningful in our lives. — Antony Nickles

I haven't said otherwise. You appear to be projecting views onto me that I do not hold.

Sure, but learning the rule does not ensure correctness, nor that, even if correct, that there would be the same justification (if any need for one). I am not unreflectively "confident" or "assured" of following the rule correctly (granting myself authority); I give over my responsibility to the rule, no longer needing to make anymore decisions (further steps--a myth is not a lie or wrong; the picture, though not literal, still strikes: see p. 180). In obeying the rule (not myself) I can be "blind" to the consequences, not responsible. I do not "judge" as Hacker claims (#222). The justifications for obeying the rule are different than the explanation (afterwards) for having followed it incorrectly. — Antony Nickles

I don't know what you mean by "I give over my responsibility to the rule". What responsibility? Also, I don't believe you when you state that you are never assured or confident of following any rules correctly. "Correctly" should not mean "flawlessly".

Why does learning the rule not ensure correctness? If you are saying that someone who has learnt the rule could still make an error, that's true, but why is your expectation that learning a rule should eliminate all errors? You appear to have a "preconception of crystalline purity" about this.

Talk of "responsibility" here is also misguided, as if you can choose to learn the rule or not. Toddlers do not make the considered decision not to learn their native language - this is the problematic Augustinian view of language acquisition.

And if they are acting from an internal/individual assessment (their "judgment") of what is in accord ("right")(even if that was as you claim, only in learning it), they are subject to the correction of society when they are wrong--their fear of exclusion is their desire for criteria (a rule I can know, be assured of) that will ensure that does not happen. — Antony Nickles

Which rules can't you know or be assured of? Should rules be tailored to each individual? The student's motivations for learning to follow the rule are irrelevant. All that is relevant for Wittgenstein's purposes is that children normally do learn to follow the rule. That is our form of life.

He is investigating why we want "obeying rules" (meaning; knowledge of the other) to be "privately determined", reliant on us individually (say, our confidence). Why he keeps trying to make sense of the interlocutor's obsession, fixation. This is not just an argument for a different picture (or a confusion to be alleviated), it is an investigation into the human condition, our desire to not have to rely on the human. — Antony Nickles

I disagree. It has nothing to do with "our desire to not have to rely on the human", as far as I can tell. He is trying to get the obsessed, fixated philosopher to see the matter in a new light. Therefore, it is "an argument for a different picture", e.g.:

it is, rather, essential to our investigation that we do not seek to learn anything new by it. We want to understand something that is already in plain view. For this is what we seem in some sense not to understand. (89)

Our inquiry is therefore a grammatical one. And this inquiry sheds light on our problem by clearing misunderstandings away. Misunderstandings concerning the use of words, brought about, among other things, by certain analogies between the forms of expression in different regions of our language. (90)

The preconception of crystalline purity can only be removed by turning our whole inquiry around. (One might say: the inquiry must be turned around, but on the pivot of our real need. (108)

There must not be anything hypothetical in our considerations. All explanation must disappear, and description alone must take its place. And this description gets its light — that is to say, its purpose — from the philosophical problems. These are, of course, not empirical problems; but they are solved through an insight into the workings of our language, and that in such a way that these workings are recognized — despite an urge to misunderstand them. The problems are solved, not by coming up with new discoveries, but by assembling what we have long been familiar with. (109)

115. A picture held us captive. And we couldn’t get outside it, for it lay in our language, and language seemed only to repeat it to us inexorably.

116. When philosophers use a word — “knowledge”, “being”, “object”, “I”, proposition/sentence”, “name” — and try to grasp the essence of the thing, one must always ask oneself: is the word ever actually used in this way in the language in which it is at home? — What we do is to bring words back from their metaphysical to their everyday use. — LW

And the way we measure whether a concept's grammar has been met is through criteria for having done them, not rules — Antony Nickles

When are criteria not rules?

the criteria for a game being all over the place, the criteria for justice being subject to disagreement — Antony Nickles

I don't believe that these are the criteria.

In the extension of non-mathematical concepts we do not have the ability to say " 'and so on', in order to reach infinity."
— Antony Nickles

what does it mean for rules to be "all-encompassing" and "justified to begin with"? — Luke

This is the criteria that Cavell is describing as "mathematical", which he believes Kripke is aspiring to impose on the grammar of all concepts, any action. As if rules are all that matter; that every application (of a concept) is already taken into consideration (into infinity--as in math). That we learn rules, instead of having lives, and that right and wrong are simply a matter of obeying the rules or not (what is right is worked out ahead of time; this is similar to Nietszche's critique of Kant's deontological morals).

Wittgenstein's intent with these remarks is not to demonstrate that it is impossible to "nail everything down for all time", although this kind of "preconception of crystalline purity" is one of his targets in the book. §143 deals with understanding, rule following, being guided by a rule, and normal/abnormal reactions. — Luke

It is this purity (what Cavell is calling "mathematical") that is the pivot-point between the two views of what happens when we get stuck. Cavell takes Kripke's view of rules as "more skeptical than the skeptic", meaning that the desire for purity (certainty, pre-determination, simple enforcement) is satisfied by making rules central to our agreement (then we can teach the rule, rather than the student, rather than agree in our lives). The rule removes us: the partial (our partiality), fallible, limited, separate, finite, impure (of the flesh; feet of clay).

you say we teach how to "use" words, but that seems different than Witt's point that, in teaching meaning, we teach the use of a word in the language
— Antony Nickles

I say that we teach how to use words, but [you say] Witt's point is that we teach how to use words in the language? — Luke

I said "we teach the use of a word in the language" (and by "language" here, the difference between our language and our lives only comes up before we reach the point where we are stuck--we ask questions and seek justifications to align our words with our lives). A word (expression) has a use(s). The distinction hinges on the difference between words as used (as if, by rules) and seeing that there are different things an expression, for example, can do: be a threat, an invitation, etc. That it would not be an accusation (except in Kripke's world): "You used that word wrong!" but a question: "What use (variety of sense) of "I know" are you talking about?"

I don't know what you mean by "I give over my responsibility to the rule". What responsibility? — Luke

Obeying a rule is not a matter of "confidence" or "assurance". It is, categorically, to obey the rule rather than follow your inclination (something internal as you say). So we do not have to be answerable for the action; we can point to the rule as the answer of why we did the action, abdicating our responsibility to be intelligible to the other, respond to their claims on us about what we have done.

The larger point, of Wittgenstein's, is that concepts are still "usable" (and, thereforefter mistaken , teachable) even if they have "blurred edges" (see §69). W's point at §77 seems to me to be that some concepts are simply resistant to sharper definition. — Luke

Maybe it helps to point out the difference here is that Kripke takes rules to be fundamental to the point of PI, and Cavell wants to claim that criteria shape the grammar of every act separately--the grammar of math (which happens to be rules), the grammar of obeying rules (which is not judged by rules), and the grammar of other concepts, such as apologies, justice, knowing, etc.

[quote="Luke;578536"And the way we measure whether a concept's grammar has been met is through criteria for having done them, not rules
— Antony Nickles

When are criteria not rules?[/quote]

Criteria are our means of judgment, not grounds of certainty (as rules are, thus merely judging if you followed the rule). Criteria outline what will count toward a thing's having a particular status or value (along with context, history, etc.) Certain criteria will be already articulated (dog shows) some more organic and loose (what counts as a game), some closed (chess) some open for further specification/rationale--part of the investigation is what will count as evidence, partly we find out what type of thing something is through explicating its criteria, partly what distinguishes this from that. Cavell’s claim is that Witt is comparing rules to ordinary (not instituted) criteria (see the PI index: having a dream, remembering right, mistaking, talking to oneself), so we are not just deciding true or false compared to something we have found certain (or which aspires to a mathematical rule).

This is where Cavell's student and teacher begin.
— Antony Nickles

But this is where Wittgenstein's student and teacher end. Likewise, Wittgenstein's turned spade is not an invitation for further explanation (see §87 again). — Luke

Well here we are back at the beginning with Cavell's claim that when the teacher is inclined to give up, they do not have to. Our judgment of the other (their act) is not based on a rule they either obeyed or not (except when it is, say, the law), but a matter for us to find out how this type of action (each its own) is justified, how those justifications fail, and how they rmay be brought back to matter for us, where new justifications may come from. All this after mistaken claims, contingencies of circumstances, and all the myriad things that in all instances are not covered by rules. And, yes, justifications run out, come to an end; we no longer can speak for each other, are enigmas to the other (p. 223); we are different, separate. But at least in learning about ourselves in making our criteria explicit, we rationally understand our differences; must account for/to the other before coming to an end with them (or be held responsible for having not). In Wittgenstein's world, the rule is not broken, the community is; we becomes us and them.

This is the criteria that Cavell is describing as "mathematical", which he believes Kripke is aspiring to impose on the grammar of all concepts, any action. — Antony Nickles

Grammar applies only to language use, not to "any action" - unless you have a reason to think otherwise?

That we learn rules, instead of having lives... — Antony Nickles

We don't either learn rules or have lives. You might as well have said: "That we learn [language/chess], instead of having lives." We learn these as a part of (within) our lives, not instead of us having lives.

...and that right and wrong are simply a matter of obeying the rules or not... — Antony Nickles

But they are. Otherwise, there is no rule.

(what is right is worked out ahead of time; — Antony Nickles

But it is. Otherwise, there is no rule. (Rules can change, of course.)

Cavell takes Kripke's view of rules as "more skeptical than the skeptic", meaning that the desire for purity (certainty, pre-determination, simple enforcement) is satisfied by making rules central to our agreement (then we can teach the rule, rather than the student, rather than agree in our lives) — Antony Nickles

What is "we can teach the rule, rather than the student" supposed to mean? The rule is not the student and vice versa. Rules are taught to the student.

The distinction hinges on the difference between words as used (as if, by rules) and seeing that there are different things an expression, for example, can do: be a threat, an invitation, etc. — Antony Nickles

Why can't it be both? We are taught the rules for how to use words and how to use those words as threats, invitations, etc. We are taught both how to wield words and how they are meaningful in our lives. (On reflection, this is what I should have said in my previous post.)

So we do not have to be answerable for the action; we can point to the rule as the answer of why we did the action, abdicating our responsibility to be intelligible to the other, respond to their claims on us about what we have done. — Antony Nickles

Aren't we responsible both for following rules and for not following rules (that is, once we know the rules)? You seem to imply that we are responsible only when we don't follow rules.

In terms of intelligibility, I would say that following the rules (e.g. in chess) is what allows us to make ourselves (our moves) intelligible to our opponent; that following the rules maintains the intelligibility.

Therefore, I do not understand how we "abdicat[e] our responsibility to be intelligible to the other" by following rules.

Cavell’s claim is that Witt is comparing rules to ordinary (not instituted) criteria (see the PI index: having a dream, remembering right, mistaking, talking to oneself), so we are not just deciding true or false compared to something we have found certain (or which aspires to a mathematical rule). — Antony Nickles

I think that Wittgenstein attempts to highlight similarities, not differences, between rule-bound activities. Perhaps Cavell distinguishes mathematics from other activities because it might be considered as "more ideal" than others, but Wittgenstein wants to bring all these activities back to the rough ground, including mathematics. As Banno noted early on, mathematics is but another language-game.

Our judgment of the other (their act) is not based on a rule they either obeyed or not (except when it is, say, the law) — Antony Nickles

Or except when we are teaching them the rule.

This is the criteria that Cavell is describing as "mathematical", which he believes Kripke is aspiring to impose on the grammar of all concepts, any action.
— Antony Nickles

Grammar applies only to language use, not to "any action" - unless you have a reason to think otherwise? — Luke

Yes, that is literally the kind of claims he is making. That the structure of our language and that of our lives are (usually, for the most part) them same—this is carried from the Tractatus but a different kind of form for each thing, each type of act; and we are looking for its “logic” (on its terms) rather than imposing a fixed criteria. A grammar for excuses (Austin), for apologies, for a threat, for acknowledging pain, for treating someone as if they have a soul, for raising one's arm, for justifying or disagreeing. Grammatical comments highlight the criteria of a thing—what is essential for it to be that thing: learning, mistaking, reading, talking, lying, seeing, etc.

We are taught both how to wield words and how they are meaningful in our lives. — Luke

Our lives are meaningful, and we learn words (moreover, concepts) in coming into our culture, acting, failing, interacting, becoming part of everything everyone does. Again this picture of "meaning" is getting in the way. Our expressions, as our lives, don't have a "meaning" attached to them; part of the confusion Witt recognizes is that we believe that since we can give a definition ("meaning") for ever word, that this is how all language works (reference/correspondence).

...and that right and wrong are simply a matter of obeying the rules or not...
— Antony Nickles

But they are. Otherwise, there is no rule. — Luke

To obey a rule is to obey it correctly (do it right) or wrong (fail to obey it). Justifications can differ as to why we obeyed it, and we can argue about what it means to have (rightly) obeyed a particular rule, but what is right and what is wrong are not contained/decided by rules (unless they are set by us--laws, commandments, etc.). To have correctly apologized is not determined by the application of a rule, it is judged by those accepting the apology (at least most importantly), depending on the injustice and other criteria (sometimes or not, depending on the situation; though if it's threshold grammar is broken, I may not accept it as an apology at all).

So we do not have to be answerable for the action; we can point to the rule as the answer of why we did the action, abdicating our responsibility to be intelligible to the other, respond to their claims on us about what we have done.
— Antony Nickles

I do not understand how we "abdicat[e] our responsibility to be intelligible to the other" by following rules. — Luke

If I am following the rule, I may only have, "I was following the rule." And so cannot explain, detail, qualify, defend, make explicit, distinguish, or justify myself, except as to how I believe following the rule is done and that I did it.

Aren't we responsible both for following rules and for not following rules (that is, once we know the rules)? — Luke

You can hold me responsible for the act, and for my choice to follow the rule (though, in following the rule, if I judge the rule as irresponsible, I am not obeying it (#222)). And I can claim I was following the rule as an excuse from the guilt/wrong, but Kripke's society is judging my having followed the rule or not, not whether the rule itself is right/wrong (judged even for following it). But, again, the point is that the desire and temptation (the aspiration Cavell says) for a purity in our language/acts, is just the wish (particularly in philosophy) to remove ourselves (have action based on abstract universal reason or knowledge or rules, not on me).

In terms of intelligibility, I would say that following the rules (e.g. in chess) is what allows us to make ourselves (our moves) intelligible to our opponent — Luke

If I am behaving as expected there is no need to make myself intelligible (as we don’t ask after intention unless something phishy happens). If you have broken the rules of chess and I tell you, and you claim you did not, you must explain yourself if we are to go forward, together. For you to explain in what sense you intended, or so that you know what is at stake and have a chance to qualify what seems inexplicable from my position. This may come to our being unable to reconcile, however, as Cavell will say elsewhere about it: though we are endlessly separate, there is no depth to which langauge can not reach, and we are answerable for everything that comes between us.

Yes, that is literally the kind of claims he is making. That the structure of our language and that of our lives are (usually, for the most part) them same—this is carried from the Tractatus but a different kind of form for each thing, each type of act; and we are looking for its “logic” (on its terms) rather than imposing a fixed criteria. A grammar for excuses (Austin), for apologies, for a threat, for acknowledging pain, for treating someone as if they have a soul, for raising one's arm, for justifying or disagreeing. Grammatical comments highlight the criteria of a thing—what is essential for it to be that thing: learning, mistaking, reading, talking, lying, seeing, etc. — Antony Nickles

I'm not sure whether it is Cavell or Kripke making this kind of claim, but, for Wittgenstein, grammar is about the sense of the words "excuse", "apology", "threat", "pain", "learning", "reading", "talking", "lying", "seeing", etc. Our actions are obviously related to the use of these words, but grammar is not about the actions themselves (independently of the words/concepts).

According to Wittgenstein scholar Daniele Moyall-Sharrock:

[Wittgenstein] does not see grammar as comprised merely of syntactic rules, but of any rule that governs 'the way we are going to talk' (MWL 72): 'By grammatical rule I understand every rule that relates to the use of a language' (VOW 303).

...grammar consists of the conditions of intelligibility of a language. It is the conventionally-established basis on which we can make sense: 'Grammar consists of conventions' (PG 138), keeping in mind that conventions here are not due to a concerted consensus, but to an unconcerted agreement in practice.

...grammar includes '[a]ll the requirements for sense'...

'The connection between "language and reality" is made by definitions of words, and these belong to grammar', writes Wittgenstein (PG 97).

...the Tractatus sets the stage for what Wittgenstein will later call 'grammar': grammar is that which enables or regulates sense (and so is itself nonsensical) and cannot meaningfully be said in the flow of the language-game but only heuristically articulated.

At the conceptual basis of our confrontation with experience are not bare particulars, but grammar: it is grammar that tells us what kind of object anything is (PI 373).

...when Wittgenstein speaks of the correspondence between concepts and nature, he is talking about the correspondence between the structures of concepts – that is, our grammatical rules – our grammar – and facts of nature. Take the concept of pain, some of the 'structures' of that concept can be expressed in grammatical rules such as: 'Human beings are normally susceptible to pain'; 'Tables and chairs don't feel pain'; 'There is psychological as well as physical pain', etc. In these passages, then, Wittgenstein is saying that of course we are interested in the correspondence between our grammar and very general facts of nature, but not in the way natural scientists or historians are interested in this correspondence. That is, we are not interested in any empirical justification or historical account for our having the grammatical rules we do. — Daniele Moyall-Sharrock

Our lives are meaningful, and we learn words (moreover, concepts) in coming into our culture, acting, failing, interacting, becoming part of everything everyone does. Again this picture of "meaning" is getting in the way. Our expressions, as our lives, don't have a "meaning" attached to them; part of the confusion Witt recognizes is that we believe that since we can give a definition ("meaning") for ever word, that this is how all language works (reference/correspondence). — Antony Nickles

I've never claimed that all language works by reference/correspondence only, and "wielding" words need not imply it. I can wield/use the words "Pass the salt" as a command/request, for example. If your earlier distinction between "wielding" words and words being "meaningful in our lives" meant to imply that not all language works by reference/correspondence only, then I misunderstood you. At least, I hope you do not intend to argue against Wittgenstein's position, famously summarised as "meaning is use".

To obey a rule is to obey it correctly (do it right) or wrong (fail to obey it). Justifications can differ as to why we obeyed it, and we can argue about what it means to have (rightly) obeyed a particular rule, but what is right and what is wrong are not contained/decided by rules (unless they are set by us--laws, commandments, etc.). — Antony Nickles

If "what is right and what is wrong are not contained/decided by rules", then why bring Wittgenstein's rule-following into it? If it is to discuss what I take to be Cavell's and/or Kripke's misreading: that Wittgenstein creates an open question with his "turned spade" and invites further justification, then I have nothing further to contribute. If you don't wish to discuss whether or not this is a misreading (or was Wittgenstein's position), then I will leave it for you and others to discuss Cavell's and/or Kripke's take on it.

If I am following the rule, I may only have, "I was following the rule." And so cannot explain, detail, qualify, defend, make explicit, distinguish, or justify myself, except as to how I believe following the rule is done and that I did it. — Antony Nickles

If that's what you meant by "abdicating [your] responsibility to be intelligble to the other", then fair enough.

You can hold me responsible for the act, and for my choice to follow the rule (though, in following the rule, if I judge the rule as irresponsible, I am not obeying it (#222)). — Antony Nickles

§222 is not about judging the rule as being irresponsible. §222 supposes that what determines following the rule is the judgment of one's private "intimation" (i.e. one's intuition, instinct, feeling, hunch). However, one could judge their intimation irresponsibly, and then "I wouldn't say that I was following it like a rule". This brings into question the supposition that our "intimation" is what determines following the rule. This supposition "is, of course, only a picture."

And I can claim I was following the rule as an excuse from the guilt/wrong, but Kripke's society is judging my having followed the rule or not, not whether the rule itself is right/wrong — Antony Nickles

Wittgenstein is not talking about "whether the rule itself is right/wrong". But if you don't want to have that discussion, then I'll leave you to it.

If I am behaving as expected there is no need to make myself intelligible (as we don’t ask after intention unless something phishy happens). If you have broken the rules of chess and I tell you, and you claim you did not, you must explain yourself if we are to go forward, together. For you to explain in what sense you intended, or so that you know what is at stake and have a chance to qualify what seems inexplicable from my position. This may come to our being unable to reconcile, however, as Cavell will say elsewhere about it: though we are endlessly separate, there is no depth to which langauge can not reach, and we are answerable for everything that comes between us. — Antony Nickles

What if someone breaks (or fails to learn) the rules of grammar (i.e. the bounds of sense)? This is a "depth" that language cannot "reach" or reconcile.

@Banno help

for Wittgenstein, grammar is about the sense of the words "excuse", "apology", "threat", "pain", "learning", "reading", "talking", "lying", "seeing", etc. Our actions are obviously related to the use of these words, but grammar is not about the actions themselves (independently of the words/concepts). — Luke

Talking about what we imply when we say "I was only following the rule" is to talk about the act of making an excuse, how it works in our lives. To learn about a concept is to learn about the world (and ourselves in it); sometimes they are not aligned, or our words are dead to our culture, or sublimated, but I wouldn't say there is a necessary separation or disconnect, but, if there was one (the spade turned), we could bridge that gap.

What if someone breaks (or fails to learn) the rules of grammar (i.e. the bounds of sense)? This is a "depth" that language cannot "reach" or reconcile. — Luke

My phrasing was maybe too poetic. The point being we can not rely on blaming language for the breakdown. Language does not ensure it, but it makes it possible to reconcile (even to a new culture, an expression in a new context, beyond its usual senses) up to the point we give up. Your example does not foreclose that possibility/responsibility, but the picture of rules running language creates the picture of "bounds" because we want everything neatly applicable and predictable and universal, etc.

I hope you do not intend to argue against Wittgenstein's position, famously summarised as "meaning is use".. — Luke

Well if I understand you to say that: an expression is used, as in meant, by me, somehow related to the action or practice, and that the 'sense of the words' above is just another way of saying 'meaning', then I would say this misses Wittgenstein's radical re-conception of the way meaning works, and that the part that "use" plays is twisted because of that picture, but, no, I don't want to argue that with you.

I can wield/use the words "Pass the salt" as a command/request, for example. — Luke

Ergh, this seems so close, I can't help it. Yes. Here, the sense/use of what you are saying is closest to "I can [ say ] 'Pass the salt' as a command/request", but then what you call "using the words" is just, "saying". But this can also be seen as a grammatical claim: "The words 'Pass the salt' [ can be used ] as a command/request" You are here (almost**) making a claim about commanding and requesting (a difference or similarity); but the point being that it doesn't have anything to do with "you". (**I'm not sure what the grammatical point could be here with this example; maybe that they both involve influencing, here, the act of another.)

Moore's paradox can be put like this: the expression "I believe that this is the case" is used like the assertion "This is the case"; and yet the hypothesis that I believe this is the case is not used like the hypothesis that this is the case. — Wittgenstein PI Sec X emphasis added

The focus on "is used like" is on whether it is: as an assertion, or, as a hypothesis; not on the person "using" a word, but on the possibilities of the expression (the possible uses); you could call these different senses, but it is not the "sense" (meaning) of the expression. Here, part of the grammar of "belief" is its potential to be an assertion, here compared to the (grammatical) fact--or claim, here, really--that part of its makeup is that it can be a hypothesis. Now you can say: "I used belief as a hypothesis" but the focus is on differentiating between the uses that belief has, not that "your use" gave it, or related it to, the "meaning" that it has--you are merely clarifying among the limited options.

So, can you say "I used the word..."? sssuuuure, but that adds nothing to your merely expressing (saying) them (maybe not even choosing them). The uses, those senses, were already there and their meaningfulness doesn't have anything (much) to do with you (not to say they may not be important to you, you may have reasons, clarifications, etc.). Of course if there is confusion we can ask: "What did you mean?", but the answer to this falls (usually) within a concept's grammar (its possible senses). Now this is different than saying there are rules and I "used the word" in accordance with its rules.

I can wield/use the words "Pass the salt" as a command/request, for example.
— Luke

...the point being that it doesn't have anything to do with "you". — Antony Nickles

I didn't mean to emphasise the "I", and I don't know why you think I did. Any English speaker could make the same command/request by saying "pass the salt", obviously.

I'm not sure what the grammatical point could be here with this example — Antony Nickles

The point of this example was to show you that I know not "all language works by reference/correspondence", since a command or request uses language for a purpose other than mere reference/correspondence. "Slab!"

The focus on "is used like" is on whether it is [ used ]: as an assertion, or, as a hypothesis; not on the person "using" a word, but on the possibilities of the expression (the possible uses); you could call these different senses, but it is not the "sense" (meaning) of the expression. — Antony Nickles

You are suggesting that the "focus" is only on possible uses, not on actual uses. As though nobody actually uses language...

Now you can say: "I used belief as a hypothesis" but the focus is on differentiating between the uses that belief has, not that "your use" gave it, or related it to, the "meaning" that it has--you are merely clarifying among the limited options. — Antony Nickles

If the focus is only on the "possibilities" of use, then it's not really about actual use at all. However, Wittgenstein is definitely focused on actual uses of language; that's why he keeps harping on about language-games and language-use as an activity:

The word “language-game” is used here to emphasize the fact that the speaking of language is part of an activity (PI 23)

To repeat: don’t think, but look! (PI 66)

We’re talking about the spatial and temporal phenomenon of language, not about some non-spatial, atemporal non-entity. (PI 108) — LW

Of course if there is confusion we can ask: "What did you mean?", but the answer to this falls (usually) within a concept's grammar (its possible senses). Now this is different than saying there are rules and I "used the word" in accordance with its rules. — Antony Nickles

How is it different? Language is the game and grammar is its rules. The rules determine which moves are allowable (make sense) in the language-game, and the moves allowable in the language-game are just the "possibilities" (different senses) that you mentioned. So, an expression can be used (e.g.) as an assertion or as a hypothesis, but which of those possibilities is actualised depends on what a speaker/writer actually does with it (how a speaker/writer actually uses it) in a given instance.

...the point being that it doesn't have anything to do with "you".
— Antony Nickles

I didn't mean to emphasize the "I", and I don't know why you think I did. — Luke

I pointed it out for a reason, but not emphasizing "you" as apart from anyone else, but that the way a word has meaning doesn't have anything to do with us, in the way your picture describes.

...an expression can be used (e.g.) as an assertion or as a hypothesis, but which of those possibilities is actualised depends on what a speaker/writer actually does with it (how a speaker/writer actually uses it) in a given instance. — Luke

underline added

Your picture injects the speaker as "the user"; that the use of language depends on them. But "the" use (not "our" use) is a part of language (our lives), not in the speaker doing something, "using it".

#43 For a large class of cases—though not for all—in which we employ the word "meaning" it can be defined thus: the meaning of a word is its use in the language. — Witt, PI

That words are meaningful is not because of how I use a word (or expression), as in the way it is used by me. There is the whole of language, that is to say everything worth expressing or that matters in our lives, and this word has a role, a place. That is its use, not our using; the word's use, as in the word has a use, or uses; Witt will also call them senses (like varieties or options), which depend (mostly) on the context, not upon my intention or my "actualizing" it.

#531 We speak of understanding a sentence in the sense in which it can be replaced by another which says the same; but also in the sense in which it cannot be replaced by any other.

#532 Then has "understanding" two different meanings here?—I would rather say that these kinds of use of "understanding" make up its meaning, make up my concept of understanding. — Witt, PI excerpts, emphasis added

There are two (at least) "understandings", and Wittgenstein is saying "in the sense of" to clarify/differentiate which grammar for this concept we are discussing. As Cavell discusses on p. 80, the classic idea of the "meaning" (what you also call the "sense") of a word, disappears completely, vanishes.

Of course if there is confusion [about which sense] we can ask: "What did you mean?", but the answer to this falls (usually) within a concept's grammar (its possible senses). Now this is different than saying there are rules and I "used the word" in accordance with its rules.
— Antony Nickles

How is it different? Language is the game and grammar is its rules. — Luke

This is one main part of this essay in understanding the impact of the desire for "mathematical" rules: that the first picture of how language works, the question is asked after, the second way, with rules, is with all applications thought to be completely known beforehand.

Thus, it is not a matter of simply judging whether a rule (aspiring to be mathematical) was followed (unless it is that kind of concept--math, chess, etc.), but understanding/teaching post-expression justifications; the usual context; the extension of the concept into new contexts; making explicit the grammar of this concept; finding out if we are missing something; adding/changing something because our lives have changed.

I think part of the motivation for misunderstanding here is that if we imagine language works on rules, than at the end of justifications for following them, we imagine there is nothing else to do because the point of the rule was to provide a foundation for a kind of certainty to our language, a bedrock. So, if what happens at the end of justifications turns on us, then it will seem our language is arbitrary, uncertain, individual, because of the ultimate contingency on me and you (not for a prior ground, but an ongoing reconciliation).

the way a word has meaning doesn't have anything to do with us, in the way your picture describes. — Antony Nickles

So you accept that 'meaning is use', but you reject that meaning has anything to do with "us": the users of words and language?

Your picture injects the speaker as "the user"; that the use of language depends on them. — Antony Nickles

Yes, the use of language depends on its users. This is controversial?

But "the" use (not "our" use) is a part of language (our lives), not in the speaker doing something, "using it". — Antony Nickles

Does language use itself? Tell me more about "the" use of language which is not "our" use of language.

There is the whole of language, that is to say everything worth expressing or that matters in our lives, and this word has a role, a place. That is its use, not our using; the word's use, as in the word has a use, or uses; Witt will also call them senses (like varieties or options)... — Antony Nickles

So words have possible uses (senses, varieties, options), but we don't actually choose any of the uses/options? Words use themselves?

...which depend (mostly) on the context, not upon my intention or my "actualizing" it. — Antony Nickles

Why "mostly"?

An intention is embedded in a setting, in human customs and institutions. If the technique of the game of chess did not exist, I could not intend to play a game of chess. To the extent that I do intend the construction of an English sentence in advance, that is made possible by the fact that I can speak English. (PI 337)

[PI Part II] 295. How do I find the ‘right’ word? How do I choose among words? It is indeed sometimes as if I were comparing them by fine differences of smell: That is too . . . , that is too . . . — this is the right one. —– But I don’t always have to judge, explain; often I might only say, “It simply isn’t right yet”. I am dissatisfied, I go on looking. At last a word comes: “That’s it!” Sometimes I can say why. This is simply what searching, that is what finding, is like here. [see also 298, 300] — LW

There are two (at least) "understandings", and Wittgenstein is saying "in the sense of" to clarify/differentiate which grammar for this concept we are discussing. — Antony Nickles

I don't find this example relevant. How does it relate to 'meaning is use'?

This is one main part of this essay in understanding the impact of the desire for "mathematical" rules: — Antony Nickles

Sorry, but I still don't get it. Aren't all rules ordinary?

the point of the rule was to provide a foundation for a kind of certainty to our language, a bedrock — Antony Nickles

But is that the point of rules?

#531 We speak of understanding a sentence in the sense in which it can be replaced by another which says the same; but also in the sense in which it cannot be replaced by any other.

#532 Then has "understanding" two different meanings here?—I would rather say that these kinds of use of "understanding" make up its meaning, make up my concept of understanding. — Witt, PI excerpts, emphasis added

The concept of "understanding a sentence" is meaningful to us, it matters to us, in (at least) two uses/senses. One is the sense that we can rephrase it to say exactly the same thing. There is another sense--in the concept of "understanding a sentence" (in its grammar)--where we follow something even though there is no other way to express it, as it is said, here, now, to you.

So words have possible uses (senses, varieties, options), but we don't actually choose any of the uses/options? — Luke

Wittgenstein's realization is the first part; the second is a different concept. You seem to see the "possibilities" of a concept, it's uses. And yes we can choose our words ahead of time (as, for a speech, which might help in clarifying the use), and we do say words--express them--(or not say them), but we do not "use" words as in: do not "mean" words. You may understand it as when Wittgenstein realizes that the internal process of "meaning" vanishes, taking with it the picture of us putting "meaning" into what we say, i.e., "using" language. All of this is externalized, so the sense (or use) of an expression is in the expression and context, not coming from us.

An intention is embedded in a setting, in human customs and institutions. If the technique of the game of chess did not exist, I could not intend to play a game of chess. To the extent that I do intend the construction of an English sentence in advance, that is made possible by the fact that I can speak English. — Wittgenstein, PI # 337 emphasis added

(PI 337)

As Austin will say, intention is only something we ask about afterwards if something is out of place (phishy)--"Did you intend to run that stop light?" So the expectation (only apart from which we may be rightfully be asked what we intented) is in the context (embedded in a setting). Now you can choose ahead of time to fly in the face of convention, but that is the extent to which we intend, mean, cause, etc.

We do not always or necessarily even choose our words before we speak, though questions can be answered about what we said afterwards. To have "spoken thoughtlessly" is not to have chosen our words poorly, but not to have taken into consideration the use for which they will be taken. We are still held to the words we say, even if we only register that this is the kind of thing said here, never considering the use (the grammar of an expression, as we don't for walking).

To the extent we "say" something (can be said to have said something) is how much what we say meets all the varied, ordinary criteria for having said (or done) that thing. Not just the words we say, but in a contex as an event--as in there is an after, in which there may (or not) be questions, determinations, pointing out parts that meet our criteria to differentiate one concept from another, one use in that concept ("I know" in the sense of ("yeah, yeah, I got it") from another, excuses, adaptations, even, but not only, justifications, etc.

But our desire for "mathematical" certainty creates a picture of the power of (necessity for) judgments made previously (rules, moral imperatives) which threatens our ability to see we can continue, to wait, to try again, to listen, without which how can we teach anything new to anyone, try to tell someone something hard to hear, have any hope in a moral moment.

we do not "use" words as in: do not "mean" words. — Antony Nickles

We obviously do use words, and we use them to mean this or that. We do not invent their meanings, we learn their meanings. And we learn to use them, and do use them, in accordance with the meanings that they have or can have. It is a mastery of a technique; a practice.

Consider this analogy: in chess, no individual decides or determines the rules (the allowable moves; the grammar) of the game on their own, but individuals can and do decide the moves that they make from among all of the allowable/possible/meaningful moves. This is analogous to choosing/using one's words (to speak meaningfully).

I don't think that we disagree on this, except that you assume my position to be other than it is, and except for your wild claims (or strong implications), such as that language is not used by us, or that we do not teach how to use words.

You may understand it as when Wittgenstein realizes that the internal process of "meaning" vanishes — Antony Nickles

He does not realise that the internal process "vanishes"; he realises that this is not how meaning works (just as individual chess players do not decide the rules on their own).

All of this is externalized, so the sense (or use) of an expression is in the expression and context, not coming from us. — Antony Nickles

Like I said earlier:

The rules determine which moves are allowable (make sense) in the language-game, and the moves allowable in the language-game are just the "possibilities" (different senses) that you mentioned. So, an expression can be used (e.g.) as an assertion or as a hypothesis, but which of those possibilities is actualised depends on what a speaker/writer actually does with it (how a speaker/writer actually uses it) in a given instance. — Luke

But our desire for "mathematical" certainty creates a picture of the power of (necessity for) judgments made previously (rules, moral imperatives) which threatens our ability to see we can continue, to wait, to try again, to listen, without which how can we teach anything new to anyone, try to tell someone something hard to hear, have any hope in a moral moment. — Antony Nickles

I think I understand what you are getting at now with your distinction between "mathematical" and "ordinary" rules. Wittgenstein refers to these as "calculi with fixed rules" and "the rules of a game" respectively (see PI 81). A game is "not everywhere bounded by rules" (PI 100), but it is still a game "for all that" (PI 68). Wittgenstein repeatedly compares language to games, and speaks of language as having rules (e.g. PI 84, 100, 125, 133, 549, 558).

However, I still disagree that morality is a significant theme of PI.

e.

I think I understand what you are getting at now with your distinction between "mathematical" and "ordinary" rules. Wittgenstein refers to these as "calculi with fixed rules" and "the rules of a game" respectively (see PI 81). — Luke

We're in the ballpark. Yes, it is the desire for rules like math that Cavell is saying leads to Kripke’s picture of a rule-driven language (a complete system). "The ordinary" would just be all our everyday criteria that matter, say, for an expression to be an excuse, but which are not complete or whose application is not fixed in advance.

We do not invent their [ word's ] meanings, we learn their meanings. And we learn to use them, and do use them, in accordance with the meanings that they have or can have. It is a mastery of a technique; a practice. — Luke

So I am trying to connect the desire for mathematical rules with picturing acting/speaking as done "in accordance with the meanings that they have" because criteria are not rules; judgment is whether you have met them, not whether you followed them, the application judged as just right or wrong (as the picture of statements as just true/false).

quote="Witt, PI # 81"]All this [ impulse to the ideal ] , however, can only appear in the right light when one has attained greater clarity about the concepts of understanding, meaning, and thinking. For it will then also be clear what can lead us (and did lead me) to think that if anyone utters a sentence and means orunderstands it he is operating a calculus according to definite rules.[/quote]

So the picture that we "mean" sentences (use them) leads us to think language operates on definite rules. And that picture of language comes from an aspiration for langauge to operate like math, sublimely. So we must attain greater clarity about meaning.

We obviously do use words, and we use them to mean this or that. — Luke

Well, again, I agree we do choose words (sometimes) and we do say them (in a context), but what else is happening? what else does "us using words" look like? if we are using words to mean something, are we always using them? "mean" them every time? isn't this simply to move the same picture of "meaning" from some internal process to something external (rule, practice)?

A game is "not everywhere bounded by rules" (PI 100), but it is still a game "for all that" (PI 68). Wittgenstein repeatedly compares language to games, and speaks of language as having rules (e.g. PI 84, 100, 125, 133, 549, 558). — Luke

At least we see that a concept does not operate with a complete set of applications already worked out. The judgment that the game is tennis (in this case) is not made by rules (but by criteria), even though there are rules to tennis (which one has to be broken or removed for it to not be tennis?). And if we do not have a complete system of rules (#133), then how can rules be the (only) way language operates? What happens when our rules would be not so much broken, as, just, run out? What happens beyond the bounds of rules?

Consider this analogy: in chess, no individual decides or determines the rules (the allowable moves; the grammar) of the game on their own, but individuals can and do decide the moves that they make from among all of the allowable/possible/meaningful moves. This is analogous to choosing/using one's words (to speak meaningfully). — Luke

emphasis added

Well, in chess we choose every move, we deliberate over it, we consider the consequences, etc. We do not have this self-consciousness with most things we say or do. And usually only when an expression or action is not straightforward in the context, is there a need (which comes afterwards) to sort out what use of a concept applies--not beforehand by the rules, or in you "meaning" some use. Yes, we do not decide the grammar of a concept, but we also cannot ensure which use our words will have. We may want to make a request for the salt, but our emotions, or ego, or my authority over you (and whatever else comes into play of the context) make my expression a command, despite and apart from my desires and intentions.

However, I still disagree that morality is a significant theme of PI. — Luke

Making the discussion about rules so important definitely makes any ethical or moral themes seem insignificant. But it is exactly this fight against the desire for certainty, universality, the completely "mathematical" which Wittgenstein is impressing upon us as an epistemological obligation. The pursuit of knowledge of our lives through an investigation of our language, learning about ourselves, the other, can be done in an ethical manner, attending to each grammar for each different thing, or tainted by the desire for an all-inclusive answer. There is also the implications of his discussion of aspect blindness and that knowledge is not our only relation to the world.

e.

I think I understand what you are getting at now with your distinction between "mathematical" and "ordinary" rules. Wittgenstein refers to these as "calculi with fixed rules" and "the rules of a game" respectively (see PI 81). — Luke

We're in the ballpark. "The ordinary" would just be all our everyday criteria that matter, say, for an expression to be an excuse, but which are not complete or whose application is not fixed in advance. There are of course other kinds of rules than “mathematical” ones — But it is the desire for rules like math that Cavell is saying leads to Kripke’s picture of a rule-driven language (a complete system).

We do not invent their meanings, we learn their meanings. And we learn to use them, and do use them, in accordance with the meanings that they have or can have. It is a mastery of a technique; a practice. — Luke

So I am trying to connect the desire for mathematical rules with the picture of acting/speaking "in accordance with the meanings that they have" which is manifest from that same desire to have the application judged as just right or wrong (as the picture of statements as just true/false).

All this, however, can only appear in the right light when one has attained greater clarity about the concepts of understanding, meaning, and thinking. For it will then also be clear what can lead us (and did lead me) to think that if anyone utters a sentence and means or understands it he is operating a calculus according to definite rules. — Witt, PI # 81

Wittgenstein is saying that the picture that we "mean" sentences (use them) is what leads us to think language operates on definite rules. That picture of langauge comes from an aspiration for langauge to operate like math, sublimely.

We obviously do use words, and we use them to mean this or that. — Luke

Well, again, I agree we do choose words (sometimes) and we do say them (in a context), what else is happening? what else does "us using words" look like? if we are using words to mean something, are we always using them? "mean" them every time? does it really change anything if we simply move the same picture of "meaning" from some internal process to something external (rules)?

A game is "not everywhere bounded by rules" (PI 100), but it is still a game "for all that" (PI 68). Wittgenstein repeatedly compares language to games, and speaks of language as having rules (e.g. PI 84, 100, 125, 133, 549, 558). — Luke

At least we see that a concept does not operate with a complete set of applications already worked out. The judgment that the game is tennis (in this case) is not made by rules (but by criteria), even though there are rules to tennis (which one has to be broken or removed for it to not be tennis?). And if we do not have a complete system of rules (#133), then how can rules be the (only) way language operates? What happens when our rules would be not so much broken, as, just, run out? What happens beyond the bounds of rules?

Consider this analogy: in chess, no individual decides or determines the rules (the allowable moves; the grammar) of the game on their own, but individuals can and do decide the moves that they make from among all of the allowable/possible/meaningful moves. This is analogous to choosing/using one's words (to speak meaningfully). — Luke

emphasis added

Well, in chess we choose every move, we deliberate over it, we consider the consequences, etc. We do not have this self-consciousness with most things we say or do. Only when an expression or action is not straightforward in the context, is there a need afterwards to sort out what use of a concept applies--not beforehand by the rules, or in you "meaning" some use. Yes, we do not decide the grammar of a concept, but we also can not ensure which use our words will have. We may want to make a request for the salt, but our emotions, or ego, or my authority over you (and whatever else comes into play of the context) make my expression a command, despite and apart from my desires and intentions.

However, I still disagree that morality is a significant theme of PI. — Luke

Making the discussion about rules so important definitely makes any ethical or moral themes seem insignificant. But it is exactly this fight against the desire for certainty, universality, the completely "mathematical" which Wittgenstein is impressing upon us as a moral obligation. The pursuit of knowledge of our lives through an investigation of our language, learning about ourselves, the other, can be done in an ethical manner, attending to each grammar for each different thing, or tainted by the desire for an all-inclusive answer.

"The ordinary" would just be all our everyday criteria that matter, say, for an expression to be an excuse, but which are not complete or whose application is fixed in advance, so, not like rules. — Antony Nickles

You seem intent on talking about criteria instead of rules. Are you talking about ordinary rules or ordinary criteria?

Rules needn't be "complete or whose application is fixed in advance"; that is Wittgenstein's point. Tennis still has rules and is still a game, even though (e.g.) there is no rule "for how high one may throw the ball in tennis". And Wittgenstein seeks to emphasise the strong similarity between games and language in this regard (see language-games). Language also has rules and remains language, even though it is not "everywhere bounded by rules".

There are of course other kinds of rules than “mathematical” ones (but these are not Witt’s idea of criteria either). — Antony Nickles

What adds to the confusion here is that, as I understand it from the little I know or have read of his philosophy of mathematics, Wittgenstein does not even consider there to be these sort of fixed, complete, all-encompassing "mathematical" rules in mathematics (itself).

But it is the desire for rules like math that Cavell is saying leads to Kripke’s picture of a rule-driven language (a complete system). — Antony Nickles

Yes, I view Kripke as seeking the "ideal" that Wittgenstein considers problematic, as described in the PI 100s.

So I am trying to connect the desire for mathematical rules with the picture of acting/speaking "in accordance with the meanings that they have" which is manifest from that same desire to have the application judged as just right or wrong (as the picture of statements as just true/false). — Antony Nickles

I think this is confused. Language does have rules (grammar) even though it is not "everywhere bounded by rules"; even though the rules are not "complete".

133. We don’t want to refine or complete the system of rules for the use of our words in unheard-of ways.
For the clarity that we are aiming at is indeed complete clarity. But this simply means that the philosophical problems should completely disappear. — LW

The rules of language (that we are taught when we learn language-games) include how to use words "in accordance with the meanings that they have". And there are right and wrong ways to use them, otherwise any combination of words would make sense and none could be senseless (i.e. otherwise there is no grammar). PI 500 indicates this is not the case.

Now, however, let us suppose that after some efforts on the teacher’s part he continues the series correctly, that is, as we do it. (PI 145)

The words “Now I know how to go on” were correctly used when the formula occurred to him: namely, under certain circumstances. For example, if he had learnt algebra, had used such formulae before. — But that does not mean that his statement is only short for a description of all the circumstances which set the stage for our language-game. — Think how we learn to use the expressions “Now I know how to go on”, “Now I can go on”, and others; in what family of language-games we learn their use. (PI 179) — LW

Wittgenstein is saying that the picture that we "mean" sentences (use them)... — Antony Nickles

No, he does not mention "use" at PI 81. 'Meaning is use' views meaning in the "right light", rather than thinking of meaning as a mental act, which views meaning in the "wrong light". Wittgenstein is referring only to those views of meaning that are in the "wrong light" at PI 81, including his own views of the Tractatus and also (I believe) those of his "middle period".

Baker and Hacker offer this exegesis of PI 81 which may help to clarify matters:

Many words of our language are not everywhere bounded by rules (§§68, 71, 75–7). In some cases, such as proper names, W. claims, we use expressions without a ‘fixed’ or ‘rigid’ (feste) meaning at all (§79). The rules for the use of our words do not budget for every conceivable eventuality — and are none the worse, for all that (§80). But there is a powerful philosophical temptation to deny that this can be so. W., when he wrote the Tractatus, succumbed to it, thinking that the vagueness and indeterminacy exhibited by natural language is only a surface-grammatical phenomenon that disappears on analysis. [...]

A different temptation, and a different reaction to the fact that the words of natural languages are not everywhere circumscribed by rules, is to view natural languages as being defective to the extent that they do not meet this requirement. In philosophy, especially since the mathematicization of logic in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, we often compare the use of words in natural language with the calculi of logic, which have rigid rules. It is then tempting to say that natural language approximates such calculi — that the calculi of logic are ideal languages, by comparison with which natural languages are deficient. It is against this temptation that W. now warns. — Baker and Hacker

And if we do not have a complete system of rules (#133), then how can rules be the (only) way language operates? — Antony Nickles

It seems that you desire this "ideal" for a complete system of rules yourself. Ask yourself the same of tennis or chess or any other game. Here's a hint:

Where is the connection effected between the sense of the words “Let’s play a game of chess” and all the rules of the game? — Well, in the list of rules of the game, in the teaching of it, in the everyday practice of playing. (PI 197) — LW

What happens when our rules would be not so much broken, as, just, run out? What happens beyond the bounds of rules? — Antony Nickles

If you're talking about beyond the rules of language, then the answer can't be "more language" or "let's talk it out", because there is no sense beyond the rules of language (i.e. grammar). Grammar is the bounds of sense.

Yes, we do not decide the grammar of a concept, but we also can not ensure which use our words will have. — Antony Nickles

This needn't imply that we can't use words to mean one thing rather than another. You are again seeking an ideal (certainty) to make language "everywhere bounded by rules" and to shore up all the gaps (to always "ensure which use our words will have").

Making the discussion about rules so important definitely makes any ethical or moral themes seem insignificant. — Antony Nickles

Yes, Wittgenstein does make quite a point about rules and rule-following...

But it is exactly this fight against the desire for certainty, universality, the completely "mathematical" which Wittgenstein is impressing upon us as a moral obligation. — Antony Nickles

Do you have a reference?

The pursuit of knowledge of our lives through an investigation of our language, learning about ourselves, the other, can be done in an ethical manner, attending to each grammar for each different thing, or tainted by the desire for an all-inclusive answer. — Antony Nickles

I'm sure it can, but where does Wittgenstein explicitly say any of this in PI? It seems to involve a lot of reading between the lines.

There is also the implications of his discussion of aspect blindness and that knowledge is not our only relation to the world. — Antony Nickles

How is aspect blindness related, and do you have a reference for the knowledge part?

So I am trying to connect the desire for mathematical rules with the picture of acting/speaking "in accordance with the meanings that they have" which is manifest from that same desire to have the application judged as just right or wrong (as the picture of statements as just true/false).
— Antony Nickles

I think this is confused. Language does have rules (grammar) even though it is not "everywhere bounded by rules"; even though the rules are not "complete". — Luke

I think we're just pulling loose threads now, but I am not saying that the picture of language controlled by rules, is that they are necessarily bounded and complete; that is the "mathematical" desire for rules (the ideal). It is that desire that creates the picture of our "meaning" expressions. There are of course some concepts for which the grammar involves rules, just not all concepts.

The rules of language (that we are taught when we learn language-games) include how to use words "in accordance with the meanings that they have". And there are right and wrong ways to use them, otherwise any combination of words would make sense and none could be senseless (i.e. otherwise there is no grammar). PI 500 indicates this is not the case. — Luke

It is not grammar that makes an expression "senseless", as if our "using" it wrong makes it not an expression at all (without "sense", as in: lacking "a meaning"). It just is an expression (as, an event), it is we that cannot make out where it fits, with which sense of a concept (a different idea of "sense"). But it still has an impact (#498--imagine modern art which is yet to be understand because its context is too new, there is no known form of the art so the grammar of art comes to an end--but is it then "wrong"?). It is us drawing the boundary(#499), perhaps excluding the other or the expression--not automatically for not following a rule, but purposefully--(#500), as we are inclined to (possibly) leave the student with the exasperation of "This is simply what I do." (#217), or not abandon them.

'Meaning is use' views meaning in the "right light", rather than thinking of meaning as a mental act, — Luke

How is the picture of us "using language" not a version of a mental act? How does simply externalizing "meaning" make our part in this picture not still causal (#220)? (If you are "using language", where/how is the "using" process happening?) If you can agree this should not be the picture, I'm not sure why we are still struggling to see that Witt's concept of "use" is not determined, as in caused, by us (beforehand), but determined, as in (in the sense of) figured out in making a determination (afterwards, when necessary), by the criteria for its grammar. Other than this sticking point of realizing "the use" is not our "using" (either causing or choosing), the only other thing hanging us up would be, in a sense, the timing (ruling before, or judging after) which affects the process of judgment. (Baker and Hacker do not appear to address the final paragraph of #81 (merely suggesting we compare the regular use of language with the ideal). In that last bit, Witt says that we must get clear about our picture of "meaning" to see why that leads to the idea of operating a calculus.)

What happens when our rules would be not so much broken, as, just, run out? What happens beyond the bounds of rules?
— Antony Nickles

If you're talking about beyond the rules of language, then the answer can't be "more language" or "let's talk it out", because there is no sense beyond the rules of language (i.e. grammar). Grammar is the bounds of sense. — Luke

I will grant that a concept's grammar is where/how we begin our process of judgment, but they are not determinative, pre-determined bounds. It is us that may not know what to do with an expression (what sense it may have), still us that decides if we continue past the logic of grammar. Grammar does not justify or limit our expressions (see above). So our ability to "talk it out" is endless: justifying our acts, making excuses, weighing criteria to be applied in judgment, pointing out relevant context (ad infinitum), settling claims of the grammar of a concept. Those paths may close; the spade may be turned. But that does not end our relationship in continuing to resolve our differences (creating a new world--projecting a concept into a new context; standing in place of our words, whether mad or "before our time" or futily. We may court rejection or irrationality, but we are not doomed to it. This is exactly the point of the essay. If we imagine language as driven by rules, then, having broken one or gone beyond it, there is not a lack of the ability to make sense, but nothing; we have reached our end.

"The ordinary" would just be all our everyday criteria that matter, say, for an expression to be an excuse, but which are not complete or whose application is fixed in advance, so, not like rules.
— Antony Nickles

You seem intent on talking about criteria instead of rules. Are you talking about ordinary rules or ordinary criteria? — Luke

When Witt refers to the ordinary he means all the criteria that are not "mathematical" (except for "mathematical" concepts). Mathematical criteria would be complete, universal, certain. etc. Criteria is a part of grammar; they are the measure of our judgments about a certain concept: whether we have made an excuse, the things that count in being said to have an opinion (#573), making a mistake (#51), reading (#159), recognizing you have raised your arm (#625)--roughly, of having satisfied what is essential to us about a concept (its grammar). We may not know this ahead of time (be aware or have it worked out explicitly, as they are imbedded in our lives).

But it is exactly this fight against the desire for certainty, universality, the completely "mathematical" which Wittgenstein is impressing upon us as a moral obligation.
— Antony Nickles

Do you have a reference? — Witt, PI 520

All the talk of the sublime, logic, wanting to know another's pain (with certainty); basically the entire struggle with the Interlocutor and the reason we need to look and see the individual grammar of something rather than give in to our desire to have a generalized understanding.

I'm not sure I would call that "reading between the lines" so much as the big picture. Witt does not say things directly because they won't matter unless you see it, come to it, yourself. There are tons of backwards, hinted statements and questions left to be answered by us. He is also the writer of the Tractatus, so he still will not allow himself to say something he is unsure of, so that leaves a lot of ground covered only about how we go wrong, removing generalized explanations, but where we go from there is wide open, left unconstrained.

There is also the implications of his discussion of aspect blindness and that knowledge is not our only relation to the world.
— Antony Nickles

How is aspect blindness related, and do you have a reference for the knowledge part? — Witt, PI 520

Getting into this is for another time, but, if you're interested: If we cannot see something as something (p. 213), then we may want to "know" (be convinced) that someone is in pain (p. 223), rather than react to them as a person in pain (one aspect of the same thing skipped over by another; here, us). We may not treat them (have an attitude towards them) as someone who has a soul, in wanting to have knowledge that they do (proof for our opinion)(p. 179). That our eyes are shut (p. 224) by our conviction for certainty (p. 223).

There are of course some concepts for which the grammar involves rules, just not all concepts. — Antony Nickles

Which concepts do not involve rules?

It is not grammar that makes an expression "senseless", as if our "using" it wrong makes it not an expression at all (without "sense", as in: lacking "a meaning"). It just is an expression (as, an event), it is we that cannot make out where it fits, — Antony Nickles

To whom is it "senseless" if not we English-speakers?

But it still has an impact — Antony Nickles

Having an impact is not synonymous with having sense.

How is the picture of us "using language" not a version of a mental act? — Antony Nickles

Wittgenstein defines meaning in terms of use as an alternative to the commonplace picture that meaning is a mental act. You are questioning how use is not a mental act? If use is a mental act, and if 'meaning is use' as W says, then meaning must also be a mental act. This would defeat the purpose of Witt's definition of meaning in terms of use. I suppose I could ask you how using a hammer is not a mental act?

How does simply externalizing "meaning" make our part in this picture not still causal (#220)? — Antony Nickles

Because I can't make words mean whatever I want them to mean. But I can use them with the conventional uses/meanings that they have. And intentionally so.

Also, it's not the same causality at #220, which is talking about rules (not) causing us (to follow them). You are talking about us (not) causing meaning.

(If you are "using language", where/how is the "using" process happening?) — Antony Nickles

The same place I use hammers (the shed).

If you can agree this should not be the picture, I'm not sure why we are still struggling to see that Witt's concept of "use" is not determined, as in caused, by us (beforehand), but determined, as in (in the sense of) figured out in making a determination (afterwards, when necessary), by the criteria for its grammar. — Antony Nickles

How can we know the meaning/use afterwards if we don't know the meaning/use beforehand?

So our ability to "talk it out" is endless: justifying our acts, making excuses, weighing criteria to be applied in judgment, pointing out relevant context (ad infinitum), settling claims of the grammar of a concept. Those paths may close; the spade may be turned. But that does not end our relationship in continuing to resolve our differences (creating a new world--projecting a concept into a new context; standing in place of our words, whether mad or "before our time" or futily. — Antony Nickles

You're talking about what can happen in the future, as if a language-game or a game like chess is played according to all the rules over time that a game has had, does have, or will have in the past, present, and future. There might be conventional uses/meanings in the future which are not currently conventional uses/meanings, but that doesn't mean they have any meaning or use to us now. Should we postpone Wimbledon until we know what all the rules of tennis will be? Can we not decide whether or not a move in a game is legal (or makes sense) now?

If we imagine language as driven by rules, then, having broken one or gone beyond it, there is not a lack of the ability to make sense, but nothing; we have reached our end. — Antony Nickles

What's the difference in terms of language?

When Witt refers to the ordinary he means all the criteria that are not "mathematical" (except for "mathematical" concepts). Mathematical criteria would be complete, universal, certain. etc. — Antony Nickles

Right, but the discussion is titled: 'Rules' End', not 'Criteria's End'.

We may not know this ahead of time (be aware or have it worked out explicitly, as they are imbedded in our lives). — Antony Nickles

You seem to be talking about the criteria of our concepts, while I am talking about the rules for the use of our words.

Baker and Hacker on 'Criteria':

[A criterion] is not part of a theory of meaning, but a modest instrument in the description of the ways in which words are used. As we should expect if we have followed Wittgenstein thus far, it plays a significant role in his philosophy, but not by way of a premise in an argument, nor by way of a theory. ‘An “inner process” stands in need of outward criteria’ (PI §580) is not a thesis from which philosophical propositions are proved. It is a synopsis of grammatical rules that determine what we call ‘the inner’. [...]

To explain the criteria for toothache, for joy or grief, intending, thinking or understanding is not to describe an empirical correlation that has been found to hold. For criteria, unlike symptoms (inductive correlations), determine the meanings of expressions for which they are criteria. To explain the criteria for the application of an expression ‘W’ is to give a grammatical explanation of ‘W’. It explains what we call ‘W’, and so explains a facet of the use of the word (AWL 17 – 19). To say that q is a criterion for W is to give a partial explanation of the meaning of ‘W’, and in that sense to give a rule for its correct use.

Baker and Hacker on 'Rules':

Philosophical questions commonly concern the bounds of sense, and these are determined by the rules for the use of words, by what it makes sense to say in a language. This is the source of philosophy’s concern with grammatical rules. For by their clarification and arrangement, philosophical questions can be resolved, and philosophical confusions and paradoxes dissolved. [...]

That a person’s action is rule-governed, that he guides himself by reference to a rule, is manifest in the manner in which he uses rules, invokes rule-formulations, acknowledges rules cited by others, refers to rules in explaining what he did, justifying what he did in the face of criticism, evaluating, criticizing and correcting what he did, and so forth (cf. PI §54). It is to these familiar features of rules and rule-governed practices that we now turn.

(1) The instructional aspect: We typically teach a rule-governed activity by citing rules, i.e. by using sentences as formulations of rules: ‘This is a pawn' [...]
(2) The definitory aspect: Rules define actions: for example, castling in chess [...]
(3) The explanatory aspect: [...] An action is explained by giving the agent’s reason why he acted as he did, and the rule which the agent follows provides part or the whole of his reason [...]
(4) The predictive aspect: The mastery of rule-governed techniques provides foundations for predictions. [...]
(5) The justificative aspect: A rule is cited in justifying (and also in criticizing) an action [...]
(6) The evaluative aspect: Rules constitute standards of correctness against which to ‘measure’ conduct as right or wrong.

Wittgenstein defines meaning in terms of use as an alternative to the commonplace picture that meaning is a mental act. You are questioning how use is not a mental act? If use is a mental act, and if 'meaning is use' as W says, then meaning must also be a mental act. This would defeat the purpose of Witt's definition of meaning in terms of use — Luke

I think maybe the disagreement here is recapitulating an ongoing one in academic circles between those philosophers who assimilate Witt’s notion of pragmatic use to that of American pragmatists like Peirce and James( Hacker and Baker) and those who argue that his idea of use stands as an implicit critique of their notions of meaning.

In the passage below , P. Hutchinson provides a reading of Witt on the relation between meaning and use that appears to support Antony’s interpretation.

“While many have been tempted to see the phrasing of this remark as a combination of Wittgenstein’s dispensable stylistic ‘tics’ and a definition of meaning, which therefore demands that the reader identify and remove the superfluous clauses and hedging strategies in order to extract the thesis (‘Meaning is use’),
we have argued something like the opposite. Wittgenstein is deliberately cautious in his wording precisely to guard against reading him as advancing the claim or the thesis that meaning is use.

Now, historically, there have been two paths proposed by those who have rightly resisted what we might call the ‘theoretical selective reading’ of this passage—the reading that seeks to overcome the clauses and modal
operators so as to distil out a theory of meaning. The first of these alternatives has it that Wittgenstein identifies or essentially-connects the meaning of a word with its use. He does so so as to draw attention to the ‘grammatical
nexus’ between the use of a word and the meaning of a word, such that if one asks for the meaning of a word one is generally satisfied with an account of the word’s use. This approach, therefore, reads the phrase “the meaning of a word is its use in language” as a ‘grammatical remark’, rather than a hypothetical remark or expression of a philosophical theory. This one might
call for shorthand the Oxford reading, as it emerges in the work of Kenny and Hacker, and is defended today by their students.

Talking of the essence of Wittgenstein’s account of meaning is rendered redundant when one observes that nowhere does Wittgenstein offer an account of meaning. Much less does he “argue” (Mounce again) for something being considered the “essence” (Mounce) of meaning.

How then might one (more successfully) read PI 43? Well, we recommend one reads it as something akin to a prophylactic: it is offered by Wittgenstein as something that might help you when faced with an otherwise
vexing philosophical question. Consider the following:
I have suggested substituting for ‘meaning of a word’ ‘use of a word’, because use of a word comprises a large part of what is meant by ‘the meaning of a word’…
I also suggest examining the correlate expression ‘explanation of meaning’. … it is less difficult to describe what we call ‘explanation of meaning’ than to explain ‘meaning’. The meaning of a word is explained by describing its use.

Witt:
It is a queer thing that, considering language as a game, the use of a word is internal to the game whereas its meaning seems to point to something outside the game. What seems to be indicated is that ‘meaning’ and ‘use’ are not equatable. But this is misleading. (AWL 48 Emboldened emphasis is ours.

In a similar vein, note also:



“An answer to the question: ‘What is the meaning of a word?’ would be: ‘The meaning is simply what is explained in the explanation of the meaning’. This answer makes good sense. For we are less
tempted to consider the words ‘explanation of the meaning’ with a bias than the word ‘meaning’ by itself. Common sense does not run away from us as easily when looking at the words ‘explanation of the
meaning’ as at the sight of the word ‘meaning’. We remember more easily how we actually use it.” (VoW p. 161. Emboldened emphasis ours)

We suggest that it is an error to read Wittgenstein as offering an “argument” for (any kind of theory whatsoever of) meaning, or (further) to be saying anything regarding the putative essence of meaning. In these two passages
we find Wittgenstein writing that he suggests substituting for “meaning of a word” “use of a word”. He repeatedly writes “we” and “for us”: “we ask…”, “what we call…”; thus he indexes these locutions, these questions and
conceptions, to ‘us’ and ‘we’, i.e. those who adhere to his conception of philosophy, ‘our method’ (cf. DS in VoW p.69). He writes of the meaning of a phrase being “characterised by us” (BB p. 65) as the use made of the phrase.

These locutions fall well short of those which one might honestly characterise as indicating identity claims, regarding meaning and use. The emboldened text in the three quotes (immediately above) should indicate that throughout his discussions of meaning Wittgenstein is very specifically talking about, and very specifically suggesting, a way of going on which will help one avoid confusion. There is something distinctly pragmatic about this - but it is not so in the way Mounce wishes to argue regarding Peirce’s theory of the sign. To bring this out, we need to first consider another quote from Wittgenstein:

The meaning of a phrase for us is characterised by the use we make of it. The meaning is not a mental accompaniment to the expression. Therefore, the phrase “I think I mean something by it”, or “I’m sure I mean something by it”, which we so often hear in philosophical discussions to justify the use of an expression is for us no justification at all. We ask: “What do you mean?”, i.e., “How do you use this expression?” If someone taught me the word “bench” and said that he sometimes or always put a stroke over it…and that this meant something to him, I should say: “I don’t know what sort of idea you associate with this stroke, but it doesn’t interest me unless you show me that there is a use for the stroke in the kind of calculus in which you wish to use the word ‘bench’”.—I want to play chess, and a man gives the white king a paper crown, leaving the use of the piece unaltered, but telling me that the crown has a meaning to him in the game, which he can’t express by rules. I say: “as long as it doesn’t alter the use of the piece, it hasn’t what I call meaning”. (BB p. 6)

P. Hutchinson provides a reading of Witt on the relation between meaning and use that appears to support Antony’s interpretation. — Joshs

Why do you think this supports Antony’s reading rather than mine?

Why do you think this supports Antony’s reading rather than mine? — Luke

I understood you to be agreeing with the Oxford approach and that of Hacker and Baker, which argues that Wittgenstein is offering a definition of meaning as use. By locating a specific grammatical nexus associated with its use, we have defined a meaning.
Hutchinson is instead saying that Witt is. or offering a definition of meaning at all. Instead, he is saying that ‘meaning’ in all its guises ( like definition) is a hopelessly confused idea.

Since you’ve said nothing about Antony’s reading, I think you’re only reacting to the word “definition”. I wasn’t completely comfortable using it either. I’m happy to say he “connects” meaning with use. I don’t see this as radically altering anything, including Baker and Hacker’s reading, unless you could explain otherwise.

Instead, [Witt] is saying that ‘meaning’ in all its guises ( like definition) is a hopelessly confused idea. — Joshs

I don’t think that’s right.

Sorry, I didn't have time earlier to provide a proper response.

This approach, therefore, reads the phrase “the meaning of a word is its use in language” as a ‘grammatical remark’, rather than a hypothetical remark or expression of a philosophical theory. This one might call for shorthand the Oxford reading — Joshs

This sounds right. As W says: "And we may not advance any kind of theory. There must not be anything hypothetical in our considerations." (PI 109)

Talking of the essence of Wittgenstein’s account of meaning is rendered redundant... — Joshs

Where did this "talk of essence" come from? Not from the preceding part of your quote. Where is the evidence or argument that the Oxford reading "[talks] of the essence of Wittgenstein's account of meaning"?

...when one observes that nowhere does Wittgenstein offer an account of meaning. — Joshs

Depends what is meant by "an account of meaning". PI 43 might be considered an account of meaning. Also PI 560.

Instead of "definition", a better way of putting it might be that Wittgenstein provides a 'grammatical explanation' or 'grammatical description' of "meaning" at PI 43; i.e. an explanation or description of the way the word "meaning" is used:

43. For a large class of cases of the employment of the word “meaning” — though not for all — this word can be explained in this way: the meaning of a word is its use in the language. — LW

I’m hoping that Antony will weigh in at some point. I’m reluctant to get myself any deeper into it in the meantime.

There are of course some concepts for which the grammar involves rules, just not all concepts. — Antony Nickles

Which concepts do not involve rules? — Luke

Hard to know how to take this. I don't mean to claim there are concepts that do not involve grammar at all (though see below). But the role of grammar as a gauge for identity, for a thing to be that thing, is judged by what is important in our lives and for our judgments, which cannot be entirely codified in advance in a particular structure (a "rule"), then generalized as part of all language. The grammar of concepts is more varied than simply (only) judging right and wrong (in accordance with a rule), such as what counts in the concepts of thinking, being in pain, seeing more than looking, mistaking, dreaming, guessing thoughts, understanding (as like a musical theme #527), not to mention the differences of the role (and limits) of grammar in the concepts of justice, beauty, virtue, progress, knowing the other's pain, illusion, fairy tales, nonsense poems (#282), etc.

However, even beyond a concept's grammatical requirements, a concept can be extended (#67, #209) into new contexts (because they are expressions of our interest #570), as we may claim something else/more to be essentially significant (as when our lives diverge from our concepts). The totality of conditions of a concept's grammar are not worked out ahead of time (#183). And concepts cannot all be taught by explaining rules, but in some cases only by giving/being an example or by practicing (#208).

It is not grammar that makes an expression "senseless", as if our "using" it wrong makes it not an expression at all (without "sense", as in: lacking "a meaning"). It just is an expression (as, an event), it is we that cannot make out where it fits, — Antony Nickles

To whom is it "senseless" if not we English-speakers? — Luke

The point is that an expression does not carry "sense" (or meaning) or "senselessness", as if within it, but that we make sense of it, or give up, call it "senseless", as in there is no sense of a concept with which we can associate it to see how it is meaningful, not that it is categorically without sense because it does not follow a rule.

But it still has an impact — Antony Nickles

Having an impact is not synonymous with having sense. — Luke

Even if we cannot make sense of an expression, place it within a sense of a concept--its grammar and criteria--a "sense" is not the only gauge or limit or result of an expression (you may just stare and gape #498).

How is the picture of us "using language" not a version of a mental act? — Antony Nickles

Wittgenstein defines meaning in terms of use as an alternative to the commonplace picture that meaning is a mental act. You are questioning how use is not a mental act? If use is a mental act, and if 'meaning is use' as W says, then meaning must also be a mental act. This would defeat the purpose of Witt's definition of meaning in terms of use. — Luke

I'm not sure how this isn't entirely circular, but, yes, I am questioning "explaining" "meaning" (let's say, how it always works) as "using" words, as (the act of?) your "meaning" it, or "intending" a meaning, even if my "meaning" is judged by conformity to a practice or convention.

For a large class of cases—though not for all—in which we employ the word "meaning" it can be defined thus: the meaning of a word is its use in the language. — Witt, PI #43

Not sure we can have a universalized picture of "meaning is use" when we would only define it that way most of the time. If my use of language in accordance with the rules for a practice is not the only definition of "meaning", then what are the other cases and how can these coexist? My claim is that in determining what is meaningful about an expression, it fits into, or we figure out how it fits into, what is important in our lives, which is "its use" within a concept, i.e., "what is the meaning (of this expression)?" is to ask in which way is it to have significance (between two options of a concept), what implications are we to associate (as we are surprised you are willing to adopt those of the concept that appears to fit your expression), etc. If that is the definition in most cases, then other cases would be where there is no importance and no implications, as in the case of simply referring to an object. Here, "meaning which?" is just to connect a demonstrative (this, that) or point out which object. Another case would be the expression of a definition, such as "The meaning of X will be Y", which would be to say, the meaning is all given, set, decided in and by the expression. There are no questions of context in these cases. Another case would be in which we expect the expression to be intended, chosen, purposeful, as in art, or a speech, as we would then claim something about the speaker "They are meaning to say X".

I suppose I could ask you how using a hammer is not a mental act? — Luke

If the analogy is that an expression is used as a hammer is used (as a tool), it does not follow that all expressions are "used", even though I grant that we can choose what we say, and even can agree that some concepts are (can be) tools, they can do things (as Austin points out), like promising; and that we can even try to do something with an expression, if a concept allows, not as if intending, but subject to failure, though not based on adherence to a rule, but to the other's acknowledgement of its success, like apologizing; or that saying something correctly is not to necessarily cause anything, as when threatening or persuading or truth-telling. Also, a hammer can be a tool, under the concept of hammering, but then so can a rock, though, even if used to hammer, is not then a hammer; and a hammer can be a weapon, but then would we say we have "used it" wrong? broken the rules of hammering? one could say I adhered to the rules for hammering (though on a person), but that is both true and yet seems to completely miss the point, as if to want to determine the meaning by an intellectual act. Maybe the use of the hammer is a foregone conclusion rather than a discussion, but, even so, the judgment of whether it is hammering or bludgeoning would be clear without involving "your" use at all.

How does simply externalizing "meaning" make our part in this picture not still causal (#220)? — Antony Nickles

Because I can't make words mean whatever I want them to mean. But I can use them with the conventional uses/meanings that they have. And intentionally so. — Luke

I agree that we cannot "make words mean whatever we want them to mean", but we also cannot make words mean something they can mean (our want does not factor in). In this picture you are still "meaning" them--using them to (or making them) "mean" some specific thing (here, a public, conventional use). Again, how is using an expression "intentionally" not causal? To take the "sense" or "meaning" out of your head and put it in the world, still leaves you in control of which use is meant, whether done right or wrong. Whether associated with a private meaning or a public one, to use them or to intend them collapses into your "meaning" them--if this is not by some mental process, how? Again, we sometimes choose what we say, but we do not always do so, nor "intend" a use for what we say, as if our intention was always picking which use we wanted.

If you can agree this should not be the picture, I'm not sure why we are still struggling to see that Witt's concept of "use" is not determined, as in caused, by us (beforehand), but determined, as in (in the sense of) figured out in making a determination (afterwards, when necessary), by the criteria for its grammar. — Antony Nickles

How can we know the meaning/use afterwards if we don't know the meaning/use beforehand? — Luke

The use of "knowing", afterwards, is in the sense of figuring out ("Did you intend to shoot that mule?"); and before, that we are not aware ("I didn't know that was offensive!"), that we have not worked out (can not) all the issues that might come up ("It doesn't matter if you believe it's raining, you can't prove it."), we are not aware of all the implications, obligations that are involved. At neither point do we "know" a concept in its entirety, with certainty, in every application (context), even all of its possibilities. Sometimes there will be no issue, sometimes our speech will turn out empty, purposeless, sometimes we do not realize what we have said, sometimes what we say will need to change the world before it can be known, in the sense of taken in.

So our ability to "talk it out" is endless: justifying our acts, making excuses, weighing criteria to be applied in judgment, pointing out relevant context (ad infinitum), settling claims of the grammar of a concept. Those paths may close; the spade may be turned. But that does not end our relationship in continuing to resolve our differences (creating a new world--projecting a concept into a new context; standing in place of our words, whether mad or "before our time" or futility. — Antony Nickles

You're talking about what can happen in the future, as if a language-game or a game like chess is played according to all the rules over time that a game has had, does have, or will have in the past, present, and future. There might be conventional uses/meanings in the future which are not currently conventional uses/meanings, but that doesn't mean they have any meaning or use to us now. Should we postpone Wimbledon until we know what all the rules of tennis will be? Can we not decide whether or not a move in a game is legal (or makes sense) now? — Luke

I am not talking about the world (necessarily) changing after we say something, but that the discussion of how an expression is meaningful, if necessary, begins after something is said. The implication you assume is exactly the picture of rules for use that imagines we know all of the applications of a concept ahead of time, as if to resolve every discussion except whether we "used the expression" correctly. And there are games in which we can decide or agree to the legal rules beforehand, they just aren't all our varied life measured differently for each kind of thing (concept). Chess or tennis have rules, but those rules are not the grammar for their identity, but just, rules, for a game, that we agree on so we completely know what to expect with certainty. In this sense, they use (some of) the same criteria as "mathematical" rules. Basically, these example do not generalize to all concepts. Cavell would say this is placing too much importance on rules, not seeing that rule-following is discussed and then moved on from to show how the grammar of other concepts differs. But some people latch on to rules because they satisfy the desire for certainty and evaluation and prediction, etc.

If we imagine language as driven by rules, then, having broken one or gone beyond it, there is not a lack of the ability to make sense, but nothing; we have reached our end. — Antony Nickles

What's the difference in terms of language? — Luke

Maybe part of the problem here is the conviction that what we say does not create a relationship between the speaker and the listener, and, if so, I agree that it may not necessarily (most days there are no misunderstandings, or no one cares at least if there are). But if the judgment is simply that my use is senseless (wrong), then that does not give us anything to do other than correction (re-conformity) or rejection.

We may not know this ahead of time (be aware or have it worked out explicitly, as they are embedded in our lives). — Antony Nickles

You seem to be talking about the criteria of our concepts, while I am talking about the rules for the use of our words. — Luke

I'm arguing those are two competing pictures. Expression is judged on criteria, not rules, and words are (nothing without) concepts.

— Luke

[A criterion] is not part of a theory of meaning, but a modest instrument in the description of the ways in which words are used....‘An “inner process” stands in need of outward criteria’ (PI §580)... is a synopsis of grammatical rules that determine what we call ‘the inner’. [...] — Baker and Hacker on 'Criteria'

The relegation of criteria to merely a description or synopsis is to overlook that they are the means by which we measure whether a thing is such a thing. They mark what counts, what is considered, what conditions need to be met; they allow for grammar itself. Criteria are not rules; we decide what sense an expression has by holding it up to our criteria for what counts in having said one thing rather than another.

— Luke

To explain the criteria for toothache, for joy or grief, intending, thinking or understanding is not to describe an empirical correlation that has been found to hold...To say that q is a criterion for W is to give a partial explanation of the meaning of ‘W’, and in that sense to give a rule for its correct use. — Baker and Hacker on 'Criteria'

Again, hard to say whether B&H need a correlation or something else that "has [to be] found to hold" but, if so, Wittgenstein does not remove the possibility that nothing will hold (us together). And to say, e.g., that "recognizing your fault" is a criteria for an apology does not mean that it is a rule of correctness. The apology may still come off (I may accept it), as you may acknowledge your blame but I may still not consider it an apology. So to say my contrition is an "explanation of the meaning of" an apology is to discount or limit what is meaningful to me, or in this situation, in exchange for a rule that dictates to me, over, say, my authority; skipping over, me.

— Luke

Philosophical questions commonly concern the bounds of sense, and these are determined by the rules for the use of words, by what it makes sense to say in a language. This is the source of philosophy’s concern with grammatical rules. For by their clarification and arrangement, philosophical questions can be resolved, and philosophical confusions and paradoxes dissolved. — Baker and Hacker on 'Rules'

This paints the picture that we can clarify and arrange the rules for what makes sense regarding our questions, then they will be resolved as confusions or dissolve. Again, this puts our agreement about expressions ahead of the occurrence of an expression, now, by me, here, to you. It may be nothing, or it may be a philosophical moment, where we do not know how to understand the other, continue with our conversation; it may be a moral moment, where what I do in response defines who I am. None of these things are possible in a world where everything is agreed to ahead of time and all our questions are already answered, or deemed senseless, or confused.

— Luke

That a person’s action is rule-governed, that he guides himself by reference to a rule, is manifest in the manner in which he uses rules

(3) The explanatory aspect: [...] An action is explained by giving the agent’s reason why he acted as he did, and the rule which the agent follows provides part or the whole of his reason [...] — Baker and Hacker on 'Rules'

Our justifications for acting only consist of pointing to rules to the extent a concept involves rules as part of its grammar. As they admit, even then a rule may only provide part of our rationale. We may also qualify our acts with excuses (mitigating our responsibility), extenuating circumstances (pointing to the context), etc. These are not judged as whether we rightly or wrongly followed a rule.

(4) The predictive aspect: The mastery of rule-governed techniques provides foundations for predictions. — Baker and Hacker on 'Rules'

B&H's claim is ambiguous as to who is doing what, when, but let's take it that the foundation on which you or I make a prediction is "mastery of rule-governed techniques". One sense is that how correct I am at predicting you is how well I know the technique--that I am predicting whether you have mastered the technique. But this picture of the certainty of prediction is taken from science's ability to reproduce an outcome based on a fixed method. Wittgenstein has many examples and claims about predictions. At pp. 223-224 he is discussing guessing at thoughts, and claims "the prediction contained in my expression of intention (for example 'When it strikes five I am going home') need not come true, and someone else may know what will really happen.... my prediction (in my expression of intention) has not the same foundation as his prediction of what I shall do, and the conclusions to be drawn from these predictions are quite different." Here there are (at least) two foundations for prediction (even just of intentions). My prediction of what I will do is a hope, a goal, the foundation of which is in a sense a promise to you or myself. This goes wrong not because I don't know what intending or promising is, but that I may break that promise or be kept from it. Your prediction of my action is based on, at least, your familiarity with me ("They always say they'll leave but then they say goodbye to everyone") and/or my knowledge of the context ("They've got too much to do before five"). My "certainty" in this is not my knowledge of the practice of promising (though that may be the threshold, it is not determinate), nor, say, of "meeting a deadline", but that I am certain, as in: resolute, sure of myself, as confident as I am "of any fact", as in: "I would bet money that....", will hold to my conviction, shutting my eyes to anything else (p. 224).

(5) The justificative aspect: A rule is cited in justifying (and also in criticizing) an action — Baker and Hacker on 'Rules'

This is to want a rule to ensure the correctness of our acts (if we have prepared with mastery); to know we are doing the "right" thing because a rule is the kind of thing that justifies an act definitively, completely. A rule can be cited as justification for an action if the concept of the act allows ("I have freedom of speech!" (a law) or "Freeing Kuwait was a Just War" (based on Christian morality), but not all actions are associated with rules. Say, running into the street during traffic is an action, let's call it risking your life, but we do not have a rule to justify it, make it "wrong", unless that makes it simply frowned upon. We could say it is justified if we risked our life to save another, but that is not a rule, there is no foundation of a mastered technique.

(6) The evaluative aspect: Rules constitute standards of correctness against which to ‘measure’ conduct as right or wrong. — Baker and Hacker on 'Rules'

And this is full circle, which is either that if I have mastered the technique and follow the rule correctly and can ensure that I am right, or it is basic moralism, as, in breaking the rule, I have no other recourse, and so not, possibly misunderstood, but wrong. Nietszche is rolling over in his grave.

There are of course some concepts for which the grammar involves rules, just not all concepts.
— Antony Nickles

Which concepts do not involve rules?
— Luke

Hard to know how to take this. — Antony Nickles

You said that "not all concepts" involve rules (or "for which the grammar involves rules"). I asked you to name an example of such a concept. How is that "hard to know how to take"?

The grammar of concepts is more varied than simply (only) judging right and wrong (in accordance with a rule), such as what counts in the concepts of thinking, being in pain, seeing more than looking, mistaking, dreaming, guessing thoughts, understanding (as like a musical theme #527), not to mention the differences of the role (and limits) of grammar in the concepts of justice, beauty, virtue, progress, knowing the other's pain, illusion, fairy tales, nonsense poems (#282), etc. — Antony Nickles

If you are talking about "what counts" in the concepts, then you are talking about the criteria of the concepts. However, there can clearly be right and wrong ways of using these words (such as "dreaming" or "justice"), otherwise we would not be able to teach the conventional uses of these words, or to understand them. You still seem to be talking about concepts (and their criteria), while I am talking about the uses of words (and their rules).

And concepts cannot all be taught by explaining rules... — Antony Nickles

But the use of words can. Otherwise, there wouldn't be correct or incorrect ways to use them. Again:

"...there is a way of grasping a rule which is not an interpretation, but which, from case to case of application, is exhibited in what we call “following the rule” and “going against it”. (PI 201)

...but in some cases only by giving/being an example or by practicing... — Antony Nickles

What gets practised? The (existing) practice is the conventional use.

The totality of conditions of a concept's grammar are not worked out ahead of time (#183). — Antony Nickles

The "conditions for" walking - or, the criteria that count as walking - at #183 seem to me quite unlike the rules for the meaning/use of the word "walking" (i.e. for whether or not one is using the word correctly/sensibly).

The point is that an expression does not carry "sense" (or meaning) or "senselessness", as if within it, but that we make sense of it, or give up, call it "senseless", as in there is no sense of a concept with which we can associate it to see how it is meaningful, not that it is categorically without sense because it does not follow a rule. — Antony Nickles

My point was that using words incorrectly can lead to nonsense.

Even if we cannot make sense of an expression, place it within a sense of a concept--its grammar and criteria--a "sense" is not the only gauge or limit or result of an expression (you may just stare and gape #498). — Antony Nickles

If the use of "Milk me sugar" has the "impact" of causing people to stare and gape, then why does W say it is not a command to stare and gape? After all, that's how commands are typically used - to have the hearer act in a desired way. It's because it lacks sense (grammar, rules) and is not a conventional use of those words. Merely "having an impact" is insufficient for it to be considered as meaningful language use (or a move in the game). That's how I read #498.

I'm not sure how this isn't entirely circular, but, yes, I am questioning "explaining" "meaning" (let's say, how it always works) as "using" words, as (the act of?) your "meaning" it, or "intending" a meaning, even if my "meaning" is judged by conformity to a practice or convention. — Antony Nickles

I went on to explain this. Here, I was just criticising your question of why use is not a mental act.

I am not saying that "using words" is the act of "meaning it". I'm saying that we can both use words and mean it (i.e. we can use words with intention). The two different senses of "meaning" may cause confusion here. W's observation that 'meaning is use' is about the meaning (e.g. signification) of a word and how it is used in a sentence, in context. A word might have several different conventional meanings, but typically has only one meaning when used, in context. We learn these conventional uses/meanings of words when we learn the language. This is the sense in which word meaning is not a mental act - because we learn a word's uses, we don't each invent them from our minds.

After becoming fluent in the language and in the conventional uses/meanings of words and phrases, one can also "mean it" when they use words (i.e. speak/write with intention). For example, if I want the salt, I know how to use language to request it. I don't imbue the words "pass the salt" with meaning by some private mental act; the words already have a conventional meaning/use. But I can still use (or even misuse) those words intentionally.

For a large class of cases—though not for all—in which we employ the word "meaning" it can be defined thus: the meaning of a word is its use in the language.
— Witt, PI #43

Not sure we can have a universalized picture of "meaning is use" when we would only define it that way most of the time. — Antony Nickles

Who said it was "universalized"?

If my use of language in accordance with the rules for a practice is not the only definition of "meaning", then what are the other cases and how can these coexist? — Antony Nickles

There seem to be few counterexamples. Personally, I think that W simply allows for the possibility that meaning may not always be use. Baker and Hacker suggest that "the phrases 'the meaning of a word' and 'the use of a word' are not everywhere interchangeable". They offer the following example: W "speaks of meaning blindness, but one could not speak of this phenomenon as 'use blindness'."

Anyway, I'm only arguing that Cavell's and your reading is inaccurate, not the merits of W's philosophy.

Another case would be in which we expect the expression to be intended, chosen, purposeful, as in art, or a speech, as we would then claim something about the speaker "They are meaning to say X". — Antony Nickles

You appear to be talking about something like subtext. Where do you see Wittgenstein as talking about subtext?

If the analogy is that an expression is used as a hammer is used (as a tool), it does not follow that all expressions are "used"... — Antony Nickles

I really don't understand your argument that language (or an expression) is not used. W says:

11. Think of the tools in a toolbox: there is a hammer, pliers, a saw, a screwdriver, a rule, a glue-pot, glue, nails and screws. — The functions of words are as diverse as the functions of these objects. (And in both cases there are similarities.)
Of course, what confuses us is the uniform appearance of words when we hear them in speech, or see them written or in print. For their use is not that obvious. Especially when we are doing philosophy!

...I grant that we can choose what we say, and even can agree that some concepts are (can be) tools... — Antony Nickles

I don't read Wittgenstein as saying that we use concepts as tools, but that we use words as tools.

...they can do things (as Austin points out), like promising... — Antony Nickles

Austin talked about How to Do Things With Words, not with concepts.

Also, a hammer can be a tool, under the concept of hammering, but then so can a rock, though, even if used to hammer, is not then a hammer; and a hammer can be a weapon, but then would we say we have "used it" wrong? — Antony Nickles

Hammers have a conventional use, but they can also be used unconventionally, just as words can also be used unconventionally. The results may not always be ideal, depending on the re-purposing.

The comparison to tools not only reinforces that language use can have various different purposes/functions, but also that the use of language occurs in the world and not (only) in our minds. Hence, language-games, which are like other games that are played in the world, often with other people.

...one could say I adhered to the rules for hammering (though on a person), but that is both true and yet seems to completely miss the point, as if to want to determine the meaning by an intellectual act. — Antony Nickles

I think you have missed the point, which is that the meaning of a word is not an intellectual or mental act.

Maybe the use of the hammer is a foregone conclusion rather than a discussion, but, even so, the judgment of whether it is hammering or bludgeoning would be clear without involving "your" use at all. — Antony Nickles

A better analogy would be that you don't/didn't invent the conventional use of hammers. You can use a hammer however you want/intend, but I wouldn't try using one to grate cheese.

I agree that we cannot "make words mean whatever we want them to mean", but we also cannot make words mean something they can mean (our want does not factor in). In this picture you are still "meaning" them--using them to (or making them) "mean" some specific thing (here, a public, conventional use). — Antony Nickles

I don't make, or intend for, words to have "a public, conventional use". They already have that without me. I only intend how I use them.

Again, how is using an expression "intentionally" not causal? — Antony Nickles

It is causal. I cause my use of the expression. The important factor is that I don't cause the conventional meaning/use of the expression, because the expression already has a conventional meaning/use (or several possible meanings/uses). I only cause my use, but I can exploit my knowledge of the different conventional meanings/uses in doing so.

To take the "sense" or "meaning" out of your head and put it in the world, still leaves you in control of which use is meant, whether done right or wrong. — Antony Nickles

I didn't take the conventional meaning out of my head and put it into the world; it was already in the world to begin with.

Again, we sometimes choose what we say, but we do not always do so, nor "intend" a use for what we say, as if our intention was always picking which use we wanted. — Antony Nickles

Right, sometimes we might be on autopilot; sometimes it might be unclear what to say. As W says at §142:

It is only in normal cases that the use of a word is clearly laid out in advance for us; we know, are in no doubt, what we have to say in this or that case. The more abnormal the case, the more doubtful it becomes what we are to say. And if things were quite different from what they actually are —– if there were, for instance, no characteristic expression of pain, of fear, of joy; if rule became exception, and exception rule; or if both became phenomena of roughly equal frequency —– our normal language-games would thereby lose their point. — PI 142

The use of "knowing", afterwards, is in the sense of figuring out ("Did you intend to shoot that mule?") — Antony Nickles

The use/meaning of the question might be ambiguous and it can be misunderstood or have an unforeseen impact, but presumably no rules of language are being broken; there is no incorrect use of words in the question.

Also, "Interpretations by themselves do not determine meaning." (PI 198)

I am not talking about the world (necessarily) changing after we say something, but that the discussion of how an expression is meaningful, if necessary, begins after something is said. — Antony Nickles

If we can only know afterwards whether an expression is meaningful, then how can we teach (the meaningful uses of) language to anyone? What is it that gets taught in the teaching of a language?

The implication you assume is exactly the picture of rules for use that imagines we know all of the applications of a concept ahead of time, as if to resolve every discussion except whether we "used the expression" correctly. — Antony Nickles

I'm not talking about "the application of concepts", but the use of words. It's unclear to me how a concept can be applied incorrectly, but it is clear to me how a word can be used incorrectly.

Cavell would say this is placing too much importance on rules, not seeing that rule-following is discussed and then moved on from to show how the grammar of other concepts differs. — Antony Nickles

Why do you (or Cavell) think rule-following is discussed at all? Also, can you provide a reference that W shows "how the grammar of other concepts differs"?

But if the judgment is simply that my use is senseless (wrong), then that does not give us anything to do other than correction (re-conformity) or rejection. — Antony Nickles

Why do you need something more to do? Nobody complains that breaking a rule of badminton "does not give us anything to do other than correction...or rejection".

Expression is judged on criteria, not rules, and words are (nothing without) concepts. — Antony Nickles

I think W would say you have it backwards; that concepts are nothing without (the use of) words. Concepts are ideas; mental contents. Wittgenstein spends a good deal of the book making the point that "An ‘inner process’ stands in need of outward criteria." (PI 580) See also the private language argument, PI 307, and the majority of the book, including:

In the sense in which there are processes (including mental processes) which are characteristic of understanding, understanding is not a mental process. (PI 154)

155. So, what I wanted to say was: if he suddenly knew how to go on, if he understood the system, then he may have had a distinctive experience — and if he is asked: “What was it? What took place when you suddenly grasped the system?”, perhaps he will describe it much as we described it above —– but for us it is the circumstances under which he had such an experience that warrant him saying in such a case that he understands, that he knows how to go on. — LW

To explain the criteria for toothache, for joy or grief, intending, thinking or understanding is not to describe an empirical correlation that has been found to hold...To say that q is a criterion for W is to give a partial explanation of the meaning of ‘W’, and in that sense to give a rule for its correct use.
— Baker and Hacker on 'Criteria'

Again, hard to say whether B&H need a correlation — Antony Nickles

B&H say they don't.

And to say, e.g., that "recognizing your fault" is a criteria for an apology does not mean that it is a rule of correctness. The apology may still come off (I may accept it), as you may acknowledge your blame but I may still not consider it an apology. — Antony Nickles

Why would you not consider it an apology if you accept it as such? Or is your acceptance or rejection about something other than whether or not it meets the criteria of being an apology (i.e. the grammar of "apology")? (Consider PI 354-355 and PI 496-497)

So to say my contrition is an "explanation of the meaning of" an apology is to discount or limit what is meaningful to me, or in this situation, in exchange for a rule that dictates to me, over, say, my authority; skipping over, me. — Antony Nickles

Whether or not you accept an apology makes no difference to what an apology is, or to what the word "apology" (conventionally) means. The conventions do "skip over you", in this sense. In terms of grammar, your feelings about what is meaningful regarding an apology counts about as much as your vote counts in an election.

B&H's claim is ambiguous as to who is doing what, when, but let's take it that the foundation on which you or I make a prediction is "mastery of rule-governed techniques". — Antony Nickles

Nobody is claiming that grammatical rules are "the foundation on which you or I make a prediction". At pp.223-224, Wittgenstein is providing a grammatical treatment of the expression “What is internal is hidden from us.”

Our justifications for acting only consist of pointing to rules to the extent a concept involves rules as part of its grammar. As they admit, even then a rule may only provide part of our rationale. We may also qualify our acts with excuses (mitigating our responsibility), extenuating circumstances (pointing to the context), etc. These are not judged as whether we rightly or wrongly followed a rule. — Antony Nickles

Okay, but PI 217 concerns W's justifications for following the rule in the way he does. One cannot wrongly follow a rule (and still follow it).

This paints the picture that we can clarify and arrange the rules for what makes sense regarding our questions, then they will be resolved as confusions or dissolve. Again, this puts our agreement about expressions ahead of the occurrence of an expression, now, by me, here, to you. It may be nothing, or it may be a philosophical moment, where we do not know how to understand the other, continue with our conversation; it may be a moral moment, where what I do in response defines who I am. None of these things are possible in a world where everything is agreed to ahead of time and all our questions are already answered, or deemed senseless, or confused. — Antony Nickles

Unless you can provide evidence to demonstrate that Wittgenstein is talking about morality in PI, rather than vaguely gesturing at it by saying that he "does not say things directly because they won't matter unless you see it, come to it, yourself" or reference "tons of backwards, hinted statements and questions left to be answered by us", then the evidence explicitly indicates that Wittgenstein's interest is limited only to grammar. He is not concerned with morality in PI.

Our inquiry is therefore a grammatical one. And this inquiry sheds light on our problem by clearing misunderstandings away. Misunderstandings concerning the use of words, brought about, among other things, by certain analogies between the forms of expression in different regions of our language. — Some of them can be removed by substituting one form of expression for another; this may be called ‘analysing’ our forms of expression, for sometimes this procedure resembles taking a thing apart. (PI 90)

If concept formation can be explained by facts of nature, shouldn’t we be interested, not in grammar, but rather in what is its basis in nature? —– We are, indeed, also interested in the correspondence between concepts and very general facts of nature. (Such facts as mostly do not strike us because of their generality.) But our interest is not thereby thrown back on to these possible causes of concept formation; we are not doing natural science; nor yet natural history — since we can also invent fictitious natural history for our purposes. (p. 230, 3rd edition) — LW

After all, didn't someone teach you what "justice" means? — Luke

Is justice something that can be taught.

The meaning of the word, yes.