Feelings are different to thoughts. Feelings are not propositional, thoughts are propositional. — RussellA

Are feelings to thoughts as words are to propositions (and things are to facts)?

(For you?)

Just trying to square this with,

the individual notes and combinations of notes in music express feelings not thoughts. — RussellA

Are feelings to thoughts as words are to proposition — bongo fury

Admittedly, I didn't make it clear what the point of my post was.

For Wittgenstein, a thought is not a single thing, a simples, but rather involves a relationship between entities.

2.01 "An atomic fact is a combination of entities"
4 "The thought is the significant proposition"
4.012 "It is obvious that we receive a proposition of the form aRb as a picture"
4.023 "A proposition is a description of a fact"

In my post, I was trying to make the same point, that thoughts are not single things, such as feelings, but involve relationships between things.

So, yes?

So, yes? — bongo fury

A proposition is a relationship between words. My belief is that a thought is a relationship between feelings. So yes, as far as I know.

I wonder what role does awareness play here. Is awareness a feeling or thought? In being aware of your feelings and thoughts are you feeling your feelings and/or thinking your thoughts?

So yes, as far as I know. — RussellA

Well I did specify:

(For you?) — bongo fury

So, yes.

Good. I didn't misunderstand.

But that line of thinking was leading me to expect,

the individual notes and combinations of notes in music express feelings not [while combinations of notes express] thoughts. — RussellA

That's the kind of reason I (and I claimed also W) counseled dispensing with mental entities.

I was going along with it (entities included) out of interest, while I thought I could follow. Awareness too, and I'm out of here.

That's the kind of reason I (and I claimed also W) counselled dispensing with mental entities. — bongo fury

In the TLP, he cautions against making claims of that kind (that's the overall message of the TLP, anyway).

Russell did believe that direct experience grounds the meanings of words.

(that's the overall message of the TLP, anyway). — Tate

What is?

That metaphysical claims are nonsense.

Never mind then. Back to words and music.

But that line of thinking was leading me to expect, the individual notes and combinations of notes in music express feelings not [while combinations of notes express] thoughts. — bongo fury

In great music, as with great painting, the notes, or brush marks, combine into a single aesthetic experience, which is a feeling rather than a thought.

As well, in a great novel, the words may also combine into a single aesthetic experience, which is a feeling, and is over and above the thoughts contained within its propositions.

In great music, as with great painting, the notes, or brush marks, combine into a single aesthetic experience, — RussellA

That depends on how you look at it, as W points out in the case of sentence tokens:

For in a printed proposition, for example, no essential difference is apparent between a propositional sign and a word.
(That is what made it possible for Frege to call a
proposition a composite name.) — 3.143

Curious that you want to downplay the relational/factual/structural aspect of the artwork and stress the whole, er, feeling, while W is keen to use musical and pictorial structure to explain propositional structure.

My concern here is understanding Wittgenstein. It seems clear to me from the many references that he did regard music as a kind of language. Addressing the question of whether he is right or wrong is best asked once we are clear what it is he is saying.

to say "music is language" is a metaphor. — RussellA

See "Metaphors We Live By", George Lakoff and Mark Johnson.

Wittgenstein came to see that language is more that just a logical relation between words.

Meaning can only be expressed in a proposition, such as "the apple is on the table". — RussellA

As he points out, a proposition need not be stated in words. Instead of saying "the apple is on the table" I can put an apple on a table. (3.1431)

Tactatus 4 "The thought is the significant proposition" — RussellA

Translating sinnvolle as significant is not wrong, but can be misleading if we are not clear what significant means in this context. It means to signify, to have a sense:

4 A thought is a proposition with a sense.

A thought represents a state of affairs, for example, "the apple is on the table". But this representation must also be logical. Thoughts refer to states of affairs and can do so because they have a common logical structure.

3 A logical picture of facts is a thought.

But this is a picture Wittgenstein comes to reject:

PI 115. A. picture held us captive. And we could not get outside it, for it lay in our language and language seemed to repeat it to us inexorably.

According to Normal Malcolm, it was the following event that led to this:

Wittgenstein was insisting that a proposition and what it describes must have the same ‘logical form’ Sraffa made a gesture, familiar to Neapolitans as meaning something like disgust or contempt, of brushing the underneath of his chin with an outward sweep of the finger-tips of one hand. And he asked: “What is the logical form of that?” [Malcolm N., (2001), Ludwig Wittgenstein: A Memoir, Oxford, Oxford University Press.]

Added:

In editing this some things were inadvertently deleted.

3.1 P/M In a proposition a thought finds an expression that can be perceived by the senses.

This is another way in which:

4 A thought is a proposition with a sense.

The proposition can be perceived by the senses. When a thought is expressed it can be perceived by others. They can know what I am thinking.

A limit cannot be drawn to thought (Preface) because we cannot think illogical thoughts:

3.03 Thought can never be of anything illogical, since, if it were, we should have to think illogically.

We cannot think illogically but we can say things that are illogical. Here we see the difference between thinking and saying.

That's the kind of reason I (and I claimed also W) counselled dispensing with mental entities.

I was going along with it (entities included) out of interest, while I thought I could follow. Awareness too, and I'm out of here. — bongo fury

If we dispense with mental entities then what is left?

That metaphysical claims are nonsense. — Tate

Depends on the claim. Maybe the issue is saying that you can claim any metaphysical position. Seems that you can only ponder or hypothesize metaphysical positions. A claim would change it from being metaphysical to scientific, no? Are scientific claims nonsense? Why?

Are scientific claims nonsense? — Harry Hindu

If they're about things in the world, they're fine. It's mainly philosophy that tries to comment on the world from a vantage point external to it.

If they're about things in the world, they're fine. It's mainly philosophy that tries to comment on the world from a vantage point external to it. — Tate

So does science. Science and Philosophy are about things. Is the idea of multiple universes and dark matter in the domain of philosophy or science? Are they mental entities as bongo put it, or something else?

The difference seems to be in the amount of observable evidence there is and its predictive power.

If evidence and predictive power are not mental entities then what are they? Are they something in the world?

The "world" here is all that is the case.

and being that thoughts are part of the world thoughts are what is the case as much as any other part of the world. The question is how are thoughts, which is one case, be about another entirely different case (not thoughts), like the movement of tectonic plates, if not by some form of causation (energy transfer, information transfer, etc.)?

If we dispense with mental entities then what is left? — Harry Hindu

Language, art, music, etc.

https://monoskop.org/images/1/1b/Goodman_Nelson_Languages_of_Art.pdf

sentence tokens — bongo fury

3.143 - "For in a printed proposition, for example, no essential difference is apparent between a propositional sign and a word. (That is what made it possible for Frege to call a proposition a composite name.)"

The Eiffel tower is in Paris, is 330m in height and is made of wrought iron. I can replace "I saw the 330m tall wrought-iron structure in Paris" by "I saw the Eiffel Tower". Is this what Wittgenstein is referring to ?

Curious that you want to downplay the relational/factual/structural aspect of the artwork and stress the whole, er, feeling — bongo fury

By definition, what makes an artwork rather than a craftwork is that an artwork has an aesthetic. An aesthetic is a unity between its parts, rather than just being an aggregation of parts loosely related.

W is keen to use musical and pictorial structure to explain propositional structure — bongo fury

4.023 A proposition is a description of a fact
2.0272 The configuration of the objects forms the atomic fact
Notebooks - Musical themes are in a certain sense propositions. [40]
Music, some music at least, makes us want to call it a language; but some music or course doesn't. (CV 62)
4.001 The totality of propositions is the language

The proposition is a combination of words, music is a combination of notes, so there is a similarity in this sense. I agree that Wittgenstein used music to explain propositions, but did he say that music uses propositions, that propositions are used in music as well as language ?

The proposition "the apple is green" describes a fact in the world that the apple is green, but what fact in the world does a combination of musical notes describe ?

If it "doesn't latch onto the inner thing in terms of meaning", then why would the disconnect "eventually show up in our uses of the concept". Meaning is use. — Luke

First, I don't know about you. but for me, "meaning as use" has it's limitations. It seems rather obvious that not all "uses" of a word, equate to meaning. Obviously people use words incorrectly all the time. However, "use" is the best way to determine meaning, generally. Use must be seen within the context of a form of life, and it's within these forms of life that we are able to say that "your use" is incorrect. I say this as a point of clarity for others reading this, not necessarily as a point of disagreement. My guess is that you would agree with this.

To answer your question, I'm not sure I have a clear idea of how this would happen, it's more of an intuition. I was thinking that if people see different colors from what I see, then this would come out in the detailed uses of what we mean, for example, by red. So, as we get into the different shadings of red, and make detailed comparisons with other color samples, the idea that you're seeing yellow instead of red would seem to break down at some point. We would begin to recognize in our various uses that we're not seeing the same color or colors. If, on the other hand, there is no way to tell if you're seeing yellow instead of red, then the whole point is moot. Whatever's happening in the mind would fall away as as so much chaff, but I suspect this is incorrect.

My original response to your previous post, before I edited it, was going to be that you seem to be arguing that Wittgenstein's beetle is both necessary and unnecessary to language use. Wittgenstein tells us that it drops out of consideration as irrelevant; that it cancels out, whatever it is; that the box might even be empty; and that the thing in the box doesn't belong to the language-game at all. — Luke

Ya, my argument can be seen in this way, but how this plays out is complex. Moreover, I disagree with some of Wittgenstein's notions. It seems to me that if you remove what's going on in the mind, then your left with nothing. I don't think Wittgenstein goes this far, even though his beetle in the box seems to remove the thing as having any great import. Much of this, obviously, has to do with how certain passages are interpreted. And, I suspect we'll never arrive at a consensus.

It appears to me that Wittgenstein is saying that language takes its meaning entirely from behaviour, from use, and only from a third-person, external standpoint. Pain and other sensations do not refer directly to the private feelings but to the public expression of those feelings; to how you (and others) act when experiencing those sensations. Therefore, that is what a sensation is; what the word "sensation" can only refer to: its public expression. — Luke

Yes, I agree.

And if that is the case - if language is entirely behavioural/external - then we cannot talk about sensations in terms of private subjective experiences or qualia or any of that. This is where we run up against the limits of language, and where Daniel Dennett is correct that qualia cannot possibly be private, ineffable, intrinsic and immediately apprehensible by consciousness. On the other hand, it seems as though we can talk about sensations and feelings directly in terms of the private subjective experiences and the sensations themselves, and not only in terms of their expression, because that is what we are doing now - or at least trying to do! In that case, Wittgenstein would be wrong about language or grammar being entirely behavioural/external. — Luke

I definitely disagree with Wittgenstein's notion of a limit to language, at least in part. He basically still believes, as he did in the Tractatus, that there is a limit to language. If there is a limit, I suspect that it's not as limiting as he thinks it is. The fact that we can talk about some of these subjective experiences, as we're doing, seems to point at something problematic with Wittgenstein's limit. I'm sure that much of my disagreement has to do with my view on consciousness/minds.

Language, art, music, etc.
— bongo fury

How are language, art and music NOT mental entities? Dont you mean ink marks, paint blotches and oscillating air molecules? It seems that those would be the non-mental entities and language, art and music would be the mental intenties as that is what certain ink marks, paint blotches and oscillating air molecules are arbitrarily interpreted as being. Arbitrary interpretations are mental entities.

For instance, how do we non-korean-speaking people know that Korean is a language? It just looks like scribbles and strange sounds being made by some people to us. How can you explain the difference in how different people interpret different scribbles and utterances if not by referring to mental entities?

It seems to me that if Witt were alive today he'd contradict himself again just as his Investigations contradicted his Tractus. One could argue that philosophy is simply language use and if language use is a game then philosophy has been relegated to a game of Scribbles (not Scrabble). It does seem that way when reading many of the posts on this forum. I'm more interested in what you're referring to with scribbles, or what is the case in the world. If that isn't how you're using your scribbles, then you're really saying anything useful.

My guess is that you would agree with this. — Sam26

Yes.

So, as we get into the different shadings of red, and make detailed comparisons with other color samples, the idea that you're seeing yellow instead of red would seem to break down at some point. We would begin to recognize in our various uses that we're not seeing the same color or colors. If, on the other hand, there is no way to tell if you're seeing yellow instead of red, then the whole point is moot. Whatever's happening in the mind would fall away as as so much chaff, but I suspect this is incorrect. — Sam26

It wouldn't make any difference if our visual impressions of red were different, as long as we both called it [whatever colour it looked to each of us] "red". The whole point is moot, meaning that there's nothing that we can say about it. That's what happens when you run up against the limits of language.

It seems to me that if you remove what's going on in the mind, then your left with nothing. I don't think Wittgenstein goes this far, even though his beetle in the box seems to remove the thing as having any great import. — Sam26

Wittgenstein doesn't want to "remove what's going on in the mind", except that whatever is inner and private is not where language gets its meaning. That's what I take him to mean when I say that sensation terms can only refer to the behavioural expression of those sensations and not to the sensations themselves. For example (my emphasis):

305. “But you surely can’t deny that, for example, in remembering,
an inner process takes place.” — What gives the impression that we
want to deny anything? When one says, “Still, an inner process does
take place here” — one wants to go on: “After all, you see it.” And it
is this inner process that one means by the word “remembering”. —
The impression that we wanted to deny something arises from our setting
our face against the picture of an ‘inner process’. What we deny
is that the picture of an inner process gives us the correct idea of the
use of the word “remember”. Indeed, we’re saying that this picture, with
its ramifications, stands in the way of our seeing the use of the word
as it is. — Philosophical Investigations

If there is a limit, I suspect that it's not as limiting as he thinks it is. The fact that we can talk about some of these subjective experiences, as we're doing, seems to point at something problematic with Wittgenstein's limit. — Sam26

Ah but we're "only doing philosophy" and perhaps metaphysically, so we are not using words as they are used "in the language in which they are at home. What we [philosophers should] do is to bring words back from their metaphysical to their everyday use." (PI 116)

The Eiffel tower is in Paris, is 330m in height and is made of wrought iron. I can replace "I saw the 330m tall wrought-iron structure in Paris" by "I saw the Eiffel Tower". Is this what Wittgenstein is referring to ? — RussellA

The structure facts, definitely. The top being 330m from the bottom. The iron molecules being roughly 40 times as numerous as the carbon, thank you Wikipedia. These are like the spatial arrangement of the "tables, chairs and books" (3.1431) or of the "a" and the "b" in "aRb" (3.1432).

The tower's being in Paris: not sure, good question. Or two questions: if its being in Paris is its relation to a different structure (Paris), then may a proposition analogously derive its sense (it's potential interpretation as a diagram) from its relations to other propositions? I'm guessing no, because atomism. Or, if its being in Paris is a unary relation, i.e. a property, then how might an isomorphism (between this tower fact and some other fact) obtain? (Does W somewhere discuss the redness of the rose in something like this respect?)

The definite description aspect, I doubt the relevance. Or rather, I've no idea.

An aesthetic is a unity between its parts, rather than just being an aggregation of parts loosely related. — RussellA

Ok, but then, still curious that you would downplay the very relations, tight as you like, by which unity of your required sort is achieved.

but did he say that music uses propositions, that propositions are used in music as well as language ? — RussellA

The gramophone record, the musical idea, the written notes, and the sound-waves, all stand to one another in the same internal relation of depicting that holds between language and the world. — 4.014

For instance, how do we non-korean-speaking people know that Korean is a language? It just looks like scribbles and strange sounds being made by some people to us. How can you explain the difference in how different people interpret different scribbles and utterances if not by referring to mental entities? — Harry Hindu

Convention?

The question is how are thoughts, which is one case, be about another entirely different case (not thoughts), like the movement of tectonic plates, if not by some form of causation (energy transfer, information transfer, etc.)? — Harry Hindu

Thought has a transcendental logical structure. You cannot think illogically (3.03) The relations of simple objects share this logical structure. The movement of tectonic plates is accidental.

6.37 There is no compulsion making one thing happen because another has happened. The only necessity that exists is logical necessity.

6.41 For all that happens and is the case is accidental.

That metaphysical claims are nonsense. — Tate

Metaphysical claims are nonsense but:

5.641 Thus there really is a sense in which philosophy can talk about the self in a non-psychological way.
What brings the self into philosophy is the fact that ‘the world is my world’.
The philosophical self is not the human being, not the human body, or the human soul, with which psychology deals, but rather the metaphysical subject, the limit of the world—not a part of it.

6.53 The correct method in philosophy would really be the following: to say nothing except
what can be said, i.e. propositions of natural science—i.e. something that has nothing to do
with philosophy—and then, whenever someone else wanted to say something metaphysical, to demonstrate to him that he had failed to give a meaning to certain signs in his propositions. Although it would not be satisfying to the other person—he would not have the feeling that we were teaching him philosophy—this method would be the only strictly correct one.

The metaphysical self is not part of the world (5.633), and so claims about it are meaningless (Bedeutung). That is, it does not signify or represent anything in the world. But what is outside the limits of the world is what is, for Wittgenstein, meaningful in the sense of being most important. It is like the relation between the eye and what it sees. The eye sees but is not something seen. It is outside the visual field (5.6331).

Thus there really is a sense in which philosophy can talk about the self in a non-psychological way.
What brings the self into philosophy is the fact that ‘the world is my world’.
The philosophical self is not the human being, not the human body, or the human soul, with which psychology deals, but rather the metaphysical subject, the limit of the world—not a part of it.

This is straight Schopenhauer.