Plato, Kant, Hume, Descartes, etc. are all reacting to skepticism, doubt in our knowledge. That’s not vague, it’s pervasive. — Antony Nickles
“Language game” is not a helpful term to latch onto; it confuses people. In an attempt at shorthand (which is never gonna work), abstraction removes any criteria and circumstances of an individual case of confusion and takes me out of the equation, along with my responsibility (in the fear of “subjectivity”). Our ordinary criteria are sufficient; it’s just hard for people to swallow that some of the time things just don’t work out the easy way, or at all. — Antony Nickles
Yes, that would be an ordinary sense of certainty. I am using it in the sense of a math-like necessity; Witt calls it “logic” or “crystalline purity”; Descartes will call it perfection; Plato just calls it knowledge. Basically it is the desire to know beforehand, generally, reliably, based on fact, without involving the human, etc. It is a standard invented by philosophy in an attempt to counteract skepticism. — Antony Nickles
Just because you don’t get it yet doesn’t mean that it is “vague”. The writing is very specific, rigorous, and necessary for its purpose. Anybody that thinks they can tell you what it “means” is wrong (including me), thus the problem with summaries. I’m just trying to help you guys in reading it; to avoid its pitfalls. — Antony Nickles
But this itself is a language game of how "certainty" is used. — schopenhauer1
“Language game” is not a helpful term to latch onto; it confuses people. In an attempt at shorthand (which is never gonna work), abstraction removes any criteria and circumstances of an individual case of confusion and takes me out of the equation, along with my responsibility (in the fear of “subjectivity”). Our ordinary criteria are sufficient; it’s just hard for people to swallow that some of the time things just don’t work out the easy way, or at all.
— Antony Nickles
Not sure what you're quite saying here. — schopenhauer1
I still think it stands that if you want to be known, then say it. Show it after you say it. Or show it and then say it. There is a balance. All show and no tell, and now you are a prophet and others are doing your telling. — schopenhauer1
The meaning of the word "slab" does not depend on the existence of slabs, as PI 40 indicates. Nevertheless, slabs exist in the world.
— Luke
You write that "slabs exist in the world", and also write that there can be the word "slab" in language even if there is no slab in the world.
So what you are really saying is that "slabs exist in the world even if there is no slab in the world" — RussellA
There cannot be a correct use of a word such as "table". — RussellA
Within different contexts there are different sets of family resemblances. Is it correct to say that this is a "table"? — RussellA
Is it just that we can’t tell others exactly what a [table] is? — But this is not ignorance. We don’t know the boundaries because none have been drawn. To repeat, we can draw a boundary — for a special purpose. Does it take this to make the concept usable? Not at all! Except perhaps for that special purpose. — Wittgenstein, PI 69
In the case of physical objects, there are many underlying activities and contexts that we skip over...........................e.g., an ottoman is not a table but can be used for that purpose, or, part of or judgment of a “table” is where we gather with others to eat, so, even if it is around a rock, we would still say we are sitting around the “table”........................This is not empirical or about the about, but is still normative, “real”, not “subjective”. — Antony Nickles
I said that the meaning of the word "slab" does not depend on the existence of slabs, just as the meaning of the word "unicorn" does not depend on the existence of unicorns. However, regardless of this fact about meaning, slabs do exist in the world. — Luke
comic — schopenhauer1
1) "the meaning of the word "slab" does not depend on the existence of slabs"
2) "slabs do exist in the world" — RussellA
As the word "slab" does not depend on the existence of slabs in the world, there can be the word "slab" in language whether or not there are slabs in the world. Therefore, the word "slab" in language cannot be referring to something in the world. — RussellA
If the word "slab" did refer to something in the world, then, if there was no slab in the world then there would be no word "slab" in language, but that is not the case. — RussellA
Sentences 1) and 2) are contradictory, in that in sentence 1) the word "slab" doesn't refer to a thing in the world but in sentence 2) the word "slab" does refer to a thing in the world. — RussellA
Sentence 1) encapsulates the core of the PI in that the meaning of a word is its use in language. — RussellA
The word "slab" can be used to refer to either an existing or to a non-existing slab. The only difference is whether the slab exists. — Luke
The meaning of the word 'slab' in the builder's language depends on two things: 1. The existence of these objects. 2. What the assistant is to do with them. — Fooloso4
The meaning is not the name of the object. — Fooloso4
That's how I understand Wittgenstein in the PI, whereby meaning is use in language, in opposition to Augustine's Referentialism.
PI 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. And the meaning of a name is sometimes explained by pointing to its bearer. — RussellA
As the meaning of "unicorn" in language doesn't depend on the existence of a unicorn in the world, — RussellA
what kind of object is being referred to in the Philosophical Investigations. — RussellA
So ostensive pointing to an object is simply one mechanism of teaching use, it doesn't replace use. — schopenhauer1
If you are trying to get ontological commitments from PI, you won't find any as far as I see. Besides that meaning of words comes from language games, you won't find much ontologically-speaking — schopenhauer1
Yes, it is very difficult to make sense of the PI when we don't even know whether the objects he refers to, such as slabs, are those of the Nominalist or the Platonic Realist. — RussellA
Can’t it mean physically pointing to an object? — schopenhauer1
For the word "slab" to correspond with the object slab, then the word is "pointing" at the object. — RussellA
Can’t it mean physically pointing to an object? — schopenhauer1
I guess what I’m saying is the object itself falls out perhaps. Whatever the object is, it’s a way to help define meaning. And that’s its importance in language meaning. The object’s only relevance here is its use in defining meaning. — schopenhauer1
Yes, this accords more or less with what I said here — schopenhauer1
It's as if I asked you to show me the house you built, but instead, you not only not show me the house, you not only not show me the blueprints even, you talk to me about how the language is used to program the software that makes the blueprints. — schopenhauer1
As Wittgenstein writes in the Preface, a vagueness in the PI is inevitable, as he admits himself that he was unable to weld his results together. — RussellA
For some of these questions it is also unclear whether he considers them valid or not, — RussellA
I agree when you say "Anybody that thinks they can tell you what it “means” is wrong". — RussellA
What status does a "table" have for me. It is an inseparable fusion of the concept "table" in the mind and a momentary set of atoms existing in the world in time and space. Both aspects are necessary. My position is that of Nominalism rather than Platonic Realism. — RussellA
Only by theorising can we make progress, as science has clearly shown. — RussellA
Both TLP and PI seems written in richly aphoristic style, which attract broad range of different interpretations by the academics and readers. — Corvus
What is his view on mental objects such as fear, anger, joy, hope, doubt ...etc? What is his idea on existence of God? — Corvus
This weeks comic ha. Very appropriate. — schopenhauer1
He is not isolating us to language removed from the world. It is through the method of looking at language that he is investigating why we misconceive the world, as they are the normally the same (until we have a situation in time when that falls apart—we don’t know our way about).
Our ordinary criteria are not based on agreement, nor statistical majority (this is not a defense of common sense or “ordinary people”), but the way our lives have aligned over our history, that we would judge things using the same criteria, usually come to same conclusions, respond the same way, have the same expectations, understand the same implications. These are not rules, nor usually explicit. It is the same basis that allows each of us the ability to evaluate his claims of what we say when, to see for yourself. — Antony Nickles
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