If there’s no foundational criteria, public cases cannot truly be “corrected” either. — schopenhauer1
The public language is founded on private languages — RussellA
Therefore any public language within a community must have been founded on the private languages of the individuals within the community.
An individual may be corrected by a public language, but recognising that such a public language has previously been collectively corrected by the individuals who make up the community.
Yes, without the foundation of private languages, a public language cannot be corrected. — RussellA
This outward pain behaviour is visible to not only me but others, and can be given the name "toothache". — RussellA
A child can then learn the word "toothache" by being pointed at the connection between toothache pain behaviour and the name "toothache"
Note that the child cannot learn such a connection from a single example, but only from many examples, where every example is different but all share a family resemblance. — RussellA
Imagine I produce a bunch of what appears to you as random symbols. And I proceed to tell you that this is a language. If you ask, “how do you use these symbols”, and I reply, “I cannot tell you how to use them, but rest assure I know how to use them in similar ways as how you use your language, and thus it is a language.” I believe you can rightfully say that I have no idea what I am trying to say or express. This also goes for these claims of judging private activities within the mind. — Richard B
Just using Wittgenstein against himself perhaps, what if every person in the community had an idea wrong such that every correction was actually never correct. How would you know any differently than the private sensation case? Diving in further in skepticism, how do you know that every supposedly public correction is not distorted by one’s own view? At some point you can keep drilling downward and you start getting to Decartes Demon again. Using public or practice or community as a way out doesn’t suffice. — schopenhauer1
Hmm. That does not count against the point, so far as I see.In the Tractatus the proposition is a picture of a state of affairs, not something between a state of affairs and the proposition. — Fooloso4
2.1 We picture facts to ourselves.
2.11 A picture presents a situation in logical space, the existence and non-existence of states of affairs.
2.12 A picture is a model of reality.
2.13 In a picture objects have the elements of the picture corresponding to them.
2.131 In a picture the elements of the picture are the representatives of objects.
2.14 What constitutes a picture is that its elements are related to one another in a determinate way.
2.141 A picture is a fact.
4.06 A proposition can be true or false only in virtue of being a picture of reality.
‘I read somewhere that Indian mathematicians are (sometimes) content to use a geometrical figure accompanied by the words “Look at this!” as a proof of a theorem. This looking too effects an altera- tion in one’s way of seeing
4.462 Tautologies and contradictions are not pictures of reality. They do not represent any possible situations. For the former admit all possible situations, and latter none . In a tautology the conditions of agreement with the world—the representational relations—cancel one another, so that it does not stand in any representational relation to reality.
Look at this with care. I do not see how it follows from your argument. Why must language exist within the individuals - why not between them? Then, if they disappear, so does language.Therefore language within a community can only exist within the individuals who make up the community. — RussellA
214. (The temptation to say “I see it like this”, pointing to the same thing for “it” and “this”.) Always get rid of the idea of the private object in this way: assume that it constantly changes, but that you don’t notice the change because your memory constantly deceives you.
Is this the position of Antirealism? — RussellA
The alternative seems to be that he still harbours a referential picture theory, somehow sitting under his theory of meaning as use. — Banno
300. It is, one would like to say, not merely the picture of the behaviour that belongs to the language-game with the words “he is in pain”, but also the picture of the pain. Or, not merely the paradigm of the behaviour, but also that of the pain. — It is a misunderstanding to say “The picture of pain enters into the language-game with the word ‘pain’ ”. Pain in the imagination is not a picture, and it is not replaceable in the language-game by anything that we’d call a picture. — Imagined pain certainly enters into the language-game in a sense; only not as a picture. — PI 300
The point upon which W. focuses here is a confusion concerning the relationship between the concept of a mental image and that of a picture. Clearly, pictures are objects of comparison, and, equally clearly, mental images can correspond to pictures. So we are inclined to think that mental images are likewise objects of comparison. Indeed, we are prone to conceive of mental images as pictures. They seem to be just like pictures, save for being mental! This is multiply confused. Imagined pain (Die Vorstellung des Schmerzes) is not a picture of pain (ist kein Bild). One can imagine a toothache or remember a headache, but this does not furnish one with a picture; there is nothing here employable as a picture or a paradigm, not even as a picture which only oneself (as it happens) can see. The description of the imagined is not a description of an inner picture, but a description of what one imagines (e.g. the face that launched a thousand ships (cf. PI §367)). Similarly, the description of the recollected is a description of what I remember, perhaps only hazily, not a description of a hazy picture. There is no such thing as using a Vorstellung of pain (as one can use a picture of something) as a sample or paradigm. Even in those cases where one can intelligibly talk of (vivid) images (Vorstellungsbilder), one’s mental image is not a sample or paradigm, for there is no such thing as a method of projection for a mental image. One cannot lay a mental image alongside reality for comparison. But it is important that if, e.g. I imagine a shade of red (and perhaps have a vivid image of it), I can paint what I imagine, and that can be used as a paradigm. ‘That is how I imagined the backcloth to be’, I might say to the scene‐painter, while pointing at a patch of paint. Here the image of red is replaceable by a paradigm (picture) of red. But nothing corresponds to imagined pain (die Vorstellung des Schmerzes) as a red sample corresponds to imagining, having an image of, red. Hence the ‘image’ or ‘representation’ (Vorstellung) of pain is not replaceable by anything that can function as an object of comparison. — P.M.S. Hacker, An Analytical Commentary on the Philosophical Investigations, Vol. 3, Part 2: Exegesis 243-427
301. What is in the imagination is not a picture, but a picture can correspond to it. — PI 301
An image, which one may have when one imagines or remembers something, is not an ‘inner picture’. But a picture may correspond to such an image, for one can often paint a picture of what one imagines and say ‘This is how I imagined it’ (cf. §280). Is this always possible, i.e. does it always make sense? No; for it is clear from §300 that though I can imagine a severe toothache, no picture corresponds here as a picture of someone clutching his swollen jaw corresponds to imagining someone with a bad toothache. — Hacker, ibid
What is the content of the experience of imagining? The answer is a picture, or a description. — PPF 10 (Part II)
389. “A mental image must be more like its object than any picture. For however similar I make the picture to what it is supposed to represent, it may still be the picture of something else. But it is an intrinsic feature of a mental image that it is the image of this and of nothing else.” That is how one might come to regard a mental image as a superlikeness. — PI 389
I don't believe it would be a picture theory per se... — Luke
This has ramifications for your discussion with @schopenhauer1, who is seems is in the thrall of a certain picture.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. — 305
Imagine I produce a bunch of what appears to you as random symbols. And I proceed to tell you that this is a language. If you ask, “how do you use these symbols”, and I reply, “I cannot tell you how to use them, but rest assure I know how to use them in similar ways as how you use your language, and thus it is a language. — Richard B
So far all of this is trivially true. — schopenhauer1
I'm not putting forth my own belief about language; rather, I'm presenting this hypothetical scenario to critique Wittgenstein's idea that language use is sufficient as a foundation. The main point is to stress the necessity of a robust foundation for language, especially if we claim it's rooted in community or "Form of Life." — schopenhauer1
That does not count against the point, so far as I see. — Banno
Here he is taking on a representational theory of meaning - the picture theory. — Banno
What the later Wittgenstein rejects is the logical connection between the picture and reality, not that we form pictures of how things are. — Fooloso4
The Indian mathematician shows that a picture can be seen - used - in different ways. — Banno
But perhaps saying the picture theory is being rejected is too strong. He is still making use of pictures, and it seems to me that hereabouts he is attempting to see how his previous representational approach fits in with meaning as use. — Banno
254. The concept of an aspect is related to the concept of imagination. In other words, the concept ‘Now I see it as . . .’ is related to ‘Now I am imagining that’.
(CV 18)What a Copernicus or a Darwin really achieved was not the discovery of a new true theory but a fertile point of view.
(CV42)Sow a seed in my soil and it will grow differently than it would in any other soil.
126. The name “philosophy” might also be given to what is possible before all new discoveries and inventions.
… our investigation is directed not towards phenomena, but rather, as one might say, towards the ‘possibilities’ of phenomena.
I don't believe it would be a picture theory per se...
— Luke
In the PI? I think that's right. — Banno
It's delicate. Consider:
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. — 305
This has ramifications for your discussion with schopenhauer1, who is seems is in the thrall of a certain picture. — Banno
So "picture" is being used diversely. — Banno
Why must language exist within the individuals - why not between them? — Banno
Depends on your flavour of antirealism. But the label is not important, so much as the content....the world is such that we can treat part of it as a slab, allowing us to talk about them and move them around.................We don't "create" the slab – that's the idealist error. Nor are there no slabs until we start to talk about them – the nominalist error. — Banno
Searle might say that this sort of thing counts as a slab; that sort of thing counts as a block. The assistant gets to recognise the difference not by any internal, private process, but by getting a clip around the ear when they bring the wrong one. Of course, that does not mean that there are no internal processes. Just that "slab" is public. — Banno
I think that both a picture and what is pictured can be seen in different ways. Consider the duck-rabbit, for example. — Luke
These words, it seems to me, give us a particular picture of the essence of human language.
(73)“This is called a ‘leaf’ ”, I get an idea of the shape of a leaf, a picture of it in my mind.
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.
However, confusingly, at PPF 10 (Part II), W states:
What is the content of the experience of imagining? The answer is a picture, or a description.
— PPF 10 (Part II)
On the face of it, this appears to contradict PI 301. — Luke
What is in the imagination is not a picture, but a picture can correspond to it.
If one has to imagine someone else’s pain on the model of one’s own, this is none too easy a thing to do: for I have to imagine pain which I don’t feel on the model of pain which I do feel.
The question is, if there are only two individuals, where does the sentence "bring me a slab" exist ?
It cannot exist in the space between the two individuals as some kind of Platonic entity independently of either individual, but can only exist in the minds of the two individuals. — RussellA
For example, Egyptian scripts couldn't be translated until the discovery of the Rosetta Stone. — RussellA
I'd suggest that language can exist in different physical forms with no need to appeal to Platonic entities. — wonderer1
If everyone who had used the language disappeared from existence, and all that was left were patterns of ink on paper, would these patterns of ink on paper still be a language if there was no one who knew what these patterns of ink on paper meant? — RussellA
I think that both a picture and what is pictured can be seen in different ways. Consider the duck-rabbit, for example.
— Luke
When the picture itself is an object I agree, but not all pictures are objects.
When Wittgenstein says at PI 1:
These words, it seems to me, give us a particular picture of the essence of human language.
he is talking about a mental image, not an object. — Fooloso4
When he says:
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.
he is talking about a mental image, a way in which something is conceived to be. — Fooloso4
When he says at 301:
What is in the imagination is not a picture, but a picture can correspond to it.
This should not be thought of as a general statement about pictures, as something that holds true for all pictures. He is talking specifically about how pain is imagined. Pain in the imagination is about what pain feels like, not about how we might picture it. See 302: — Fooloso4
I think the history of events surrounding the Rosetta Stone shows hieroglyphics to have been language even when no one in the world understood the interpretation of the language. — wonderer1
As you point out, the common factor is a mind. — RussellA
Obviously not.2) These two minds are independent of each other — RussellA
On your reading, a picture can be synonymous with a mental image. Your reading therefore seems inconsistent with Hacker's reading — Luke
PI 389, which states: "it is an intrinsic feature of a mental image that it is the image of this and of nothing else." — Luke
That is how one might come to regard a mental image as a superlikeness.
My mental image may be at one time of a duck and at another time of a rabbit, but when my mental image is of a duck I cannot see it in any way other than as a duck (i.e. how I see it at the time), and the same for when my mental image is of a rabbit. — Luke
Perhaps what is in the imagination is not a picture because what is in the imagination (a mental image) can only be seen in one way, unlike a picture which can be seen in more than one way. — Luke
In this article I am going to describe Wittgenstein’s famous picture theory of language. The aim of this theory is to set out an account of what sentences mean and just as importantly, to give us a way of distinguishing sense from nonsense. The theory is found in Wittgenstein’s first book, the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, which ranks as one of the hardest-to-read of all the great works of philosophy. It is an unusual book, written whilst Wittgenstein was serving in the Austrian army during the First World War and finished whilst he was a prisoner of war in Italy. It is remarkably short for a great work of philosophy; this is in part due to Wittgenstein's condensed writing style, which has put off many readers and confused a good number of philosophers. But Wittgenstein’s aim was not to confuse his readers: he simply wanted to express himself as precisely and as logically as possible.
So the picture theory of language is an attempt to discover the essence of language. In its simplest form, the theory says the function of language is to allow us to picture things.
In itself, this doesn’t tell us all that much. Pictures can have many purposes – just think of the differences between hieroglyphics and modern artworks. Therefore it is helpful to consider a very basic type of picture, such as a diagram I might draw to show a friend the way to my house. I do not have to sketch every detail of the route my friend should take, such as what the view will look like along the way. Rather, I need to show my friend where to turn, and perhaps mark some prominent landmarks along the route.
Suppose that my diagram indicates that my friend should take the second right after the lights. Of course, the situation that the diagram presents to my friend need not be true to the facts; my diagram might be part of a practical joke on her, in which I send her to someone else’s house. In constructing a picture such as this, I am not constrained by the actual facts. Although my house is on the second road on the right, I am perfectly able to draw a diagram in which the house is pictured on the second road on the left.
Wittgenstein is keen to emphasize that what a picture means is independent of whether it is a truthful representation or not. But if a diagram can be misleading or downright false, so that it does not picture the facts, what does it picture? Wittgenstein says that what a diagram or picture represents exists in logical space. One way to understand this is to see that the way the world has turned out is not the only way that it could have turned out. Had things turned out differently, my house could have been on the second left, even though it is actually on the second right. So a picture represents something that is the case, or alternatively, could have been the case had the world turned out differently.
What is it that makes the arrangement of lines on my diagram a picture, whereas a scribble produced at random (say, by a crab crawling around in the sand) is not counted as a picture? According to Wittgenstein, it is that the lines in the diagram are related together in a way that mimics the way the things they correspond to are related. For example my diagram has symbols for roads and houses, which if true, are arranged in a way which mimics their arrangement in reality.
Our diagram is a good example of what Wittgenstein had in mind when talking about pictures, for its usefulness relies on the way in which the parts of the picture are arranged, rather than relying on it being a lifelike artistic depiction of the facts. The important point is that the structure of the picture mirrors (represents) the structure of a possible situation. The possible situation is what the picture means. This is why we can know what a picture means without knowing whether it is true or false. The picture is true when the situation it pictures is the actual situation. To find out if it is, we have to look and see how the world actually is.
Wittgenstein’s theory of language holds that sentences work like pictures: their purpose is also to picture possible situations. It must be pointed out that Wittgenstein is not concerned with mental pictures, ie the images we conjure up in our minds. The thesis is not that the meaning of a sentence is what we picture in our minds when we hear or think the sentence. That was the theory of language advocated by John Locke, the 17th century empiricist philosopher. Rather, Wittgenstein is concerned with a more abstract notion of a picture, as something that either agrees or disagrees with any way the world might have been, and which says, this is the way things actually are.
Logical Analysis
The next element of Wittgenstein’s first theory of language concerns how sentences are built up from simpler sentences (or propositions, as Wittgenstein calls them, meaning a sentence that’s unambiguously either true or false). His idea is that whenever a sentence contains one of the logical connectives ‘not’, ‘and’, ‘or’, or ‘if … then’, we can work out the truth-value of that proposition (ie whether it’s true or false) if we know the truth-values of the sentences that make it up. This is seen most easily by giving an example. Suppose I say, “If it isn’t raining, then we will go to the park and have a picnic.” This sentence is made up from the following simpler sentences:
1. It is raining
2. We will go to the park
3. We will have a picnic
We build our complex sentence in three stages. First, we negate sentence 1 by adding ‘not’ to it; then we join sentences 2 and 3 with ‘and’; finally, we join these two new sentences using ‘If … then’. Wittgenstein gives us a method of determining the truth-value of our complex sentence in terms of the truth or falsity of sentences 1 to 3. Negated sentences ‘not …’ are true when the sentence that occupies the ‘…’ place is false. Sentences built by joining two sentences with ‘and’ are true when each of the original sentences are individually true. Finally, conditional ‘if … then’ sentences are false when the first sentencein the complex sentence is true but the second is false, and true otherwise. These conditions correspond to the truth tables any philosophy student learns in their first logic classes. Combine these rules together and you discover the truth conditions for the compound sentence.
Having given this analysis of complex sentences in terms of simpler ones, Wittgenstein then says that there must be sentences that are completely free of logical complexity. He calls these elementary propositions. These are not simply sentences in which ‘not’, ‘and’, ‘or’ or ‘if … then’ do not appear, for Wittgenstein holds that sentences can contain hidden logical complexity which does not show up in everyday English. An example of this is given by definite descriptions such as “the present King of France is bald.” According to Wittgenstein’s teacher Bertrand Russell, this actually means “there exists exactly one person who is both the present King of France and bald.” According to Russell, the existential ‘there exists’ is hidden in everyday English use, but can be brought out through logical analysis. — Mark Jago
PI 389, which states: "it is an intrinsic feature of a mental image that it is the image of this and of nothing else."
— Luke
It is Wittgenstein's imagined interlocutor who makes this claim in the quotations. W.'s response is:
That is how one might come to regard a mental image as a superlikeness.
One might regard a mental image in this way but a mental image is not a superlikeness. One's mental image can be quite unreliable. — Fooloso4
367. A mental image is the image which is described when someone describes what he imagines. — PI 367
One might regard a mental image in this way but a mental image is not a superlikeness. One's mental image can be quite unreliable. — Fooloso4
An image may change over time based on new experiences or the unreliability of memory. — Fooloso4
The question in hand here is, what happens with the picture theory as Wittgenstein moves on to the Investigations?
Who can give a simple, direct answer to that? — Banno
T 218 What any picture, of whatever form, must have in common with reality, in order to be
able to depict it—correctly or incorrectly—in any way at all, is logical form, i.e. the form of
reality.
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