You keep giving orders to folks... Did someone die and named you king of TPF? Otherwise I suggest you learn to ask politely, when you have a request to make.
now — Olivier5

When you make a claim, you gotta prove it. Basic philosopher's etiquette. I look regal to you because you've forgotten your manners. Sorry about that.

If everyone starts with their own rules — frank

I think it's worse.

The magic word was missing. Also I don't understand your request, nor why it was made. — Olivier5

You made a claim. Now you have to prove it. Can you?

Boiling Frog.

The boiling frog is a fable describing a frog being slowly boiled alive. The premise is that if a frog is put suddenly into boiling water, it will jump out, but if the frog is put in tepid water which is then brought to a boil slowly, it will not perceive the danger and will be cooked to death. — Wikipedia

Boiling Frog.

The boiling frog is a fable describing a frog being slowly boiled alive. The premise is that if a frog is put suddenly into boiling water, it will jump out, but if the frog is put in tepid water which is then brought to a boil slowly, it will not perceive the danger and will be cooked to death. — Wikipedia

... magic trumps its logic. — 180 Proof

:up:

The only problem with religion is its unshakeable conviction that it's true and not just that, for eternity. That is to say religion is, in @180 Proof's dictionary, maladaptive -like an organism that fails to make adjustments to alterations in its environment it's doomed. There's a rather Parmenidean ring to it as in (religious) truths are treated as eternal (changeless).

The only religion that's thankfully Heraclitean and may outlive other faiths is Buddhism (anicca/doctrine of impermanence) and if it does become obsolete, at least it saw what was coming down the pike.

Is that an order? — Olivier5

A request actually.

Crossword puzzles, poetry, magic... — Olivier5

Explain these uses without resorting to sign-referent theory of meaning.

Sure, but I read the OP as questioning how much we should doubt. Maybe that's too much interpretation. — the affirmation of strife

A good point. Nevertheless, once we're reduced to attempts at finding out how much doubt is acceptable, we've already conceded that there's a problem viz. that everything and anything is doubtable. I regard the enterprise of moderating skepticism as only to sugar coat the bitter pill that we must all swallow.

Yeah, it's a bit of a language issue. I agree we usually define "thinking" as involving a "doer", and that is probably the most practical way. As for your question, Nietzsche remarks later in the same book that he considers thoughts as something that happen to you, rather than actions per se. He presents the observation (purely anecdotal) that often we think something before we realise that we are thinking (or something to that effect). But that's probably for a different post :) — the affirmation of strife

Here's the problem: Before one can talk about action, the actor must already exist.

I think, therefore I am — René Descartes

Descartes has it backwards. To think (act) is to presuppose a thinker (actor). Circulus in probando.

As for the topic of doubt, I think that doubt is healthy in moderation (like most things... all things?) but we should not fail to consider the extremes. Can we "live in doubt", well, the imprecisions of language are evident here again... We can live with doubt, certainly, I would say it is even necessary. But sometimes enough is enough, we will never have perfect information all the time and too much doubt is, like you say about suffering[1], incapacitating.

[1] Despite my response in the other thread, I don't completely disagree about that either... — the affirmation of strife

We can doubt anything and eveeything. That's how it is I'm afraid.

What about incorrect uses? People use words incorrectly all the time, is their incorrect use driving the meaning of the word?
— Sam26

I love this question. Especially if we substitute "usage" for "meaning". — bongo fury

Meaning is use

Ludwig Wittegenstein: Sign-Referent concept of meaning is bollocks.

---

When we say a sign's (a word's) meaning is its referent we are using the sign (the word) to stand for the referent. That is to say, inter alia [1*], one particular use for words is to refer to things individually or as a group (the standard definition of "meaning").

[1*] What could be other uses for words?

When you use that specific imagery...no, I guess you wouldn't. Nor would I...

You're trying to see if I acknowledge that my treatment of ants may be cruel by applying how I treat bugs (stepping on them because I can) from a perspective where you are still intelligent but bug-sized, and you're using specific imagery to critique the unceremonious regard for how I kill them : being crushed under some dismissive asshole's foot vs .giving them the freedom to be left alone from my kind attention. There appears to be a subtle commentary on materialism too... Dying from a running shoe of all things. It's clever. Also, my feet aren't that "malodorous".... except on days I play tennis or frisbee :grin: — IanBlain

We too are slightly buggish in our own way. Aren't we the offspring of Adam and Eve who were banished from the garden of Eden because they did what they were not supposed to do - they were bugs (in the divine program). :smile:

If I ask what you mean by "God", it's not that I think you have a personal definition. It's that different language communities use it differently — frank

This doesn't help in any way because a communal, social meaning can't be had unless each inidvidual makes his own private/personal meaning public/social and that's exactly what's problematic. So long as it's possible to have a very personal/private interpretation of words, the problem of private languages extends to communities as well.

But what is essential about our experience is not that we cannot entirely, completely express our experience or know the other's, but that we are separate. I can continue to express and respond to you regarding my experience (or hide it), and our experience is identical to the extent to which we accept that it is the same. This is the grammar of our experience by which the essence of it (what is essential to it) is expressed. — Antony Nickles

The beetle in the box: The word is same - "beetle" - but what it refers to maybe different. Wittgenstein's aim is not to come up with a solution, it seems impossible, but to do an exposé of the problem.

How many philosophical issues are beetle-in-the-box kind?0

It appears that this is a language issue. This thing that we're engaged in, doing, as we have this conversation has been labelled an action, an act viz. thinking from which follows the neccesity of a doer, a thinker [Cogito ergo sum]. Are we really doing anything while we're thinking?

Nobody uses private, untranslatable languages. Witt wasn't attacking a thesis anybody anywhere has ever held.

He was just highlighting that language is a tool for communication between people who are immersed and embedded in a world. — frank

:ok: There is this general sentiment, as evidenced by the way debates are conducted (the first order of business being define one's terms), that people (usually) have idiosyncratic definitions of words for concepts that play a major role in a discussion. Such words, with personal meanings can be viewed as constituting the vocab of a private language.

Suppose X and Y are engaged in a conversation about God. X claims God exists. Y is unsure if his understanding of God and existence is the same as X's. So Y demands that X define "God" and "exists". X will naturally comply. Say X says "God is being who's all-good, all-knowing, and all-powerful". Y again faces the same problem. Is his (Y's) understanding of good, knowledge, and power the same as X's? This process reiterates at all levels of clarifications of meaning X attempts.

There must be a point at which Y stops asking for further clarification on the meaning of the words X uses - Y is confident that X and Y are on the same page so to speak. Is this a possibility? :chin:

Questions

1. How much of philosophy depends on the existence of private languages?

From the way philosophy is conducted, the first port of call being define your terms, it appears that what philosophers are most wary of are idiosyncratic (private) meanings of words and if an exchange/discourse, a productive one that is, is to take place we need to be clear on what the terms involved mean. Not that peculiar definitions are a problem as such but they need to be brought out into the open before we can have a conversation.

What if this can't be done as happens when the referent can't be shared/made public? Pure subjective experiences are exactly the kind that we can't show to other people - they're categorically private.

Even so, some words like "pain", referring to a purely subjective experience exist. Wittgenstein probably explains this in terms of visible/observable/shareable correlates like wincing, grimacing, tears, screams, etc. Is the correlation perfect? Does it matter? No and yes. It matters because these correlates function just like words and the beetle-in-the-box scenario rears its ugly head. Somehow reminds of theaters and thespians. A friend of mine, every now and then. for some reason, says "quick, act normal!"

2. Meaning as use.

Agreed, let's play along with Wittgenstein, and one, agree words are minus essences (family resemblance) but what exactly does "use" mean in meaning is use? A word is, all said and done, a symbol/sign - it stands for something, the referent. A word's use is predicated on that purpose/function. Take that away and how exactly am I supposed to use a word?

I'm exhausted. Will post as and when it seems right to do so. Until then adieu!

Yeah, this is exactly what Witty objects to (e.g. essences). — 180 Proof

Why?

I’m certainly not saying it’s all in the head. — Possibility

Then why are we arguing? :chin:

Empirical data is contingent not just upon an observer, but an actual observation/measurement event. An interaction in spacetime (4D). Non-duality in the sense that I’m referring to here, though, is not a reduction from five to four-dimensional awareness, but a paradigmatic shift from five to six-dimensional awareness. — Possibility

This is a classic case of obscurum per obscuris or even more accurately what we have here is full-blown case of Ignotum per æque ignotum.

There is no argument. Advaita (non-duality) is not in opposition to forming a pair, but rather dissolves the necessity for distinction by understanding that Atman IS Brahman. Just as the eternal Tao is the ten thousand things, unnamed. In the realm of possibility, diversity is identical to unity, and vice versa. This is what is meant by ‘invariance under transformation’. It’s not really a way of looking at the world, but rather a way of understanding it so that we can more accurately perceive potential from a variety of perspectives, and from there more carefully and responsibly interact as part of the world. — Possibility

Word play!

Update

Beetle In The Box

There's the word "beetle".

I use it to refer to x in a box I have.

You use it to refer to y in your own box.

I can't look inside your box and neither can you look inside my box.

Ergo,

Not necessary that $x = y$

or

possible that $x \neq y$.

This is about a word, "beetle", that's got private meanings (x for me and y for you).

However, words are signs we use for referents, the actual thing that interests us. Words that we use to refer to private experiences (can't be shared with others) are like the word "beetle" e.g. the word "pain".

There is no way I could divine what the word "beetle" or "pain" means to you and vice versa.

We're only left, therefore, with the word "beetle" ("pain") and nothing else. You and I could very well be talking about entirely different things (referents). Thus, the conclusion that philosophies that depend on experiences that can't be made public, shared, are private would be pointless. It's like using a word without knowing what it means. I would get the grammar (syntax) right but any sentence I construct would be semantically dubious. Therefore, @180 Proof,

Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent. — Ludwig Wittgenstein

Ah, Fool buddy, you've shot yourself in the dark again. :smirk: — 180 Proof

:lol: Trust me to do that!

There is no "Wittgensteinian problem of language-games" that I can see. Besides, "a scientific one" would just comprise another language-game. You either find Witty's semantics useful for clarifying our discursive (bad) habits or you do not. I very much do. — 180 Proof

What exactly is a language game? It can't be context because that was old news and people seem to regard Wittgenstein's theory of language as a novel idea.

The PI could have justifiably – more precisely – been titled "Philosophical Reminders". He isn't providing new knowledge, Fool; Witty is elucidating confused and inconsistent discursive practices – calling attention to how philosophers in particular myopicly misuse ordinary language to, what he thought, say what cannot be said rather than shutting up when and where silence articulates – shows – what words cannot. — 180 Proof

Methinks it's the other way round. Philosophers are the ones who maintain strict standards of word usage (definitionally accurate). Ordinary folk, on the other hand, seem to be misusing words left, right and center.

Your Post

As for silence in philosophy, I think it's a rather complex issue:

1. I don't know thus I can't speak (ignorance + silence).
2. I know but I can't speak (knowledge + silence)

From silence alone, we can't tell the difference between knowing and not knowing.

Update

To comment on my own previous post

1. Context vs Language game & Form of life.

A language game differs from context in the following sense:

Take the word "drug". In one language game, that of medicine, its meaning shifts from being beneficial (curative) to harmful (addictive) based on context. Vide infra.

The doctor prescribed John some drugs for his Delhi belly and he was soon well again.

The doctor told John to stop taking drugs as it was damaging his mind and body.

Feels a bit contrived but seems to make sense. Context can make a difference (change the meaning of words) within a particular language game. Is this a distinction without a difference?

2. Language as social (Private language)

Wittgenstein is saying something new only if the prevailing theory of language holds that each one of us has our own private version of the meaning of the words. When we converse, what such a theory would say is happening is best illustrated by an example: Suppose there's a word "W". I would have a private meaning A of that word and my interlocuter would have his own meaning B. Since meanings A and B are private (mutually inaccessible), it isn't necessary that A = B.

When the word "W" pops up in our conversation, I would think A and the person talking to me would think B. We would basically be talking past each other. The way out of this quandary would be, through discourse, to find common ground, home in on what either of us actually mean (Socratic dialectic).

However, as Wittgenstein states, A and B are private, they're part of a private language, and thus the Socratic dialectics leads us nowhere. The beetle-in-the-box! What I mean or what my interlocutor means with "W", Wittgenstein claims, "drops out of the conversation". We're left debating, discussing, just the word "W" (its referent no longer of any consequence).

Update

1. Context vs Language game & Form of life.

That the meaning of words depend on context was well established way before Wittgenstein formulated his theory of language games & forms of life. Ergo, since Wittgenstein believed that his theory was brand new indicates context-sensitive meaning of words was/is not what a language game & form of life is about.

2. Language as social (private language).

Here too, everyone already knew language, being a form of communication, is social and so what does Wittgenstein's claim that language is social add to what we were aware of long before Wittgenstein was even born.

Scientific, rather than "mental", models (i.e. theories) seem the best approximations of reality we have (or need). The Scientific Image accounts for our Manifest Image but not the other way around. And so to which does philosophy belong? Both, I think, but only in the gaps where the Scientific & Manifest overlap. — 180 Proof

Well, arguably, what happened to all that essence and substance talk, was that it was transformed into the basis for modern science.
— Wayfarer

That's why, it seems, I instinctively used H2O, the chemical formula for water, in my post. It seems so natural to do so, as if that, the chemical composition of water, is its (water's) essence but...is it? I suppose it is - everything about water can be explained with how the molecule H2O would/does behave. I wonder if Wittgenstein had anything to say about science and what seems to be its focus on the thing-in-itself (the referent e.g. water) rather than the sign (the word "water"). Could we then say that to deal with the Wittgensteinian problem of language games we could switch our perspective to a scientific one? I'm shooting in the dark here so do bear with me. — TheMadFool

That's a function of our brains' perceptual cognitive & psychological biases and not just, or even principally, our a function of semantics. Scientific, rather than "mental", models (i.e. theories) seem the best approximations of reality we have (or need). The Scientific Image accounts for our Manifest Image but not the other way around. And so to which does philosophy belong? Both, I think, but only in the gaps where they overlap. — 180 Proof

:up: Thanks.

Update

Do not mistake the finger pointing at the moon for the moon. — Some Guy

Wittgenstein claims that how we use the finger, what we point to with it, decides what the finger is, its meaning as it were. True that but...it doesn't follow that the moon or anything else the finger points to is minus an essence.

This is the crucial realization in my humble opinion: Wittgenstein's thesis would only carry weight if, in the example above, the moon (referent) itself had no essence to it. That would be an astounding discovery. However, since he's only really talking about the finger (words/signs), :meh:

What does this mean? It's like saying bringing a fish in the ocean closer to water or taking it farther way. :roll: — 180 Proof

It simply means how accurate is our mental model of reality.

Update

For me the meaning of definition is given by the uses and purposes of dictionaries. Dictionaries catalogue common current usages (and sometimes past, obsolete usages for the sake of those who might be interested). So, I'm not seeing a problem here. — Janus

I'll respond to you later. See my update post.

Will think about it :up: Thanks a ton.

Not clear what your point is there. — Janus

It's all got to do with how we define the word "definition".

My guesstimate is that if our aim is to understand reality, the definition of "definition" will have to be tailored to that end. That's the reason why we've defined "definition" as about essential features (essences).

However, just like Bolyai & Lobachevsky (mathematicians) ushered in the era of non-Euclidean geometry simply by tinkering with the parallel postulate, we could to alter the definition of "definition", make it about something other than essences or play around with its logical structure (e.g. replace AND with OR) and see what happens, let the chips fall where they may in a manner of speaking.

Maybe, just maybe, something amazing might happen as it did with non-Euclidean geometry (theory of relativity).

Here's my take on what you're wondering about:

The correct use of words is a matter of convention which may change over time. — Janus

Intriguing to say the least. An attitude reminscent of Bolyai and Lobachevsky, the two of whom discovered/invented non-Euclidean geometry.

However, philosophy, I reckon, is aimed at grasping reality which means the meaning of "definition" has to be so crafted as to make that possible. Lobachevsky and Bolyai kind of moves (playing around with the definition of "definition") would eventually lead to us losing touch with reality unless...that doesn't happen and we actually end up gaining a deeper insight on the issues herein mentioned.

Thinking, believing, understanding, pointing, excusing, deducing, etc., etc. All the various concepts and activities of our lives have different conditions (criteria) and possibilities than reference or correspondence (and embody different interests and judgments of our culture in different ways). This is the main point of the PI (that everything is meaningful in its own way). — Antony Nickles

:up: What's meaningless in one language game is meaningful in another? :chin:

Why would Wittgenstein then say some philosophical problems are psuedo-problems, not real but actually instances of "bewitchment by language"? By the way, none of the articles I read on Wittgenstein provide concrete examples of this happening in actuality.

It doesn't make sense!

You are restricting what you call philosophy to something analogous to a statement being true or false (essence as something singular and certain), when, for example, Austin has shown that there are statements that have the value of being true without the same criteria and mechanism as true/false (that some statements accomplish something (or fail to) in the saying of them). — Antony Nickles

See my reply to Janus above - we can perform a Bolyai-Lobachevsky move no doubt but then the question is, will that bring us closer to reality or take us further away from it?

You say this, but how would you know? Sun and snow would exist, sure, but without consciousness there would be no distinction between them as hot and cold, near and far, up and down. Yinyang, too, would exist, but without consciousness there would be no distinction between yin and yang, let alone any recognition of ‘opposites’. — Possibility

I agree that consciousness, I really hope we're tuned into the same channel here, plays a significant role in duality; after all it's a point of view, a way of looking at the world. However, I'm reluctant to say it's all up here, in the head. After all, empirical data of the world does yield a yin-yang pattern in reality.

I've heard of non-duality (advaita vedanta for example) but haven't studied the arguments. Too, non-duality is said to be self-refuting since it stands in opposition to duality forming a pair.

As real as apples? Does this mean you can visually describe or define a non-apple for me, in the same way that you can visually define an apple? Can you distinguish a non-apple from anything other than an apple? ‘Non-apple’ refers to anything and everything that is not an apple, from an orange to stardust out beyond Mars. It is an indeterminate concept, as real as the concept ‘apple’ and its potential, but not as definitive as the apple I hold in my hand, or the one I ate yesterday. These I can describe in great detail, and their descriptions will be different from each other in small ways, but will have many similar properties. A ‘non-apple’ is defined only by its relationship to the concept ‘apple’. An orange is an example of a non-apple, but is no more the opposite of an apple than stardust. — Possibility

You need to give this some more thought.

An old thread I know but seems something worth exploring even if only for fun and nothing else.

The so-called fine-structure constant is the only scientific constant I know of that has fascinated physicists in a form that's uncharacteristic of physical constants - as a rational number $\approx \frac{1}{137}$.

It's rather lamentable that though Pythagoras was the first to hint at a mathematical universe, "all is number" he claimed, he and his disciples had a disdain for irrational numbers which, ironically, all known physical constants fall into the category of. Perhaps Pythagoras, wherever he is as of this moment, will be much relieved that at least one of these constants, the fine-structure constant, has generated so much interest in a form he would've liked/preferred viz. as the rational number $\approx \frac{1}{137}$. Pythagoras also was the first one to analyze music mathematically. Maybe there's something melodic to the fine-structure constant.

There's no extant text from Pyrrho. Read the Outlines of Pyrrhonism (aka the Outlines of Skepticism in a recent translation) by Sextus Empiricus. — Cabbage Farmer

Arigato!

Well, arguably, what happened to all that essence and substance talk, was that it was transformed into the basis for modern science. — Wayfarer

That's why, it seems, I instinctively used $H_2O$, the chemical formula for water, in my post. It seems so natural to do so, as if that, the chemical composition of water, is its (water's) essence but...is it? I suppose it is - everything about water can be explained with how the molecule $H_2O$ would/does behave. I wonder if Wittgenstein had anything to say about science and what seems to be its focus on the thing-in-itself (the referent e.g. water) rather than the sign (the word "water"). Could we then say that to deal with the Wittgensteinian problem of language games we could switch our perspective to a scientific one? I'm shooting in the dark here so do bear with me.

Nobody talks much about the "incorrect" use of words. We like to think language is democratic. — bongo fury

I would love a democratic approach to language - remembering rules is a millstone around our necks but, luckily or not, once a word, here "definition/meaning" is defined, correct and incorrect naturally/automatically enter the picture.

I can see how you arrived at the conclusion that words don't have an essence, because Witt shows that "meaning" (as a thing) is not how language is meaningful, which could be taken as words have no necessity. And add to that the overall investigation to show that reference is only one of many ways that language is meaningful (so not just word to object, or to definition, unlike a sentence). — Antony Nickles

In what ways other than reference is language meaningful? Even if there's an answer to that question, of what relevance do they have to philosophy?

The connection between meaning and use is harder because he is using the same word (meaning), and so people imagine the same picture as meaning as a thing, only now, the referent is "use" — Antony Nickles

Yup!

Because, I think, modern philosophy on the whole doesn't want anything to do with essence, substantia, or any of those medieval scholasticisms. The world has moved on. Philosophy nowadays wants to ground itself in the concrete, in the day-to-day realm of what we actually do, not with what it sees as reified concepts such as 'essences'. All of which is completely tangential to Wittgenstein, I suppose, so treat it as a footnote. — Wayfarer

Why I wonder? How would we go about living lives if, for instance, we don't know the essence of poisons and their antidotes? How do we recognize water if we ignore the essence of what water is? Surely, something's not quite right with Wittgenstein and his acolytes if they're, as you seem to be claiming, moving away from essences to merely, quite obviously, playing with words.

Philosophy is not a word game...or is it?

This was a dismissive, poor summary of Witt at one point, but not a real reading. You feel that the conditions and criteria of our expressions (their grammar) could not express what is essential about something, but it is you (following Kant) who assumes the separation of the world from our language. Wittgenstein found that our expressions show our cares, desires, our judgments, all our lives. That the two are bound together. So when he looked at what we imply when we say _____, he was making claims about how the world works as much as our expressions. The history of the things we've said about a thing are all the things that matter to us about that thing. — Antony Nickles

My apologies. I'm a tyro with a bad attitude. Someone who Bertrand Russell regarded as a singular genius must surely deserve more study than I have put in.


Update

1. Meaning is use [words lack an essence].

2. Language games [Form of life determines meaning (use)].

3. Family resemblance [Illusion of essence]

4. Private language [Incoherent for many reasons]

Someone help me construct a coherent picture of Wittgenstein's philosophy.

I'll give it a shot. :zip: There, I tried. The floor is now open for others.

Designed'? Who designed it? Did Esperanto finally catch on? Instead it's probably more like this.

Animal communication is the transfer of information from one or a group of animals (sender or senders) to one or more other animals (receiver or receivers) that affects the current or future behavior of the receivers....When the information from the sender changes the behavior of a receiver, the information is referred to as a "signal". Signalling theory predicts that for a signal to be maintained in the population, both the sender and receiver should usually receive some benefit from the interaction. Signal production by senders and the perception and subsequent response of receivers are thought to coevolve.
....
The vervet monkey gives a distinct alarm call for each of its four different predators, and the reactions of other monkeys vary appropriately according to the call. For example, if an alarm call signals a python, the monkeys climb into the trees, whereas the "eagle" alarm causes monkeys to seek a hiding place on the ground.
[\quote]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_communication — hanaH

Sometimes the design doesn't necessarily require a conscious, deliberate effort. Your signalling theory is about how language can evolve to maximize/optimize its utility. The end result is a language that seems designed (by someone). See :point: Intelligent Design Vs. Evolution to get an idea of what I meant.

By the way, what does this have to do with Wittgenstein, care to share?

I'm pointed out languages as complicated systems of conventions that animals use to coordinate their behavior. We can babble about essences all day long and get nowhere. Phlogiston. We can call one of the vervet monkey's "warning cries" the "eagle" alarm, and even say that she 'means' or 'refers' to the eagle she sees. But this hypothesized essence is secondary to the conventional reaction of the other monkeys to the cry. The 'meaning' is there in the world in the way that the community of vervet monkeys use it. — hanaH

I made it clear right from the get-go that I agree with the great Wittgenstein that words lack essences - they can be used in any way we want therefore. I'm especially concerned about family resemblances since it creates an illusion of essence (overlapping elements of meaning).

However, that words lack an essence doesn't entail that the referents of words lack an essence. Come to think of it, Wittgenstein seems to be rather confused about what philosophy is - philosophy is, all things considered, about essences (the referents of words) and not, I repeat not, about words that were meant to stand for those essences (referents).

Why then all the fuss about Wittgenstein and the so-called linguistic turn? I ask because it would mean that philosophers who subscribe to Wittgenstein's views have abandoned the idea of philosophy as about essences (referents) of things-in-themselves and are now under the impression that philosophy is linguistic, to do with words (signs). To use a mathematical analogy, what Wittgenstein has done is shift the focus of philosophers from the number 2 to the numeral "2". Frankly, this makes zero sense to me.

As for language as a community/social entity, I'm with you on that. Here to, we have to be extra cautious because language being social was known much before Wittgenstein and so when Wittgenstein said language is social, he surely meant something else. What is that something else is unclear to me.

Very roughly, the whole question of 'essence' goes back to Parmenides - both the philosopher of that name, and the Platonic dialogue concerning the same figure.

As is well-known, Plato set the bar very high for what constitutes knowledge. He dismisses a lot of what people think they know by showing that their knowledge is mere opinion or pretence. The question of what constitutes knowledge is never completely solved, in my opinion. But one of the underlying themes is that the rational intellect (nous) is able to know in a way that mere sense cannot, because it is able to grasp intelligible principles through reason. And when the mind does that, it finds a higher degree of certainty than it ever does in respect of opinions about sense-able objects.

That is what underlies the discussion of the nature of the forms, which are intimately connected to essence, as the essence is 'what a thing truly is', as distinct from its appearance which is incidental ('accidental' in that lexicon). So to know a particular truly is to know its intelligible form, which mind does directly, in a way sense cannot.

That is what is at the origin of Western metaphysics. Of course it was then massively elaborated for centuries, first by Aristotle and the other successors of Platonic philosophy, then also by the Islamic philosophers and so on, down through the centuries. That was the musty, dusty 'tradition of metaphysics' from which successive generations of modern philosophers have sought to free themselves.

Well, almost all. Except for the Catholics. — Wayfarer

Thanks for your valuable contribution to the discussion.

Yes, Platonic forms fits like a glove with what I mean by essence. There is an element of perfection in Platonic forms and essences that must've attracted religious thinkers to it, God is, after all, perfect. A slight digression there but it seemed worth noting.

Anyway, what bothers me, as I mentioned in my reply to hanaH, is why Wittgenstein believed that philosophy was not about referents (essences/Platonic forms) but about the signs (words) used to symbolize them? It seems rather preposterous to say that just because words are missing essences that the things that refer to them too are minus essences.

As far as I'm concerned, I regard family resemblances (a key notion in Wittgenstein's philosophy) as nothing more than the misuse/abuse of language (incorrect application of the definition of words) and Wittgenstein goes on to found his philosophy on what is, all said and done, mistakes people make. Reminds me of the liar paradox - a subtle variation of which is used by Kurt Gödel in his incompleteness theorems. Why would anyone in his right mind use a lie to prove a point? Can a falsehood be used to prove anything at all? :chin:

Why would Wittgenstein found his philosophy on mistakes?

Care with the attribution - the quote in my last was from Antony Nickles, not I. It was a thread on much the same topic, but apparently before it's time. — Banno

I didn't want to involve @Antony Nickles since you were the one to post. Sorry if it was inappropriate.

Wrong definition, buddy.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/dumb — Wheatley

:smile:

Ah, my Padawan, you must go into the wilderness and sit before a turd for a month and experience it. Then you will no longer consider it for use as an emoji. :pray: :grin: — James Riley

:rofl: