You can call it my own sermon if you like, but they are all things that Wittgenstein says, all things that were referenced. As to why you think calling it a sermon serves any purpose, I will leave to you. And as to why you drag Copleston into this I will also leave to you. — Fooloso4

Right, leave everything to me then! :) If it looks like a sermon, acts like one, then it is what it is. Copleston was dragged because I think he expresses the same views as yours regarding the ethical part of the Tractatus. I put in bold the parts that I find relevant.

Wittgenstein would not agree. He does not regard God as an object, objective/transcendent or otherwise. — Fooloso4

Whether God is that transcendent/objective object or otherwise, he (Copleston) certainly attributes religious/mystical experience to God, one way or another. Whereas, in your reading of the Tractatus, this mystical/ethical/religious experience is attributed to ethics. But then again, you seem to link ethics to God as in the sermon above, so essentially, these two different views are the same.

Well for one I very much doubt that all the above are things that one knows. I said previously what I think W. meant by the world of the happy man, and in the case of religious experience: that one speaks in similes, relating happiness to God or some divine providence, but this is not to be taken literally; and as we do not have words for God or the divine, similarly we do not have words for this happy experience. But as you said we went over this. So you agree that it was your own sermon?

But I think you are claiming the same for the Tractatus and for Wittgenstein as Father Copleston did, in his debate with Russell I linked to before. In there he writes:

http://www.scandalon.co.uk/philosophy/cosmological_radio.htm

C: ... Well, perhaps I might say a word about religious experience, and then we can go on to moral experience. I don't regard religious experience as a strict proof of the existence of God, so the character of the discussion changes somewhat, but I think it's true to say that the best explanation of it is the existence of God. By religious experience I don't mean simply feeling good. I mean a loving, but unclear, awareness of some object which irresistibly seems to the experiencer as something transcending the self, something transcending all the normal objects of experience, something which cannot be pictured (huh, it's not a picture) or conceptualized, but of the reality of which doubt is impossible (what one knows)-- at least during the experience. I should claim that cannot be explained adequately and without residue, simply subjectively. The actual basic experience at any rate is most easily explained on the hypotheses that there is actually some objective cause of that experience.

and

C: ... I'm speaking strictly of mystical experience proper, and I certainly don't include, by the way, what are called visions. I mean simply the experience, and I quite admit it's indefinable, of the transcendent object or of what seems to be a transcendent object. I remember Julian Huxley in some lecture saying that religious experience, or mystical experience, is as much a real experience as falling in love or appreciating poetry and art. Well, I believe that when we appreciate poetry and art we appreciate definite poems or a definite work of art. If we fall in love, well, we fall in love with somebody and not with nobody....

Just as Copleston says that the objective/transcendent object and cause of religious/mystical experience is God, so you say that for Wittgenstein, the condition for these kind of mystical experiences is the ethical. Which is also the condition for beauty - poetry and art, right? And that this is what Wittgenstein was getting at in the Tractatus, well at least in these two pages of his book?

And what was this then?

It is quite clear that there is ethical experience. One knows what it is, according to W., to be a happy man. One knows what it is to be in agreement with the world, with one's conscience, the will of God. One knows what it is for life to have value and meaning. One knows what it is to live in the eternal present. One knows the mystical (it makes itself manifest). One know how to see the world aright and what it is to see the world aright. One knows how all things stand, how it is all related, that is, God. — Fooloso4

Something that someone just knows but cannot put into words? I am asking, because it looked like a sermon to me, and I wouldn't take Wittgenstein to be a preacher.

Right, so number 1 is that, whether for W. meaning and value are actually the same, whether they are essentially the same - same same but different like the asians usually say (same same, in short) -, and whether they have the same source (ethics).

Now number 2 relates to happyness, if, again for W and the Tractatus, it coincides with "good willing", which coincides with doing God's will, for whatever that means, and seeing the world aright, in which case I think we may call this particular interpretation of the Tractatus as the "stairway-to-heaven" interpretation, with the rungs of the ladder referring to this stairway.

The same distinction in use can be found with Bedeutung. In English we also use the term 'meaning' in different ways. — Fooloso4

So you are saying that 'sense' in 4.022/4.031 and 'sense' in 6.41 mean different things? But yes, because I cannot see how the "sense of the world" would represent some situation. So in 6.41, value is meant as "sense"? And in that sense, does he see value and meaning as essentially the same? Is this why you said to me previously:

So I see here W argue in favour of amorality, just like Nietzsche, the opinion that ethics is non-existent, in thinking or in saying, in this world or beyond.
— Pussycat

Here you betray your lack of understanding not only of Wittgenstein but of Nietzsche as well. What they have in common is the fundamental importance of value and meaning for life. They differ, however, in where that is to be found. For Nietzsche it is the revaluation of values. — Fooloso4

I mean to express the position that: if one discards ethics as the condition for value, then one has to discard meaning as well. That is, the world cannot have a meaning, one's life cannot have a meaning, but be utterly meaningless, if one does not accept at least some value coming from the ethical.

If Wittgenstein was correct in claiming that happiness is the reward for the good exercise of the will and it was true that he was not happy, then that seems to be a correct conclusion. If you read Monk's biography and well as comments made by Wittgenstein in Culture and Value and elsewhere it is clear that he sometimes is critical of his actions. See also his comments about confession. — Fooloso4

Yes, I remember reading it some years ago, but diagonally like they say, some excerpts only. Wittgenstein said he wasn't happy, in several occasions, but in any case this is evident. Nowadays, he would have been diagnosed with some mental illness, for sure, bipolar disorder, manic depression, OCD most probably.

hey hi Wallows!

Woof!

We need to make a distinction between meaning as Sinn or sense and meaning as significant or of value. — Fooloso4

Alright, can you bring an example that clearly shows this distinction?

Happiness is said to be a reward for the good exercise of the will (6.43) — Fooloso4

So if that is the case, combined with the fact that W. was not happy in his life, we can safely infer that he did not exercise his will in a good way, and thus he was not rewarded, right?

I'm back, hehe!

So let us conclude this if you like. First of all, I think your reading of the Tractatus sees the transcedental ethics as providing the condition for meaning and value both: without ethics, there would be no value, and no meaning either; ie the condition for meaning and value is the same. Is that what you are saying?

And as to happiness, do you think that Wittgenstein is saying that whoever surmounts these ethical propositions and sees the world aright, will be happy? Because if so, then how do you explain the fact that he led a most unhappy life himself?

how much of personal timidity and vul- nerability does this masquerade of a sickly recluse betray!

Did Nietzsche just call Spinoza a sickly recluse??

But the fact is certainly related to the act. So if he cannot see the immorality in the facts themselves, then how can he see it in the act? Is it only that we cannot speak of it/say it (that it is immoral), as if we were deaf and mute or something, but everything else is the same as before?

Philosophy alienated me from friends and family! So it taught me something with regards to that.

But anyway Wittgenstein must have had a rather peculiar view of ethics and morality in general. It struck me as odd when I read his lecture where he equates an act of murder to that of a falling of a stone:

If for instance in our world-book we read the description of a murder with all its details physical and psychological, the mere description of these facts will contain nothing which we could call an ethical proposition. The murder will be on exactly the same level as any other event, for instance the falling of a stone. Certainly the reading of description might cause us pain or rage or any other emotion, or we might read about the pain or rage caused by this murder in other people when they have heard of it, but there will simply be facts, facts, and facts but no Ethics.

I mean, a normal person I think would have said that the murder was quite unethical and immoral, and denote the murderer as unethical and immoral too. But not Wittgenstein, he only sees facts.

In any case, I think we can safely say where Wittgenstein places all ethical propositions, somewhere next to the lifeline. :grin:

It is not like sightseeing. It is not a once and done experience. — Fooloso4

haha, well done Fooloso4, you have a sense of humour after all!

It is an attempt to put into words what cannot be put into words. When he says "ultimate value", however, it suggests something much more profound and important than something pleasant. When he says that he is "so to speak" in agreement with the will of God, again I think he means something far more profound and significant than something pleasant. When he says that his conscience is the voice of God, he is not stating a matter of fact. To attempt to ascribe a more specific meaning to it is antithetical to the Tractatus. — Fooloso4

The word "meaning" can have different meanings. We use it differently when we say "the meaning of a chair is something that we use to sit on", when we say that "this object has a special meaning for us", and when we inquire into the meaning of life. The word-sign may be the same, but it has a different form, so it means something else in each case. So in the case of "ultimate or absolute value", I think he means the source of all value, the transcedental ethics, or God so to speak, but not the actual value, since no such ultimate value can be ascribed or described, and the source is not the same as what emanates from it.

Do you mean ethics in the sense of rules or standards of proper conduct? If so, Wittgenstein says nothing about this — Fooloso4

No, I meant ethics as the transcendental: if it was employed as a means to see the world aright, then what is its use after this?

The closest he gets in the comment in the Notebooks about conscience quoted in an earlier post: — Fooloso4

I think he uses this as a simile like he says so in the lecture: when someone is happy then he says and feels as if he is with God or in heaven, where being with God and heaven mean something pleasant. The same holds for the ethical rewards - reward must be something acceptable. Equivalently, when someone is unhappy then he says and feels as if he is with the Devil or in hell, where the Devil and hell mean something unpleasant - punishment be something unacceptable. Or doing the will of God, so to speak, he means it also as a simile for when he is happy and in accordance with his own conscience, not that he is actually doing God's will.

My whole tendency and, I believe, the tendency of all men who ever tried to write or talk Ethics or Religion was to run against the boundaries of language.

So for the man that finally understands Wittgenstein, it wasn't ethics/the ethical that was transcended, but rather propositions about it: the ethical was needed for this experience of transcendence, having been the condition. But what happens to ethics afterwards?

Wittgenstein does not say and it does not follow from anything he does say that the ethical has been transcended. It is just the opposite, the ethical transcends the facts of the world. (6.41) — Fooloso4

But when he writes that: "he who understands me finally recognizes them as senseless, when he has climbed out through them, on them, over them. (He must so to speak throw away the ladder, after he has climbed up on it.) He must surmount these propositions; then he sees the world rightly". This surmount, climb through, on and over these (nonsensical and ethical) propositions, isn't that transcendence?

I mean, can't we rewrite the above as: "he who understands me finally recognizes the ethical propositions as senseless, when he has transcended them", without changing the meaning?

And yet at the penultimate rung of the latter at 6.421 he says that ethics is transcendental. How do you explain this? — Fooloso4

He gives no meaning to "transcendental", so anyone can explain it how he sees fit. One can take Kant's meaning of transcendental, for which by the way there are different interpretations and debates. Another can say that transcendental is something that can be transcended, or gone beyond, for whatever that means. Another that transcendental is itself nonsensical and cannot be put in words etc.

when someone else wished to say something metaphysical, to demonstrate to him that he had given no meaning to certain signs in his propositions.

What is the meaning he gives to "transcendental"? What does this sign represent in the proposition "ethics are transcendental"? Is it a metaphysical concept to begin with?

What one sees when the world is seen aright is not simply that propositions about what cannot be put into words are senseless but that the world is mystical. — Fooloso4

Yes, the world is mystical, like we didn't know.

What is inexpressible would be nonsense if one attempted to express it. This does not mean that the mystical or the ethical does not exist. It does, it shows itself. What is senseless is not the ethical but rather propositions about the ethical. — Fooloso4

It doesn't mean it exists either. Or that the ethical that has been transcended has anything to do with what is obtained at the end of this transcendence, it might be something completely different.

There is indeed the inexpressible. This shows itself; it is the mystical.

So he says that the mystical shows itself, not the ethical. But then again, someone may say that whatever is inexpressible shows itself, and as long as the ethical is inexpressible, then also the ethical, which is the mystical, shows itself. Go figure. But this all too funny I think. :grin:

Ethics still of course exists, in a sense, or rather not in a sense, it actually exists, for those that are still on the bottom of the ladder or climbing it up, but once they reach the top, they see it as something senseless, it just won't make sense to them at all then.

Is not this the reason why men to whom after long doubting the sense of life became clear, could not then say wherein this sense consisted? — 6.521

Once they transcend it, or go beyond it, its senselessness will become clear.

My propositions are elucidatory in this way: he who understands me finally recognizes them as senseless, when he has climbed out through them, on them, over them. (He must so to speak throw away the ladder, after he has climbed up on it.) He must surmount these propositions; then he sees the world rightly. — 6.54

But getting rid of excess baggage is not as easy as it sounds, and one has to occupy oneself considerably with the subject matter in order to do that, for example walking away like the guys in the Vienna circle did, is not an option. And what a peculiar and special deed would that be, if to get rid of something heavy, one had to carry it through thick and thin, only to throw it away at the end. The Tractatus describes that deed.

Of course there is then no question left, and just this is the answer.

But I think that Wittgenstein did not think so only of ethics, but of everything that cannot be expressed in language, ethics only being a small part of it. That is one interpretation at least, but surely there are more, as the bibliography suggests, I mean if one would do some research on the Tractatus, he would find plenty of different views, it is not at all clear.

Thank you Amity, I guess ... :blush:

That is correct. This is a basic Tractarian distinction. One that I have repeatedly pointed to only to have it ignored and the same mistake repeated — Fooloso4

Nope, wrong again. And well, no matter how many times a mistake is repeated, it still remains a mistake won't you all agree now? The only thing that a repetition shows is that someone is stuck in time, sounding like a broken record, like a needle stuck in a groove, as the expression goes.

Ethics, if it is anything, is supernatural and our words will only express facts; as a teacup will only hold a teacup full of water and if I were to pour out a gallon over it.

Here Wittgenstein says that Ethics is supernatural, he doesn't say that "Ethics seems to be supernatural", so there goes the argument about the factual claim. And of course, sceptical like he is, unlike others - not to name them, adds "if it is anything", I mean the guy is not even sure that ethics exists, or if it is anything at all, like a ghost or an apparition or something.

I'm not an expert on Wittgenstein, and anyone who claims that they are, are likely full of shit. — Wallows

no shit Einstein! hahah

down in the deathly hallows
there's a man that wallows
oh what a pity to be
in a pit most shallow
I say spit boy!
and never swallow

You know, it's funny, Amity, that you only see my "lows" and personal false allegations but somehow manage to turn a blind eye to Fooloso4's lows and personal false allegations, repeated comments about my blind spot, and my cacophony as of late. As well as to patience, you think that it is only him that is patient with me, whereas I am just ... what? Fooling around?

This was a direct quote from the lecture. Are you saying that Wittgenstein was deceived in believing that certain experiences have supernatural value? Or are you still accusing me of not understanding him? — Fooloso4

Accuse is a bit harsh for a choice of words, but yes, I am saying that you don't understand him. "should seem to have" is not the same as "has", I wonder how and why you don't see that.

edit

We have been over this. Experiential. A proposition does not tell me if I am happy or in pain. — Fooloso4

Ah so experiential truths, like the truth of what vanilla ice cream tastes like (mundane), the truth of me having a toothache, the truth of feeling safe and in accordance with the world, the truth of seeing/feeling the world as mystical or a miracle, the truth of being happy. And you are saying that these experiential truths cannot be expressed in language and propositions, thus we cannot communicate them, at least not in the ordinary sense, but only show them (this be the only - if any at all - way of communication), they make themselves manifest. Right?

I am talking about the etymology and meaning of the terms. The term biology does not mean that logic is mixed with life. The term psychology does not mean that logic is mixed with psyche. More to the point,
Wittgenstein marks the limits of logic and world and the "I" is not within those limits. They are separate and distinct, not mixed. — Fooloso4

But what is logic, according to Wittgenstein? Or the logical form? When I say that logic mixes with X, I mean to say that the logical form is inherent in that X, that X has a logical structure. So biological forms have a logical structure. And I say that this is also the case for the psyche, giving birth to psychology.

Again, are you asking me to put into words what Wittgenstein says cannot be put into words? The problem can be seen, as I pointed out, with mundane experiences such as the taste of vanilla ice cream. This is an experience that most of us can relate to. In the Investigations he talks a great deal about the experience of pain. When someone says that they are in pain we know what they mean. But the experience of the mystical is not one we can so easily understand since it is not a common experience. — Fooloso4

I was asking so that I could understand what you mean. But if you think that what I am asking cannot be put into words, but only shown, then I guess that your efforts should have been better focused on the latter, the showing. For example, in one of my previous comments to you, I used the word privilege ironically, this was evident to you, and to anyone following the discussion I think, pretty obvious. And it was evident to me that you realized it, putting it in quotes and all. Because "privilege", as used in that context, is not identical to the "privilege" that is commonly ascribed to, let's say, a king, but nevertheless has some relation to it. What happened there? A combination or mixture of forms, logical forms I mean: the logical form of privilege proper was mixed with irony, irony's logical form, and this was made manifest, it showed itself, irony showed herself. And then you decided, on your own merit, not to further fuel the so-called quarrel, but somehow quiesce it. This also was made manifest, this silencing. But had you acted differently, then we might have seen what it is for something to wax, only to wane at a later time, as it was done before. So all these forms, logical forms, of waxing, waning, quiescing were made manifest, here, as is the case, apparently, in every discussion. But one cannot talk about these forms in hope that he will represent them in his speech or language, but only show them.

... It is the paradox that an experience, a fact, should seem to have supernatural value.' — Fooloso4

Yes, it would seem or appear so, but you know what they say, appearances can be deceiving.

No propositional truths. — Fooloso4

What sort of truths then? Truths that cannot be expressed in language? Is this what you say? Personal truths? What exactly?

He provides no such explanation, and if he did wouldn't he have to discuss it, that is, talk about value judgments? You miss the point. It is not about value judgments but the experience of value. — Fooloso4

Basically my questions and let's say assertions have to do with the fact that I don't understand what you mean by these experiences, the experience of value. But I think that you are using the word 'experience' in a different context as the one that is conventionally used, I mean, how to say, the every day experience, or like a physicist would use it when he conducts his experiments. Do you think that this experience of value is of the same form of everyday experience? Somewhat related, or entirely different?

First of all, I am not ahead of myself. I have followed the Tractatus. In a few places I cited his other writings. There is nothing else in addition to these points that I have said that cannot be found in the Tractatus. Second, your claim about mixing logic and soul is contrary to the Tractatus. If you like you can assert the "privilege" of saying things that are contrary to the text but you should be aware and make note of the fact that they are. — Fooloso4

I did it to myself in my first comment, and then in the second I publicly acknowledged it. I am just following on Wittgenstein's footsteps here that he carved for us but without us, I think, when he said:

Don't for heaven's sake, be afraid of talking nonsense! But you must pay attention to your nonsense.

Some trial and error, so to speak. As long as thoughts are expressed. But if one gets it at the end, it wouldn't matter what happened in the past, would it now?

'ologies' are the talk about or examination of or study of the subject matter. Biology is not the logic of life, it is the study of life. Psychology is not the logic of the psyche, it is the study of the psyche. — Fooloso4

So you are saying that logic plays no role at all in biology or psychology? Cause this is what I am getting at, the logical forms found in those.

Ethics and aesthetics are the same (6.421) 6.44 and 6.45 refer to aesthetic experience, meaning and value. — Fooloso4

Again, per my question as to these experiences.

Yes, so you have comic writers warn:

Is Dennis the Menace a superhero? Or some spoiled brat? At least Captain America is well nurtured!

I am not an expert in comics, but I think that we should have a look at how the concept of superheroes has been developed since the beginning. At first I think it was for political reasons, american propaganda, communist danger and the cold war, well maybe even before that to give hope to people during a dark age - the world wars, so their image was impeccable and perfect. But nowadays I think that the current has changed, in that superheroes are beginning to be portrayed as mentally unstable people. What do you think?

Ethics has nothing to do with truth-functions, for propositions can express nothing higher. — Fooloso4

So if ethics has nothing to do with truth-functions, does this mean that no truth comes out of ethics?

He has done no such thing. There is no talk of value judgment in the Tractatus. It is a matter of seeing of what makes itself manifest (6.522). — Fooloso4

I didn't say that there was talk of value judgement in the Tractatus, but only an explanation how these are possible. How is it that people value one thing over another, for example a piece of music, some ideology, some human characteristic, different beliefs etc.

Where does he say that logic mixes with the soul? Once again you have missed an essential element of the Tractatus, the "I" or self or soul is not in the world, it stands outside it. — Fooloso4

Well yes, he doesn't, but seeing that you get ahead of yourself, I took the liberty to improvise as well, I mean why should there be only you that has that privilege?

The term psychological does not mean that there is a logical part of the psyche. Logic is derivative of the Greek "logos", which meant originally to gather together, and thus to give an account, to speak or say. Psychology is the logos of the psyche. — Fooloso4

So psychology is the logos of the psyche, not the logic of the psyche?

The reason it is not "6.424" is because it is not a continuation of 6.423, which says that it is impossible to speak about the will in so far as it is the subject of ethical attributes. The subject is still ethics. Ethics is not about attributes of the will. It is about the exercise of the will. How we choose to act and the rewards or punishment that follow. — Fooloso4

By what you are reasoning here, you say why it is not a continuation of 6.423, but you don't actually say why or how it is a continuation of 6.42, where ethical propositions are discussed. But let us take propositions 6.4x from 6.43 and below. We have:

6.43 If good or bad willing ... (let us not repeat ourselves)

6.44 Not how the world is, is the mystical, but that it is.

6.45 The contemplation of the world sub specie aeterni is its contemplation as a limited whole. The feeling of the world as a limited whole is the mystical feeling.

Do you think that in 6.44 and 6.45, the subject is still ethics? And if so, how is ethics connected with these propositions?

It's because you crazy yankees like to play heroes, being a superpower. Saving the world, rescuing the girl and all. Take for example Captain America, I mean, what sort of name is that for a super hero, huh?? Could it be more obvious? But you are all a bunch of fools, if you don't mind me saying so! :razz:

The numbering system in the Tractatus is not ornamental. The remark about the world of the happy man is not some offhand remark unrelated to the statement in which it occurs. It follows from the prior related statements. — Fooloso4

Yes of course, the numbering is not ornamental in the Tractatus. But if we want to take things from the beginning, chapter 6 begins with :"The general form of truth-function is: [...]. This is the general form of proposition". And then 6.4 states: "All propositions are of equal value". What relation do you think the general form of truth-function has with 6.4?

According to 6.41 value is not found in the world. This is followed by 6.42 which states that there can be no ethical propositions because propositions cannot express anything higher. Ethics is transcendental (6.421). This is followed by 6.422 which states there must be ethical rewards and punishments, and that they reside in the action itself. 6.423 states that it is impossible to speak about the will in so far as it is the subject of ethical attributes. This is because the will is not a thing in the world. Rather than attributes of the will it is the actions or exercise of the will that is at issue, but it cannot change what happens in the world, it changes the world as a whole (6.43). — Fooloso4

But in 6.422 he says that the consequences of an action are irrelevant. And that the reward and punishment must lie in the action itself, they must thus be intrinsic to the action, in and of itself, with no recourse to experience, to what happens in the world outside of us I mean, as a result of this action. Thus, willing anything, IF it changes anything (the if here is not to be taken lightly), it won't change the external world, the macrocosm, but only our world, the microcosm, how we see and value things. But value does not exist in the external world, the world of logic that can be expressed in language, therefore, IF it exists anywhere, it must lie on the outside, or inside our microcosm. All this however, is purely psychological, since believing, willing, judging etc something does not necessarily make it so, which is the foundation for all psychology. And thus the Tractatus has explained how value judgements are possible. Finally, it is evident from the above that the will resides in our microcosm, being part of our psychology, so anyone, like Kant, that speaks about the will is doing psychology and not philosophy or logic. However, because "logic fills the world", it mixes with our soul and psyche somehow - the microcosm, and it is not a happy coincidence that the word itself "psycho-logical", bears a logical part, but language has managed to preserve and show this mixture, as well as distinction. And it is for this reason that philosophers have more than often confused logic and rationality with their own psychology.

And I think that 6.43 was purposely numbered so by Wittgenstein, being in equal section under 6.4 (All propositions are of equal value) and not under 6.42 (as in 6.424 for example) where he discusses ethics, in order to show that what is contained there (the will and feelings of happiness and unhappiness) pertains to psychology, mostly, and not ethics.

At least this is what I believe about the Tractatus.

Yes ok. So? Why do you see good willing to be a characteristic of the happy man, and bad willing that of an unhappy man? Because they are placed in the same order afterwards? If he wrote:

"The world of the unhappy man is a different one from that of the happy man",

would you have said that the good exercise of the will is that of the unhappy man, and bad willing that of the happy man?

I don't see the connection, in fact, I don't think they are related at all, in that happiness does not have anything to do with the will, as it is stated above, I am saying that the two statements are unconnected.

You really should check the text before saying such things: — Fooloso4

Lets just say that the Notebook was never written or that it was unavailable to us, and we only had the Tractatus. Do you think that from the statement above only, we can infer that W linked the world of the happy man to the good exercise of the will, whereas the world of the unhappy man to its bad exercise, and all this to ethics?

Ethics is not a theory of ethics, just as music is not a theory of music. The failure to make that distinction results in a failure to understand what Wittgenstein means by ethics. The comparison with music was deliberate because in the Tractatus he links ethics/aesthetics. Someone who has never heard music will not come to understand it via a theory of music. — Fooloso4

Yes, which I translated to "is the will fundamental in all ethical theories?". Your disagreement is with theory? Or with fundamental? I guess with the first. But I lost you there, what do you mean by ethics is not a theory of ethics? We have something, say X, and to be able to understand it and say a few things about it, we build a theory of X around it. How does this lead to misunderstanding? And when W says something about the musical score in the Tractatus, he does so to link the musical form to the pictorial form, and go from there to the logical form that governs everything in the world. I don't think that this has anything to do with ethics or aesthetics per se.

The will is fundamental for all ethics in so far as we intend to do what is right or good. When we ask how that is to be accomplished Kant and Wittgenstein part ways. Kant thinks there is a moral science, Wittgenstein rejects this. That does not make it "100% percent Kant". — Fooloso4

Well yes, I exaggerated a *bit*, it's true.

So, which is it? Is the will fundamental or not? The basis of your confusion seems to be, once again, the failure to distinguish between ethics and a theory of ethics. — Fooloso4

It's whatever one chooses I guess. I just copied here what W says in the lecture:

Now instead of saying "Ethics is the enquiry into what is good" I could have said Ethics is the enquiry into what is valuable, or, into what is really important, or I could have said Ethics is the enquiry into the meaning of life, or into what makes life worth living, or into the right way of living. I believe if you look at all these phrases you will get a rough idea as to what it is that Ethics is concerned with. — W

This should be seen in light of the saying/showing distinction. What answers the inquiry is not something that can be said but something that becomes manifest, something experienced. It is not a matter of defining one in terms of the other. It is not a matter of defining it at all. — Fooloso4

There it is again this talk of "experience"... I think that the main reason you misunderstand the Tractatus is because you are primarily concerned with ethics. The saying/showing distinction in the Tractatus has to do with the logical form: this form is the one that cannot be talked about, but only shown. For example, according to W, we cannot say what time is, but only show it.

Are you claiming that when he says: — Fooloso4

"Transcendental" is so Kant, isn't it?

But I was referring to the part you so cleverly omitted:

6.422 The first thought in setting up an ethical law of the form “thou
shalt . . . ” is: And what if I do not do it. But it is clear that
ethics has nothing to do with punishment and reward in the
ordinary sense. This question as to the consequences of an action
must therefore be irrelevant. At least these consequences will not
be events. For there must be something right in that formulation
of the question. There must be some sort of ethical reward and
ethical punishment, but this must lie in the action itself.

(And this is clear also that the reward must be something
acceptable, and the punishment something unacceptable.)

This I say is the traditional view of ethics, that reward coincides with something acceptable and happiness, which also coincides with good willing, in contrast to punishment and something unacceptable and bad willing.

The conclusion for Wittgenstein, as I see it, is this: if ethics is something that can be expressed in language, then it will not do for us what we always tried to make it do, but will become quite another. On the other hand, if ethics cannot be expressed in language, then we should remain silent about ethical matters. Thus, you can't have it both ways, one must choose between these two ifs. You can't have your cake, and eat it too.

The moral law for Kant was not grounded in psychology and did not appeal to psychology. It is determined a priori by reason. — Fooloso4

I am certain that for Kant it appeared so, but according to Wittgenstein, the categorical imperative is purely psychological.

Philosophy, according to Wittgenstein, sets the boundaries of what can be thought and said. Ethics is on the side of that boundary that cannot be said or thought. Ethics is transcendental. It is not about theories or propositions or formulations, but rather the life of the "happy man"; life as he knows it via his own experience of the good exercise of his will. — Fooloso4

Surely for Wittgenstein, ethics cannot be expressed in language, in this we agree. However I don't see anywhere in the Tractatus him saying that ethics is about "the life of the "happy man"; life as he knows it via his own experience of the good exercise of his will". This is just you, speculating.

As late as "On Certainty" skepticism remained central to his investigations. We need to distinguish between two forms of skepticism: 1) knowledge of ignorance and human limits, 2) radical doubt. Wittgenstein accepts the first and rejects the second. — Fooloso4

Yes right, this form of scepticism that doubts where a question cannot be asked.

The topic is the Tractatus but you jump from W. to Kant because both discuss the will and then to a misrepresentation of Russell in order to show that for him the will plays no part in ethics. Based on that misrepresentation you make a dubious claim about a science of ethics, try to tie it back to the Tractatus, and conclude that there are ethical facts and an ethical science. — Fooloso4

Yes, the topic is the Tractatus, but we got sidetracked discussing this question: "is the will fundamental in all ethical theories?". All my previous comments had to do with that. Wallows, first, mentioned utilitarianism, but he didn't expand further, so I decided to say a few things. And then I remembered the debate that Russell had with Copleston, and since Russell had a close relationship with Wittgenstein, I thought it would be pertinent to throw Russell into the discussion. As for Kant, some of the things that Wittgenstein said in the Tractatus, I think that they are directed towards him, so Kant is important here as well. Now, as it seems, I might have misrepresented Russell, however I did not say that for him the will plays no part in ethics, nor did I try to tie anything back to the Tractatus - my comments had nothing to do with the Tractatus but with the question above standalone - or make any conclusions. I just took his two possible ethical theories to help me with whether the will is fundamental in ethics.

What you fail to see is that for W. the will does not make ethical determinations. The will does not make ethical determinations for Kant either. In addition, however ethical determinations are made, to choose and act ethically does require the will. Simply determining that one should choose or do ‘x’ does not mean one will choose or do it. I might decide that I would benefit more by not doing ‘x’ even if it harms others. The will alone is not sufficient but is necessary if one is to choose and act ethically. Simply following the rules is not enough because one might not follow them when he can go undetected and it is to his advantage to not follow them. — Fooloso4

Well, this is what I've been saying all along, that the will is not making ethical determinations, at least in the ethical theories above, and this I see as "the will not being fundamental in ethics", as in those theories we could have - in principle - a computer program determine what is ethical. Because the question was not whether the will plays some role in ethics, but whether it is fundamental. And I see the ethical determinations as being fundamental. You, on the other hand, see the will fundamental no matter what. So I guess we are both right and wrong, depending on how one looks at it. But I think for Kant, the will is inseparable from ethical determinations and actions both, they are somehow intertwined, I mean if you separate them, then you end up with something that is not Kant.

As to a science of ethics: Russell is not claiming the possibility of a science of ethics but a science of perception - just as the physicist can give an answer to why an object looks yellow or blue, he suggests that there is "probably an answer of the same sort" as to why I think one sort of thing good and another evil. That does not mean that there is a science that determines whether it is good or evil but rather a possible science of moral perception. Moral perception, however, is not moral truth: — Fooloso4

Yes, you are right.

Your question which for some reason you were not able to previously articulate: — Fooloso4

I didn't articulate it because I thought we were on the same page, apparently not.

What evidence do you have that such a thing is possible? Where in the world are the facts of meaning and value located? How are they known? — Fooloso4

This depends on how one defines/formulates ethics. For example, if ethics is defined to be "the will to do good", then the question above whether "the will is fundamental in ethics" is obviously ridiculous and absurd. It's like someone would come with a good disposition and ask: "come here fellas and let us ponder upon this question, no bias, no strings attached, to find out whether blue is truly a colour". And the others would say, of course: "what the heck are you talking about? how can blue not be a colour? the colour blue is obviously a colour! what sort of question is this? are you stupid or something??!". But if ethics, as Wittgenstein says in the lecture, is defined to be the general enquiry into what is good (taken from Moore), or the enquiry into what is valuable, or what is really important, or the enquiry into the meaning of life, or into what makes life worth living, or into the right way of living, then the will may in fact not be fundamental, or be trivial or even redundant.

Now I am going to use the term Ethics in a slightly wider sense, in a sense in fact which includes what I believe to be the most essential part of what is generally called Aesthetics. — W

If Aesthetics is the inquiry into what is beautiful, then we can define Ethics similarly as the inquiry into what is a beautiful life, making thus Ethics part of Aesthetics, defining it in terms of beauty that is, and then there would only be beauty to investigate to get a glimpse of them both.

You seem to have moved without making a clear distinction from challenging my interpretation of the Tractatus to what appears to be an ambiguous challenge to the Tractatus itself. From challenging what I said about the role of the will in the Tractatus to challenging the role of the will in ethics to an assertion of ethical facts to speculation about a science of ethics.
..
There is nothing here that indicates that you have distinguished Wittgenstein’s position from your own claim of a science of ethics. Nothing that indicates that they are not seen by you as one and the same. — Fooloso4

Well maybe I wasn't clear, it doesn't matter anyway. But I think that just as you misunderstood me here, you also misunderstood what W was trying to say in the Tractatus, in propositions 6.42 to 6.43: it is not his own opinions on ethics that he is presenting there, but those of conventional ethics, as they have been traditionally discussed. Basically I see that he is trying to put everything where it belongs: traditional ethics as the "will to do good" does not belong to philosophy but to psychology, this is an insinuation to Kant who discusses the will quite a bit. Also proposition 4.1121:

4.1121 Psychology is no nearer related to philosophy, than is any other natural science.
The theory of knowledge is the philosophy of psychology.
Does not my study of sign-language correspond to the study of thought processes which philosophers held to be so essential to the philosophy of logic? Only they got entangled for the most part in unessential psychological investigations, and there is an analogous danger for my method. — W

These unessential psychological investigations point to Kant and his categorical imperative, Kant is not doing philosophy there but psychology.

6.423 Of the will as the bearer of the ethical we cannot speak. And the will as a phenomenon is only of interest to psychology. — W

Philosophy cannot speak of ethics where the will is present, but psychology can. And if we formulate ethics such as we could philosophically speak of it, then it will not do for us what we always tried to make it do, just like the soul (This shows that there is no such thing as the soul—the subject, etc.—as it is conceived in contemporary superficial psychology. A composite soul would not be a soul any longer):

6.4312 The temporal immortality of the soul of man, that is to say, its
eternal survival also after death, is not only in no way guaranteed,
but this assumption in the first place will not do for us
what we always tried to make it do. Is a riddle solved by the
fact that I survive for ever? Is this eternal life not as enigmatic
as our present one? The solution of the riddle of life in space
and time lies outside space and time. — W

On the other hand, he finds that solipsism does actually belong to philosophy, because it has sense: "The I in solipsism shrinks to an extensionless point and there remains the reality co-ordinated with it. There is therefore really a sense in which in philosophy we can talk of a non-psychological I". Which is why solipsism occupied him for the rest of his life.

Scepticism, however, does not have any sense at all, and is therefore excluded from philosophical investigations:

6.51 Scepticism is not irrefutable, but palpably senseless, if it would
doubt where a question cannot be asked.
For doubt can only exist where there is a question; a question
only where there is an answer, and this only where something
can be said. — W

--------

This is more or less it, what goes where. I wish I were in a better mood and state to express myself clearer, but I am pretty much tired, surely there is a lot I forgot and neglected to mention to tie things up. But life, if it could be expressed into a proposition, it would most probably be a funny one.

:) this is not what I meant by what does it say, but ok, I will have a look.

no i haven't, what does it say?

Once again, you have misunderstood Wittgenstein. For W. ethics has nothing to do with what happens in the world. He is quite clear that ethics is not a science. He is also clear that it does have to do with the will. I provided ample evidence of this based on the Tractatus, the Notebooks, and the Lecture on Ethics.You jump from a remark made by Russell to the conclusion that W. held that ethics is a science and has nothing to do with the will, the opposite of what he says. — Fooloso4

No, once again, it is you that have misunderstood me. I quoted W to make an argument for this particular theory that we were discussing, I didn't say nor do I believe what you say next. The question here is: "what would happen to ethics if it was found that ethics is one of the natural sciences?". Of course W in the TLP does not see ethics this way. So you see that it is you that is jumping to conclusions, probably because you are so blinded by your beliefs that you are not even able to hypothesise anything else, but then again your condition does not have anything to do with philosophy, rather as W would say, it is only of interest to psychology.