Fair enough. You've done a good job of keeping the thread going.

:up:

Same here. That's my preferred method of communication and learning. It's very tedious and cumbersome though. Not something that will ever allow you to succeed in college. Maybe if you were ultra fast at this method, which I am not. — Posty McPostface

You do need some background, so I wouldn't recommend trying to do it if you don't know much about Wittgenstein. The Tractatus, for example, is one of the most difficult works in philosophy, so it's very difficult to read and to think you'll understand it. Many philosophers have misunderstood Wittgenstein's works.

What's been fun for me, is to read and study Wittgenstein, then to compare my interpretation with others who are experts. It's exciting to learn that your interpretation is one that the experts also have, or you see where you disagree with the experts. Whatever the case may be, you've thought it through yourself.

If I were you I would concentrate on primary source material. The best way to understand Wittgenstein is to read Wittgenstein. Secondary sources are important, but I think we can rely to much on them.

I don't agree. Meaning, so far as it has any meaning, is constructed by folks doing stuf — Banno

I take it by "doing stuff," so to speak, that it's "doing stuff" in a particular way, i.e., one can do stuff, but the stuff we're doing may still lack meaning, even when it appears to have meaning. For example, Wittgenstein criticized philosophers for doing stuff, because some of it lacked sense. Note also, and I think we agree on this, that many threads appear to be "doing stuff," and yet, much of it is senseless. As I've gone through Wittgenstein's PI recently, I began to see much more complexity to the "meaning as use" idea.

I pointed out in another thread that use doesn't always translate into meaning, but that if we want to learn what it is to mean something, then use is the place to start. I say start because of the complexity behind Wittgenstein's ideas. I think sometimes we can oversimplify his ideas.

This is not a criticism of your point, but only an added observation.

No, I'm not saying you're making a mistake, just trying to make sure there is no misunderstanding. I'm trying to point out things that should be kept in mind.

No, I don't want to start it another way. Why? Because it's clear that this is the case. If you do think of these things in another way, then you will be completely misguided. I'm not offering an opinion about this, i.e., it's well established.

You must not think that when Wittgenstein if referring to objects or names that this corresponds to what we normally think of as objects and names. I would suggest getting clear on this before moving on.

In the preface to the Tractatus Wittgenstein tells us what the aim of the Tractatus is:

"The book deals with the problems of philosophy, and shows, I believe, that the reason why these problems are posed is that the logic of our language is misunderstood. The whole sense of the book might be summed up in the following words: what can be said at all can be said clearly, and what we cannot talk about we must pass over in silence.

"Thus the aim of the book is to draw a limit to thought, or rather--not to thought, but to the expression of thoughts: for in order to be able to draw a limit to thought, we should have to find both sides of the limit thinkable (i.e. we should have to be able to think what cannot be thought).

"It will therefore only be in language that the limit can be drawn, and what lies on the other side of the limit will simply be nonsense (Tractatus, p. 3)."

It's generally regarded that T. 1.0 and 1.1 are conclusions to what follows. Also keep in mind that Wittgenstein is trying to solve the problems of the connection between thought, language, and the world. Wittgenstein believed that there was an a priori order to the world. The world has a fixed structure (Nb p. 62). Wittgenstein moves from the nature of logic, then to language, and finally to the world (Nb, p. 79).

if all interpretations fit what you were saying, the discussion would be over.:smile: — Arne

Very true, and the fact that there is disagreement is very important to working through these ideas, and it's very important to not being bored. :nerd:

It's interesting that the various interpretations of what I'm saying, doesn't quite fit what I'm saying. Fdrake is probably the closest to my view, although there are some subtle differences in terms of his overall picture of language, and other differences I'm sure. Some of it has to do with what parts of language we're emphasizing. I've tried to explain my ideas as clearly as I could, but maybe I've fallen short. That said, I do enjoy the conversation.

You appear to consider the use of the word 'soul' as equivalent to Wittgenstein's 'beetle' because one person doesn't know what the next person has in their box (in either case). Is that a fair description of your position? — Luke

I'm going to try to word this a bit differently to see if it helps to make my position clear.

I am saying that we don't know what's in each other's boxes, but it's more than that, the only access we have to the inner experience, is the outward behavior (pain for e.g.). Other than that there is no access to be had. So again it's not only that we don't have access.

So the boxes equate to our inner experiences, which none of us has access to except that there is an outward cry, as in the case of pain. Note that Wittgenstein says, "But suppose the word "beetle" had a use in these peoples language?--If so it would not be a name of a thing. The thing in the box has no place in the language-game at all; not even as a something." This compares nicely to what I'm trying to say, because the meaning of the word soul that I'm critiquing, is that use that is pointing to the inner thing. Remember this particular incorrect use has a referent, the thing that lives on after we die. I'm saying there is no referent, because it's similar to the beetle example. However, in this incorrect use, they're saying the meaning of the word soul has a referent, but what is it? It's like asking what your beetle is, it may be something, but it may be nothing.

We never should point to the inner thing in terms of meaning or sense. Why? Because there is no outward expression of it. Obviously there are words that have referents, not all, but many words are learned in just this way. But we never should be pointing to something internal to give meaning or sense to a word. This is not to deny the inner thing, but only to say that a word doesn't get its sense in this way (at least in terms of inner experiences). But again, this is exactly what they believe gives meaning or sense to soul. And if it's not the inner referent that they're pointing to, then what is it? Again, even the definition points to the inner thing.

There's not much more I can say, we just disagree.

I think a belief can be justified without anyone actually justifying it. A cat is justified in believing there is a mouse in the mousehole by its sense of smell, it does not require a syllogism as well. — unenlightened

I believe what you're doing is imposing our linguistic understanding onto the cat or dog. The only way we know, for example, that an animal has a belief is because of it's actions. Note, however, this is only done from a linguistic perspective.

Knowledge along with the necessary ingredient of justification is only done with propositions, i.e., in a linguistic setting. Beliefs can take place apart from a linguistic setting, and this is seen by the actions of the one having the belief. So a belief can be pre-linguistic, but knowledge or justification is something that happens after one learns a language. It's necessarily linguistic. I would say the cat believes there is a mouse in the hole because he smelled it, not that the cat is justified. And of course it doesn't require a syllogism, that would be linguistic. These beliefs are simple and basic, there is no need for justification.

Since when does epistemology happen outside of language? I think the most you can say is that the dog has beliefs. Knowledge involves justification, who is the dog justifying his belief to? Himself? This reply is to unenlightened too.

This is different to your earlier claim, where you said that "Christians generally use the word soul incorrectly". Now you are saying that their use of the word is neither correct nor incorrect. Please clarify your position. — Luke

Ya, you miss understood my point. I did say earlier that there is a correct use of the word soul, also that there is an incorrect use of the word soul, the latter being that thing that lives on after we die. However, that's different from the point I was making in that quote. One of the reasons it's incorrect is that there is no way to demonstrate that it's incorrect or not. That's also part of the reason the beetle example is also senseless, because there is no way for us to establish a correct or incorrect use of the word beetle. Think of it in terms of how we learn to use the word pain, we learn based on the rules of use that happen socially, but these rules are rules that have a correction built into them (like mathematics), and it's observable. I can observe if you call someone's joyful acts, painful, that that is incorrect. Let's say that there were no outward signs of pain, would you think it had sense? Would you think it had sense if we attached a definition to it?

Wittgenstein's example has nothing to do with what "we" talk about as a community; it refers to the (mistaken) philosophical assumption that an individual can create sensation terms (or other language) solely via their own sensations. Clearly, the word 'soul' has an established communal usage by more than one person, so it is completely unlike Wittgenstein's beetle. — Luke

Yes, you're right, he's talking about this in reference to a private language. My point is that there would have to be a rule based social component to give it meaning. Also, I'm connecting what Wittgenstein said in these passages, with his ideas in other passages. The problem is that we have to look at Wittgenstein's total picture. I do more of this in my commentary on Wittgenstein. This is why I often argue with the idea that Wittgenstein is giving some absolute picture of meaning as use. His writings are much more nuanced and complicated. Use alone doesn't drive meaning, even if it's done with others. If that's what Wittgenstein is saying, then I just vehemently disagree, but I don't think it's that simple, and I think it involves some of the things I mentioned above.

Note also that Wittgenstein's beetle example involves a group of people, each having their own beetle in a box; so it's not that an individual can't create meaning via their own private sensations, even though that's true, it's that no person or persons can do it. According to your idea, if a group of people started calling pain something quite different than what we normally mean, then it would have sense, even if there were no outward signs of pain. Language always involves rules, but, and here's the important part, those rules necessarily have a social corrective mechanism. Ask yourself, what would it mean to be incorrect in this particular use of the word soul, it's a kind of self-sealing use of the word.

By the way I'm very familiar with those passages. All I do is read Wittgenstein. Of course that doesn't mean I'm always right, but I am very familiar with those passages. In fact, I've just recently gone all the way through the PI.

If your concern is that we, as a community, have no way of determining that “the thing we are referring to is the same thing”, then it sounds a lot like it is just a lack of referent. You appear to be saying that a lack of referent is the reason for why we can’t be sure, or can’t find a way to agree, that we are referring to the same thing. But I thought we had already agreed that sense does not require a referent? — Luke

It depends I guess on what you mean by referent. So I can point to a specific referent when referring to the Earth, or I can talk about many referents when speaking about cars, cups, or trees, depending on context. These things of course have nothing to do with my internal private experiences, at least in the sense that we are talking about. When we observe how these words are used we can clearly see, in most cases, if you're using the word correctly. If you point to a car, and say tree, we would naturally think something was amiss, and rightly so. We learn these kinds of words through ostensive definition.

Similarly when referring to pains, although, I'm not sure if one wants to call a particular pain a referent, but there is something (call it a referent if you prefer) associated with the pain that let's language and the public connect up with the inner experience. The way we learn to use the word pain, is not by pointing to some unknown inner experience, but by observing the public thing that becomes manifest. So the inner experience must have a public side to it in order for us to agree in terms of meaning. We say this because if the inner experience has nothing that can manifest itself publicly, then how are we able to make sense of the thing. That public thing, by the way, must be more than simply writing down what we think is the meaning of the word.

Definitions are more like guides, they're not what give words meaning, use (although this isn't absolute) has more to do with meaning than anything else. They sure didn't have dictionaries thousands of years ago, but they could observe how someone was using a word within the public domain of rule-following.

Now it doesn't follow from this that we can't talk about our inner experiences unless their is a publicly driven something that's available for us to observe. This may sound contradictory when comparing it to what I just said above. However, we must take into account that once we learn a language within a social setting, then it can be reasonably assumed that you know what you're talking about when you refer to an inner experience. The point being that if you have already demonstrated that you know how to use the word pain, anxiety, happy, etc, correctly, then generally you don't need a public referent to express the inner experience. However, learning what the inner experience is, must take place publicly, and within a linguistic environment. So the inner experience is linked to certain behavior expressions.

As you pointed out there are no behaviors or objects associated with other kinds of words, i.e., no referents if you prefer. It therefore follows from this that not all words need a referent, and this is true, so I follow your point. So how do we learn words without referents? There are arbitrary rules of use associated with the marks or writings we do on paper, or when we type, and the rules associated with these various markings can be checked for proper use. We do this with mathematics too. Note that even though these kinds of words need no referent as you say, they still need some way of checking them publicly, and this is important. It's important because any word that has a meaning, must be checked in a way that makes sense of rule-following, which is why a private language is impossible. Rules and rule-following is not a private thing. However, don't confuse this with not being able to use what we've learned privately. Thus, it doesn't follow from what I just said, that I can't do mathematics privately, or that I can't refer to some inner experience privately. It only means that meaning, viz., making sense, first has to be established openly or publicly, before I can do the private thing.

If all of this is true, then it follows that Wittgenstein's beetle example demonstrates that if we talk about something that is totally private, i.e., it not only has no referent, but there is no way for us to establish a rule of use that can be publicly said to be correct or incorrect. This is why it doesn't make sense for me to make a knowledge claim without some way of verifying that one does indeed have knowledge. It would be weird if your high school teacher asked you if you know algebra, and you replied, "Yes," and that was all there was to it. No, we want to observe that you indeed do know algebra, do some algebra problems (publicly).

Now let's move on to the word soul, and here I'm referring to that thing that is said to be in us that lives on after we die. This is the use I'm referring too, not the use that refers to the behavior acts of a body, viz., he has soul, or your expressions are soulful. These two uses have a public domain, and more importantly they have clear cut (in most cases) uses that can be seen publicly to be correct or incorrect.

The use of the word soul that I'm critiquing, is the use that has no outward behavior act associated with it, i.e., it's referring to the thing in the box, the thing we call beetle (the soul). You can't see it, smell it, and there is no outward expression of it, like there is with the learning of the word pain. But you say it's like learning the use of the word the, of, or about, we learn them by applying these words correctly in certain contexts. However, we learn these words in a much different way, and in completely different contexts; learning them requires learning grammatical rules, like learning mathematics has to do with learning particular rules associated with the marks we make on paper. There are clear guidelines to follow, where errors can be ascertained publicly.

I say the word soul as used by many religious people, has no clear cut meaning that can be said to be correct or incorrect. Moreover, they're saying that there is a something attached to the meaning of the word, viz., the thing that lives on after the body dies, so they're saying it has a referent. Furthermore, they're claiming that that is what gives it meaning or sense (even though it doesn't matter if you associate a referent to it or not, the word is still senseless). Isn't this exactly what people are doing when they refer to the beetle in the box, it's the thing in their box that gives meaning (they think) to the word. How do we know what that thing is? Note that even if I apply the same meaning to the beetle in the box (it's the thing that lives on after we die) that they do when referring to soul, this still does nothing to give the word sense, the problem still persists. Let's suppose that people claim to have religious experiences around their beetle, does that give it sense? Even if they create language-games around the beetle, does that give it sense? How do we know that the thing associated with the word, is a thing at all? That would be like me saying I have a pain, and it causes certain feeling inside of me, but if there were not outward observational things for the word to latch onto, how is saying I'm in pain have any sense.

How is the word soul the same as other inner things that have outward expressions? There are no outward expressions of this thing. All there is, is a definition, but that's not enough to give it sense. No more than giving a definition to the beetle would give it sense.

By the way, meaning isn't always use, that's not what Wittgenstein proposed, there is much more to it than that. If that was the case, then any group could arbitrarily change all meaning simply by using a word how they wish. How we use a word is very important, and use tells us much about meaning, but use is not an absolute method of determining meaning, no more than context is. If I use the word car to describe a headache in a particular context, will that drive the meaning of the word car?

Sorry, but I couldn't get to everything you wrote. I was trying to clear up any misunderstandings. I'm not sure this will even do it, probably not. :razz:

Right, so you do agree that 'soul' has sense, but not that 'immortal soul' does. But again, I must disagree with you, because we understand the sense of 'immortal' by its negation of the sense of 'mortal', and to make sense of 'immortal soul' is just to apply that notion of living forever or never dying to what we already understand to be the living soul. Of course, in accordance with my answer to Srap, I acknowledge that we cannot fully understand the sense of 'immortal soul', in its specific application as 'life after death', unless we have experienced it. — Janus

There is no relationship between the use of the word soul as it has been historically used apart from religion, at least some religions, and how Christians use the word soul, they mean two different things. To say that we have a soul that is recognized as bodily movement among other things, doesn't mean that there is an invisible thing that lives forever. There's nothing invisible about the correct use of the word, it's completely visible, and makes sense because it's visible. But this other idea of soul is devoid of sense. As I said before it's like Witt's beetle example.

The last part of your paragraph I dealt with above.

But still you could not fully understand what 'murderous intent' means unless you had experienced it yourself. — Janus

I just don't see this as being true. Do I have to have the exact experience as you in order to understand certain kinds of pain? I've never had my arm hacked off, so does that mean I don't understand something about the meaning of pain? You might respond, yes, unless you've had that experience you really don't understand that kind of pain. But you might say this about any experience, i.e., how would anyone one know what any pain feels like, because none of us have access to another's inner experiences? How could you possibly know what someone else experiences when they get a dental needle in their front gum, even if you have had the experience? This again links meaning or understanding back to the inner experience, which, I believe is incorrect.

There are public expressions of ecstasy or beatitude, which can be associated with the word 'soul' just as public expressions of suffering due to disease, injury or emotional trauma can be associated with the word 'pain'. Of course an individual will not understand the sense of the words unless they have had private experiences of ecstasy or suffering that they can associate with the public expressions of these private states. In other words the lack of sense of 'soul' is merely a lack of sense for you, and you are unjustifiably attributing this lack of sense to others. — Janus

Any bodily expression is an expression of the soul, which really is related to what we've meant by soul historically. If you really want to know the meaning of soul, watch a living body, it's the very expression of a soul. Note though, that this is the same as how we arrive at the meaning of pain, expressions of pain are the thing that demonstrate the inner experience, the same is true of soul, at it's root meaning.

However, what is the expression of soul, or the meaning of soul as Christians use it? I'm not saying that all Christians are always using the word soul in a senseless way, but much of the time they do, especially when referring to some inner thing that has no outward expression. It's that thing that lives on after we die, well, what are the manifestations of this thing? I can tell you what the manifestations of pain are, or I can tell you what the traditional manifestations of soul are? But what in the world are Christians talking about? Saying it's that thing that lives on is senseless, and it's not just senseless to me, it is senseless, unless you can tell me how it's not. I'm listening, or reading.

No. I thought I already explained what makes the use of the word soul different.

Why would you think I'm taking it personally? I just don't see what you're saying as connecting up with much of what was said.

Anti-foundationalism, where do you see that? I'm sorry, but what you saying seems a bit bizarre. Especially since I've constructed a kind of foundationalist view from much of my understanding of Wittgenstein's later philosophy. If anything we might have some agreement here, maybe.

So the goal of communication is to limit misunderstandings by constructing a shared mental frame of constraints. — apokrisis

First, no one said that the goal of communication is to limit misunderstandings, at least I didn't. Much of what you're saying is a complete misunderstanding of what's being said.

no state of understanding ever bottoms out in concrete atomistic definiteness. — apokrisis

Where does anyone even hint at this? Maybe if we were discussing Wittgenstein's Tractatus you could make such a criticism, but no one is suggesting that, especially me.

I'm glad we agree that sense does not require a referent. However, it seems to be the lack of a referent which leads you to assert that the Christian use of the word 'soul' is incorrect. Given a community who share a use of this word in similar ways (you even offered a definition of the word on the previous page yourself), I don't see how it's at all like W's beetle.

I think there's a definite distinction between saying one person is using a word incorrectly and saying an entire community is using a word incorrectly. It seems inappropriate to label the usage 'incorrect' in the latter case. — Luke

Well maybe I wasn't clear in that post. It's not just a lack of a referent, it's lack of any way to be subject to a rule that gives meaning to the word, or any way that we could possibly agree, or not agree, that the thing we are referring to is the same thing. Christians do offer a definition of the thing they are referring too, are you suggesting that because there is a definition that that in itself is enough to give meaning to the word? I don't think so. Suppose the soul was the thing in the box, would saying it was the soul give it sense? We could even imagine saying the beetle is that thing that goes on after I die, the essence of who I am.

We could easily extend Wittgenstein's beetle example into a language-game similar to how Christians use the term soul. We could develop language-games around the use of the word beetle, would that give it sense? We could imagine pulling out our boxes whenever we refer to the word beetle. I think it's exactly like Witt's beetle example. How is it not? I'm open to being wrong, but at the moment I don't see it.

Finally, why would you say that it's inappropriate to say that an entire community is using a word incorrectly? Communities of philosophers and theologians do it all the time. Wittgenstein railed against philosophers for doing this.

Many words have no referent (e.g. 'the', 'of', 'if', 'then' or names of fictional entities) but this doesn't make the use of these terms incorrect. — Luke

Hi Luke, I haven't talked to you in a while.

Those of you who have followed my posts over the years, or have followed my recent posts, I hope know and understand that I agree with Luke's point. However, if we're talking about the beetle analogy for e.g., there is no agreement, not only in terms of having a referent, but there is no way to know what rule to follow in terms of correct usage. So while it's true that many words have no referent, there are objective ways to know how to use words like 'the,' 'of,' 'is,' etc, there are rules of grammar for us to examine, or some other objective feature for us to examine, as in the case of pain. So sense isn't necessarily dependent on a referent.

I'm always willing to listen to good arguments, and new ways of looking at things.

You make it sound like someone is force feeding you, viz., that an argument against your belief is being shoved down your throat. I'm right you're wrong kind of battle, as though it has nothing to do with discovery, but a kind of ego battle.

I like it, sounds good to me.

Give me my argument, that way I can see your interpretation of what I'm saying. Don't just quote me, but spell it out.

What I think Wittgenstein is interested in blocking, as a sort of catastrophic misunderstanding, is taking a word as it used in one language-game, and bringing it into a another language-game where it is expected to play that same role, to have the same usage. — Srap Tasmaner

It's not just catastrophic misunderstandings, but also subtle misunderstandings, so subtle that much of the time they're missed.

Again, I agree.

The part where you're relaying a completely private experience, i.e., your experience is private. Of course if you're doing more than just saying your in pain, for e.g., screaming in pain, then it's completely appropriate.

Every time you post something, I don't see where we disagree. I'm just guessing as to where that disagreement is. I see where there is possible disagreement, but that's about it.

No, the referent in my private use is not what establishes meaning. I thought I made this clear.

it's actually very clear when I refer to 'my feelings' outside of Wittgensteinian ordinary language analysis, you mean how you feel about things. Or, with a philosophical veneer, you mean something which you take as equivalent to your feelings (not identical). So when I say my piles are a 'sharp, throbbing' pain, you have a very good idea of how I feel if you have the prerequisite experiences and are familiar with the words. 'sharp, throbbing' is my formative transposition of the feeling into language, just like these posts are a formative transposition of how I see us philosophically at odds. — fdrake

I don't see how what I've said differs from this quote. Of course you mean how you feel about things. I'm not saying it's senseless to refer to inner experiences. I think you're misinterpreting my analysis. I'm saying it's senseless if there is no social way of latching on to your inner experiences. I thought we were in agreement on this issue.

Maybe this is where the disagreement arises. We both seem to agree that language is social and that meaning is established socially. So let's suppose that after learning what it means to have a pain, i.e., I've learned how to correctly use the word pain in a variety of contexts, I then go on to tell you that I have a pain in my foot; and as I tell you this, I show no outward signs of pain. So your talking about pain in a very subjective way, i.e., I'm relying on what you mean by pain as you express some inner experience. There is nothing in what I'm saying that poses a problem here.

So according to your interpretation of what I claiming, it wouldn't make sense, or have a sense/meaning to make such a statement. However, this is not what I'm claiming. My claim is that we learn the correct use of the word pain socially as we understand the objective physical cries, moans, complaints, etc. All of us learn the use of the word in this way. After we learn the correct use of the word we can reliably associate it with our inner experiences, and since this is true, generally it's also true that when we talk about inner experiences, even though there is no outward signs, I can be reasonably sure that you're using the word correctly. However, the sense of the word is learned by the outward signs.

I tried pointing this out when I talked about having a private language, and doing mathematics privately. It's very similar, i.e., it's true that having a private language is not linguistically possible. However, this doesn't mean that I can't do mathematics privately, once I've learned mathematics. The same is true of words having a sense when talking about private experiences. Once I've learned how to use the words correctly, I can refer to my private experiences even though you may not see any outward signs of my inner goings on.

Note two things about this: First, you've already learned the correct use of the word within a social context; and second, correction is done in a social context. So if you were referring to the pain in your foot, but later I find out that you weren't using the word to refer to pain, but to a feeling of joy, then of course there was no sense to what you were saying. But generally people use such words correctly to refer to their inner experiences, but only after learning how to do it in the social context.

True, but not all uses of words that you think make sense, do make sense.

You may decide that the soul is not immortal. If Plato, for instance, asserts that it is immortal, his usage of the word is correct though you think his assertion is not. — frank

My point is whether the use of the word soul has sense, not whether there is something immortal that goes on after death. Besides even Plato can be wrong, and has been wrong about some ideas, even though I believe he is right up there with the greatest of philosophers.

Ah, I understand 'use' differently from you I think; all the cases of 'pain' I briefly profiled count as 'uses', and none of them are either 'correct' or 'incorrect': they are simply uses simpliciter. One can speak of the 'correct use' of a word of course, but this is not how I understand Wittgenstein's own deployment of the term (in the context of 'meaning is use in a langauge-game'). The contrast-space of 'use' here would simply be 'not a use in a langauge-game, rather than 'incorrect use'. — StreetlightX

One of the purposes of Wittgenstein's language-games is to show how it is that we mean something by our words, and how this comes about, this has been true since the Tractatus. This is important as we traverse this topic.

In his notes on On Certainty Wittgenstein is pointing out, as I understand it, that Moore's use of the word know is senseless, and it follows from this, I believe, that it's incorrect. Now I'm not saying that all senseless uses of words are incorrect, or that all language-games involving senseless words are incorrect uses, but that one of the features of incorrect usage is that the word is senseless. There are certain language-games where it makes perfect sense to talk in a senseless way, maybe to emphasize the senseless nature of a word, or to be funny. However, in some language-games using senseless words simply misleads us, especially in philosophical language-games. It's important to make a distinction between what's nonsensical and what's senseless. Without getting into a discussion of the differences between these words, suffice it to say that nonsensical tends to be a more radical misuse of a word than something senseless. A piece of nonsense tends to be completely devoid of meaning, whereas something senseless can appear to have sense, like the beetle example. The differences between these two words can be a bit vague, but I think you get my drift.

One more thing about correct and incorrect usage, since language is by it's very nature rule-based, it would seem to follow necessarily that one can speak of correct and incorrect uses of words; and of course in terms of Wittgenstein we see this especially true, I believe, in On Certainty. That said, not all language-games lend themselves to this view.

If someone was to compare the language-games of a primitive culture, where their knowledge was based on the movement of the stars, would it be correct to say that their use of the word know was incorrect? Note that in this example, the whole language is based around this notion, so it's not as though we could compare the use of the word know against other language-games within that language. All of the uses of know is this primitive language-game would revolve around understanding the stars and their movements.

Finally, there's more to Wittgenstein's language-games than meaning is just "not a use in a language-game," because the notion of meaning, which is at the core of Wittgenstein's philosophy, has to do with words having a sense. This gets back to my talk above about the word soul having no sense in much of the discourse of Christians. A language-game in itself may or may not have a sense, and that's one of the reasons I make the claim that one is being incorrect in terms of the use of a word or words.

It might be incumbent on you to demonstrate this. But seriously, how do Christians use this word incorrectly, or how is it like Wittgenstein's beetle? It has an established usage among Christians, AFAIK. — Luke

Yes, it's an established use among Christians, but just because something is part of a language-game, that doesn't mean it's correct usage, or more importantly that it has sense. My contention is that it has no sense, however, I'm open to another way of looking at it.

My point is that the way Christians use the word is exactly like the beetle analogy. They refer to this thing that's a soul, but what is it that they're referring too? Let's assume the beetle analogy for a minute. I can say many things about it in the abstraction, it's that part of me that continues after my death, or that it's this or that, but there's no way to confirm it. When I use the word pain there are outward signs that confirm that inner experience or thing, but there is nothing that can be associated with the word soul as used by Christians. Meaning is established as a rule-based agreement amongst people, and along with that, is the idea of being correct or incorrect. How do we know if we're even referring to the same thing?

If you trace the use of the word soul, and the way it's been used historically (outside of religion), it refers to the animation of the living body; and the animation of a body doesn't necessarily mean that there's something that survives the death of the body.

Am I saying there is nothing that survives death, no, I'm just saying that the use of the word soul in the Christian context has no sense.