Comments

  • Phenomenalism
    Yes. — Michael

    So the true factual literature "my dog has fleas" isn't about an actual dog?

    Or is it that actual things are the same kind of things as made-up things?
  • Phenomenalism
    the kind of thing that we hear in the case of a veridical perception is the same kind of thing that we hear in the case of an hallucinatory perception (e.g. the schizophrenic who hears voices). — Michael

    And, I suppose: the kind of thing that we read about in true factual literature is the same kind of thing that we read about in fiction?
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    Entities are patterns of properties. — Harry Hindu

    At a stretch. Ok. If mental entities include linguistic conventions, then no one counseled dispensing with them.
  • Is there an external material world ?
    we renounce dualism (Dennett, 1991). We
    put in its place a dual aspect monism     — Hobson and Friston's Choice
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    ...a mental entity — Harry Hindu

    Not an entity, that's the thing. A linguistic regularity. A pattern.
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    For instance, how do we non-korean-speaking people know that Korean is a language? It just looks like scribbles and strange sounds being made by some people to us. How can you explain the difference in how different people interpret different scribbles and utterances if not by referring to mental entities? — Harry Hindu

    Convention?
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    The Eiffel tower is in Paris, is 330m in height and is made of wrought iron. I can replace "I saw the 330m tall wrought-iron structure in Paris" by "I saw the Eiffel Tower". Is this what Wittgenstein is referring to ? — RussellA

    The structure facts, definitely. The top being 330m from the bottom. The iron molecules being roughly 40 times as numerous as the carbon, thank you Wikipedia. These are like the spatial arrangement of the "tables, chairs and books" (3.1431) or of the "a" and the "b" in "aRb" (3.1432).

    The tower's being in Paris: not sure, good question. Or two questions: if its being in Paris is its relation to a different structure (Paris), then may a proposition analogously derive its sense (it's potential interpretation as a diagram) from its relations to other propositions? I'm guessing no, because atomism. Or, if its being in Paris is a unary relation, i.e. a property, then how might an isomorphism (between this tower fact and some other fact) obtain? (Does W somewhere discuss the redness of the rose in something like this respect?)

    The definite description aspect, I doubt the relevance. Or rather, I've no idea.




    An aesthetic is a unity between its parts, rather than just being an aggregation of parts loosely related. — RussellA

    Ok, but then, still curious that you would downplay the very relations, tight as you like, by which unity of your required sort is achieved.




    but did he say that music uses propositions, that propositions are used in music as well as language ? — RussellA

    The gramophone record, the musical idea, the written notes, and the sound-waves, all stand to one another in the same internal relation of depicting that holds between language and the world. — 4.014
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    If we dispense with mental entities then what is left? — Harry Hindu

    Language, art, music, etc.

    https://monoskop.org/images/1/1b/Goodman_Nelson_Languages_of_Art.pdf
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    In great music, as with great painting, the notes, or brush marks, combine into a single aesthetic experience, — RussellA

    That depends on how you look at it, as W points out in the case of sentence tokens:

    For in a printed proposition, for example, no essential difference is apparent between a propositional sign and a word.
    (That is what made it possible for Frege to call a
    proposition a composite name.)     — 3.143

    Curious that you want to downplay the relational/factual/structural aspect of the artwork and stress the whole, er, feeling, while W is keen to use musical and pictorial structure to explain propositional structure.
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    ↪Tate


    Never mind then. Back to words and music.
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    (that's the overall message of the TLP, anyway). — Tate

    What is?
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    ↪Harry Hindu


    That's the kind of reason I (and I claimed also W) counseled dispensing with mental entities.

    I was going along with it (entities included) out of interest, while I thought I could follow. Awareness too, and I'm out of here.
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    So yes, as far as I know. — RussellA

    Well I did specify:

    (For you?) — bongo fury

    So, yes.

    Good. I didn't misunderstand.

    But that line of thinking was leading me to expect,

    the individual notes and combinations of notes in music express feelings not [while combinations of notes express] thoughts. — RussellA
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    ↪RussellA


    So, yes?
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    Feelings are different to thoughts. Feelings are not propositional, thoughts are propositional. — RussellA

    Are feelings to thoughts as words are to propositions (and things are to facts)?

    (For you?)

    Just trying to square this with,

    the individual notes and combinations of notes in music express feelings not thoughts. — RussellA
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    There would be no public language if there were no private thoughts. — RussellA

    Interesting theory.
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    But as Wittgenstein is identifying thought as proposition, in talking about propositions, he is also talking about thoughts. — RussellA

    Loosely (indirectly, residually) of course, but he (like the grade school teacher) isn't heading towards your kind of diagram, in which thoughts or any other mental units combine or map as discrete units (in the manner of word or picture tokens). Is my point.

    He's getting out of the head, into the language.
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    ↪RussellA


    My comment was very broad brush, so I wouldn't be surprised to have chapter and verse thrown against it. But the only line there that I can see addressing my comment is

    4 The thought is the significant proposition — RussellA

    But I'm suggesting that, like the grade school teacher, W wants to talk in technical terms (worthy of a diagram) about the propositions and their reference, not so much about thoughts as such: as items in their own right.
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    "...the actual colour that I experience in my mind, which could be green for me and yellow for you" is incoherent. — Banno

    How do you mean incoherent? Because of a homunculean regress? Or because inescapably private? Or somehow else?

    Or is "incoherent" not the criticism? "Fantastical", maybe?



    It might be helpful at this point to again look at one of the great themes, perhaps the main theme, running through all Wittgenstein's work. It's the distinction between what can be said and what can be shown. The notion permeates his work. — Banno

    But does it distinguish, simply, between literal, declarative statements and other kinds of symbol use (words, music or pictures), as it does for Goodman?

    Or does it, for W or you, have to do with the isomorphism business? (I often wonder.)



    In the Tractatus, a name is the thing it denotes. — Banno

    Is this a typo? If not, then oh dear.
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    One respect in which I think it fair to say that the Tractatus anticipates the PI is in arguing in terms of "thought" in such a way as to facilitate behaviourism, as opposed to the kind of psychology indulged here -
    ↪RussellA


    W's use of "thought" reminds me of how teachers in the UK tell 3rd-graders to recognise a complete sentence: as one that expresses "a complete thought". I.e. what it reminds me of is how to use but immediately get past the psychology, and to work with language and logic instead.

    Like the teacher, he probably didn't mean "thoughts" to refer to identifiable brain events that correspond or fail to correspond to propositions. It was more a matter of putting the reference of symbols in the perfectly realistic context of our deliberate efforts to make sense of them.




    The proposition "Rembrandt is a painter" is a description of Rembrandt as a painter. By seeing a picture of a Rembrandt painting, which is isomorphic with the person Rembrandt, we gain an acquaintance with Rembrandt. — RussellA

    Does W say "acquaintance"? Or is this you critiquing him?

    And do you not think that W claims that the proposition "Rembrandt is a painter" is isomorphic to the fact of Rembrandt being a painter?
  • Is there an external material world ?
    No, classifying is descriptive. It's part of the language game. — Marchesk

    So is seeing-as. It's reaching for suitable words and pictures.

    Part of the confusion over the hard problem is failing to understand the difference between describing the world and experiencing it. — Marchesk

    Well put. The difference is artificial, like the problem.
  • Is there an external material world ?
    What does it mean to see differently other than to see different things? — Michael

    It means to classify the same things differently.

    To see different things is to carve it all differently.
  • Is there an external material world ?
    Because it seems to me that when we say that one person sees something as red and another as blue that the words "red" and "blue" are referring to the particular qualities of their individual experiences. That's colour as everyone ordinarily understands it. — Michael

    How isn't it a Cartesian theatre understanding?
  • Is there an external material world ?
    I saw this image recently: — Michael

    In a Cartesian theatre?
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    ↪Fooloso4

    I wish... I had a pair of bongos.


    As I understand it, as they are used here those symbols denote any two elemental objects. — Fooloso4

    Any two, or any two that are related in the fashion specified (by "R")?
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    Single quote marks are also sometimes used in academic writing, though this isn’t considered a rule. — Fooloso4

    Sure, but also they can be 'scare' quotes:

    Specialist terms that are unique to a subject are often enclosed in single quotation marks in both U.S. and British English. — Fooloso4

    So in a thread about distinguishing word from object, requests for clarification might be expected.

    Square brackets [ ] should be used. — Fooloso4

    Haha, fair do's.

    There are no "sign objects" — Fooloso4

    But there are sign-objects by other names, e.g. "the picture's elements", "a propositional sign [...] composed of spatial objects", "elements of the propositional sign", "simple signs", etc.

    'a' and 'b' are variables. — Fooloso4

    I expect this could be a right reading. But I'd like to know whether this means, for you or for W, that

    "a" and "b" are two particular symbols with no fixed denotation?

    Or something else?     — bongo fury
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    He used the term 'name' in a way that is different from the way we ordinarily use it. — Fooloso4

    Ok. And you prefer single inverted commas, but the reader infers, from your use of the word "term", that you use these single marks as quote marks. We aren't sure why you decline to clarify with doubles, when invited, but never mind.

    Names referred to the simple or elementary objects. — Fooloso4

    If you mean, names were for W those symbols that referred to simple or elementary objects, that doesn't sound any different to ordinary usage of "name" in logic.

    What they are, he never said. — Fooloso4

    Also standard. Interesting, of course, if W is keen to be asked the further question.

    The relation between these objects is not another object and so a relation is not a name. — Fooloso4

    Do you mean,

    The relation between these objects is not another object and so a relation cannot be named (referred to by a name). — Fooloso4

    ? Or,

    The relation between these sign-objects is not another sign-object and so such a relation cannot be a name? — Fooloso4

    ? Or both?

    'a' and 'b' are not names either but refer to any simple object. — Fooloso4

    Do you mean,

    "a" and "b" are not names either but refer to — Fooloso4

    ... any two particular names, according to context?

    Or do you mean, "a" and "b" are two particular symbols with no fixed denotation?

    Or something else?
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    'R' is not the name of the relation between 'a' and 'b'. What that relation is is determined by 'a' and 'b'. — Fooloso4

    Do you (agreeing with W) mean,

    "R" is not the name of the relation between a and b. — Fooloso4

    ?

    And then do you (agreeing with W) mean,

    What that relation is is pictured by the relation between "a" and "b". — Fooloso4

    ? Although that doesn't fit with the following sentence, so do you (agreeing with W if you say so, not sure I follow) mean,

    What that relation (between a and b) is is determined by a and b. Simple objects contain within themselves the possibilities of their combinations. — Fooloso4

    ?
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    an abstract counterpart to the whole truth-bearer. Not just a dog that has fleas, but an abstract referent of "that the dog has fleas". Not just a thing, but a fact. — bongo fury

    W's picture theory of meaning is that a particular one of the facts or structural features of a truth-bearer is isomorphic to (is a diagram of) its truth-making counterpart.

    This means that the truth-bearer is of interest as, or as the location of, a fact, not just as a thing. E.g. as the fact that its "a" character is in a certain spatial relation on the page to a "b" character. (3.1432.) Not just as the individual thing, the written or printed sentence token, in which that fact occurs.

    (Or, in this case, the relevant syntactic fact might be a certain spatial relation between the "dog" and "fleas" tokens.)

    The subtlety of the distinction leads W to declare, with some emphasis,

    3.14 The propositional sign is a fact.

    Notice though that this is very far from equating a truth-bearing proposition (or even the propositional sign the fact of whose structure is crucial for the picturing relationship) with the truth-making fact that it thus pictures.
    ...
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    I don't see a point to what you said more than:

    That the dog has fleas is a fact.
    "The dog has fleas" is a sentence.
    That "The dog has fleas" is true is a fact.
    "'The dog has fleas' is true" is a sentence.
    That "'The dog has fleas' is true" is true is a fact.
    ""'The dog has fleas' is true" is true" is a sentence...

    ...and so on.     — Banno

    The point is that, in the terminology of the text in question,

    That the dog has fleas is a fact and not a sentence.
    "The dog has fleas" is a sentence and not a fact.
    That "The dog has fleas" is true is a fact and not a sentence.
    "'The dog has fleas' is true" is a sentence and not a fact.
    That "'The dog has fleas' is true" is true is a fact and not a sentence.
    ""'The dog has fleas' is true" is true" is a sentence...

    Hence (but not otherwise),

    no contradiction so far in the text. — bongo fury



    Objects need not be (material) things. The exact use of "name" and "object" is contentious. — Banno

    Sure, but irrelevant thus far, for W in the text in question:

    objects (entities, things) — W



    And so a true proposition is a fact
    — Banno

    True propositions mirror or picture facts, they are not facts in themselves. This is explained in W. picture theory of meaning.     — Sam26
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    ↪Janus
    :ok:
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    "Fact" is used variously to refer to true propositions and states of affairs. — Janus

    In everyday usage, sure. But W seems clear enough here that he means "combinations of things". As opposed to individual things, and as opposed to any sentences or pictures describing or depicting them. Truth-makers not truth-bearers.
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    So facts are not true propositions? — Banno

    In the text in question, indeed not. They are what true propositions picture.

    That "the dog has fleas" is true, is not a fact? — Banno

    The situation you there picture may be a fact. (For W in the text in question.) But the picture itself - the sentence - i.e. " 'the dog has fleas' is true" is merely a proposition. Just as is "the dog has fleas". (For W in the text in question.)
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    for Wittgenstein the objects and their associated properties form a thought, and hence a picture; fact — Banno
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    The facts are those propositions which — Banno

    No, not in the text in question.

    whether a proposition is true or false depends on whether it correctly pictures a fact. — Sam26

    Yes.
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    When we agree on new uses for a term we are essentially creating a new context with which we use the term. — Harry Hindu

    Sure. Cherry-picking cases of past usage that help to sell our new theory.

    Weren't Newton & co. rather cheekily re-purposing psychological words like force ("courage, fortitude"), inertia ("unskillfulness, ignorance"), moment ("importance")? — bongo fury
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    So that the fact "a is f" is written f(a). — Banno

    Perhaps you mean,

    So that the fact that a is f is written "f(a)". — Banno



    , if "my dog has fleas" obtains in the world, then my dog has fleas is a fact. — RussellA

    Perhaps you mean,

    , if it happens in the world that my dog has fleas, then "my dog has fleas" is a fact. — RussellA

    (in the sense of true sentence).

    Or perhaps you mean,

    , if "my dog has fleas" is a true sentence, then it happens in the world that my dog has fleas. — RussellA

    I don't claim you won't find plenty of similar mishandling of quotation marks in my posts. But the topic here is whether we need to care.
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    Does “fact” refer to the true proposition, the true sentence, which states that my dog has fleas? Yes. — Banno

    In a lot of usage, sure.

    But W seems clear enough here, in the text in question, that he would say no, he means "combinations of things". Their manners of combination, if you like. The ways they are, and inter-relate.

    As opposed to individual things, such as flea-ridden dogs, and true sentences. And as opposed to any sentences or pictures truly describing or depicting the things, which are of course themselves individual things. Such as, "my dog has fleas" (a sentence thing happening to describe a flea-ridden dog thing) or " 'my dog has fleas' is true" (a sentence thing happening to describe a true sentence thing). These are all things, not facts, according to the text in question.

    If not these, then what? What are facts in the Tractatus? Well, specifically: they are what people tend to mean by "truth-maker" when they oppose that term to "truth-bearer". They tend to think there must be an abstract thing corresponding to the whole true sentence (truth-bearer) just as there is (typically) an individual thing named by a noun in the sentence. It's my impression, anyway, that this is what those people tend to mean, and that they follow Russell and early W in conceiving of an abstract counterpart to the whole truth-bearer. Not just a dog that has fleas, but an abstract referent of "that the dog has fleas". Not just a thing, but a fact.

    Of course, plenty of philosophers of language, later W included, would rather do without the abstract counterpart. But the text in question is clearly doing with.
  • A Newbie Questions about Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
    There seems to be an equivocation on the word “fact.” — Art48

    In everyday usage, sure. But W seems clear enough here that he means "combinations of things". As opposed to individual things, and as opposed to any sentences or pictures describing or depicting them. Truth-makers not truth-bearers.

    which contradicts 1.1. — Art48

    Only if you can't resist applying "fact" either to truth-bearers or to individual things. But no contradiction so far in the text.

    Cool thread :clap:
  • Fitch's "paradox" of knowability
    According to the knowability principle, a statement is true if it can be known to be true, — Michael

    Is "if" in the wrong place, or does it just need an "only"?
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