After I give @Ludwig V’ a chance to comment on my response to his latest, I’m going to repost all my commentary in one post, as, by renaming the discussion, no one can search the whole thing anymore to find the sections.

@Ludwig V


Thank you for this. My hope is that I have read the words themselves correctly first and then dug deeper and let it give us everything it can before I jumped to any conclusions or think I’ve got it figured it out ahead of all that, but I’ve maybe made it seem there is only one thing to take away when there is a lot everyone else sees and has rightly brought up not because it conflicts but because different parts catch our interest.

@Paine

Put it this way, seeing these errors as logical makes them seem more appropriate for philosophy. — Ludwig V

I’m interested to hear more. The skeptic’s argument at their word appears to fly in the face of common sense, but yet to make sense to philosophy. I would think we all agree that Witt is not just arguing back with common sense (“The table’s right there!”) and I would hope we could agree that he shows that philosophy has been wrongly restricting what counts as “logic”, and that there is a logic to our different ways of judging each thing. So what are we doing with “appropriate”?

Now I will grant that part of what he is saying is that the skeptic is just doing it wrong; that they are thinking poorly in imposing their standards and creating a picture to have those make sense. And there is an admonishment by examples to do better (philosophically) by realizing the validity of the everyday logic of each thing. I’m happy with that here.

I only worry that in characterizing something as “inappropriate” we fall into thinking we have to guard the gate of what we imagine is logical vs, say, “emotional” (that this is a false dichotomy) when part of what he is doing is trying to make us see we are unnecessarily limiting what is able to be rationally and intelligibly discussed. For example, to bring ethical discussion back from the wilderness that the Tractatus imagined (this is not an argument for emotions).

That is, the temptation is not the temptation of pleasure. It's more like the temptation of taking the first offer for you car because you have better things to do than hang about selling it or putting on yesterday's clothes because that's what you have at hand. — Ludwig V

I agree; he’s not talking about some innate propensity or urge. Witt interchangeably uses the word “inclined”, which I see in the sense that we are set up to think of things a certain way, take a certain position in regard to the other. Partly our next step seems reasonable in the framework forced onto a topic by the analogy of the object (but also queer thus needing philosophy to explain). Thus we see the other as impenetrable if we only approach them as an object of knowledge.

There is also a moral component that something we are inclined to do is not necessarily something we have to do and so perhaps should not do, as, when we reach the bedrock of authority, we can still choose to continue to teach, lead again, listen, discuss why, etc., rather than just bring the hammer of convention down.

But this leaves the place of conviction still on the table. I remembered I had come across this before (bellow), which I took up here, and I see it that when you are inclined or tempted, you are not as yet committed. You have the chance to reflect and realize you are being set up or deluded before you act. And an inclination is not a reason, nor a cause, but we are responsible for our convictions.

‘I cannot know what is going on in with [someone writhing in pain with evident cause]’ is above all a picture. It is the convincing expression of a conviction. It does not give the reasons for the conviction. They are not readily accessible. — Witt, PI (p.223)

So the real question is not what are we tempted by, but what are the reasons for our conviction. Why are they not easy to reach? Is that it takes a lot of the kind of work we’ve done here to see the interests we really have? To get past our self-delusions. Are they withheld?

I'll venture that what W is interested in is not how we actually think, but how we should think - logic justifies its conclusions, psychology merely reports them. — Ludwig V

I agree; for me his work is largely ethical in that sense (like an ethic, a form of conducting yourself). How to think better, deeper, closer, more detail, based on the facts, having a case or example, letting things be what they are, etc. And there is a particular logic that “justifies” conclusions; but of course that is not the only version of logic. And sometimes it’s a matter of showing someone examples of other logics that changes their mind.

from the Tractatus to the PI, the distinction between science and whatever he is doing keeps being reestablished. That difference is often depicted as a limit to what can be explained but he seems hell bent to put it in other ways. — Paine

I agree the comparison with science is key. I don’t think the focus is on the distinction so much as that traditional philosophy wishes it had the same kind of outcomes as science, that matched its completeness, generalizability, predictability, consistency, etc. I take this as what he is talking about that our dissatisfaction with our ordinary criteria (p.59) makes us turn a “muddle” into something that would have an “answer” which is how and why the skeptic becomes “puzzled” (p.58). The restricted standard that the skeptic wants (as in the Tractatus) is what “limits” what they consider “rational” so they don’t recognize that although our ordinary criteria allow for us to get into muddles sometimes, there are also valid, intelligible ways to get out of it (just not ensured to ahead of time).

So, we have discussed previously where W looked at how the desire to be mysterious is recognized as a motive. But there is nothing like a move to make that an explanation for why it always happens. The latter would be an example of a reduction through psychology. — Paine

Sure, I don’t think it is an inherent trait or natural propensity, but it is one intelligible, possible reaction to our human condition of being separate. Another would be to imagine the only fault lies in language.

that we often impose one set of meanings to replace others… does not explain why W does not reduce one set of signs into another. — Paine

I’m not sure what the “set of signs” are, that they would be different (irreducible). The things he has us say are the same. “I can’t feel your pain.” etc. He just shows there are multiples senses of such a phrase which apply different (types of) criteria—allowing us to see the demands of the skeptic. He does say we can “construct new notations, in order to break the spell of those which we are accustomed to” but that is just an exercise to highlight the distinctions we make or could make.

One starting place is to ask why W wants to separate psychology from thinking. — Paine

Well, without a further explanation of what “psychology” means, I’ll assume we are talking about the kind of thing the skeptic pictures as a “thought” in us (as an object), or when they imagine thinking as a mechanism in a “queer kind of medium” that would “explain the action of the mind” (p.6). I take the method here is to show how (and why) the skeptic pictures thinking this way by contrasting it with (and perhaps in this way “separating” it from) the logic and reasons of our ordinary ways of judging what is a thought and what is considered thinking (as I mention above). I would conjecture that other reasons for differentiating these two versions of thought would be to show that our ordinary criteria are more varied, substantial, and illuminating than we had considered (been blind to). But I’m interested to hear what you take thinking to consist of, and why psychology would be a part of it (or thought to be), one that needed to be separated, and for what reason.

I resist the idea that thoughts about "the object" come down merely to a psychological motivation. — Paine

Is this to say you think I’ve made a mistake in reading? or that you disagree with him? And, to try to say this again, I’m not arguing this is the only thing to be learned, but I wouldn’t say it is insignificant (“merely”). And I still don’t understand what a “psychological motivation” is meant to distinguish, and differentiate from what. I mean, does pointing out that they are logical errors as well (generalization, forced analogy, abstracting criteria, etc.) make it seem less… personal, individual… ethical? And not to mince words, but I take him to be investigating why we take a particular framework of how we think about objects and impose it on how to think about thought, meaning, and understanding. I just need a little more, or to understand what I’m supposed to justify/explain if that’s the case.

I mean… it’s not gonna hurt (it is a dense 70 pages though). I hope it would help and be easier to scan through the discussion for the posts labeled Section___ that dig into the text of every 3-5 pages, as the above is a summary of those 20 posts, though those are still only what caught my eye. If there is anything of particular interest, I can point to my notes and the section of text.

Yes, but, importantly (though not in disagreement), not a physical process, or a conceptual process structured on the criteria for an object, but the process of the logic of a practice to judge (afterwards): what qualifies as understanding something; how we have a conversation about what is meaningful about what I said; or the difference between what we determine to be thought compared to just the voice inside your head, slogans, being polite, etc.

@Banno @Sam26 @Paine @Ludwig V @Jamal @Manuel @Astrophel @Joshs @Kurt Keefner @Shawn

Wrap it up!

I don't know who all has an interest in this, but below is my recap of my notes on the Blue Book. I encourage those who followed along to post their own takeaways. All these points are discussed in more detail, and the text cited, in my posts above labeled "Section". I may separately address the topic of method.

I offer that the investigation here leads to the question why the skeptic** wants to turn what is important to us (about thought, meaning, and understanding), into an object, to see it through the framework of a thing. Not just like a rock (that we identify, measure, equate, etc.) but in the classic picture that there is a “real” object, and we get from it an “idea”, which we picture as a corresponding “internal” object (appearance, experience, etc.), that he calls “sense data”.
(**I take it Witt sees himself, and each of us, as what I am labelling “the skeptic”--in that asking “why” is not just us versus them. So I will use ”we” interchangeably (though he does makes the distinction of old philosophers and “we” new philosophers). Also, my determination is that getting into why here is left hanging, and is more explicitly taken up in the Philosophical investigations.)

Also the verbs, like “meaning”, are imagined as discrete mechanisms, making a connection every time. In the case of meaning: between language and “our understanding” (as a sense data object ). But philosophy has to account for any disconnect, which gives the mechanism a “queer” sense that seems hidden from us. He says we create a “mysterious” process in order to be able to treat it as a “problem” (p.6) because we have a scientific “preoccupation” with “answers”.

As an aside, there is a key point which allows for asking “why”. He realized that how society ended up with the ways we assess things is not only contingent on our world and our lives (not in “essence” or as “reality”, but in the sense of our history of circumstances and our practices), but he found that each thing has its own different measures, which he calls “criteria”. The epiphany is that criteria are what matters to us (society) about that thing, and so reflect our interests in it. There is the possibility for confusion is the similarity in terms, but the “why” of the skeptic is their interest in having particular criteria (separate from our everyday criteria—thus the reason for showing all the examples for comparison).

The desire for the form of an answer first shows our interest in rules and causality, but he contrasts that by showing how we may or may not follow a rule (at all) and that the timing is that reasons are given afterwards. We mostly say things that have already been said in situations similar enough to ours that it doesn’t need more elaboration or that we have means to clear up afterward when your response makes it clear that you do not understand what I was trying to say.

But we picture a complete solution before we act, and so instead of meaning being variations as yet undetermined, we imagine “our meaning” as an “undefinable” fixed object (in us); as if “our understanding” is present in our saying something. We imagine a specific purpose (e.g., no doubt) with particular criteria for judgment (“objectivity”), that is just communicated without clarity, instead of having various criteria to focus on which reveal what is meaningful to us, that would take a conversation back and forth to work out.

We want “consistency”, and the analogy of an object allows us to simplify across cases and generalize, so, for example, we see each other’s pain and our “sense data” of color needing to be “equal”. Evidence is wrongly gathered or attributed because they meet criteria we want or impose (like an “object” being empirical, certain), so ordinary criteria are overlooked and we become confused and create a mysterious process, situation, in the form of an "answer".

The best juxtaposition I noticed was the difference between “…a thing I am thinking about, not 'that [thing] which I am thinking'.” (P.38) In the first, we are perhaps in a discussion (with ourselves even) considering, remarking on, analyzing, etc. a thing/object. Thinking in the second case is just the description of a thing/object which I have, “my thought”, which I take as a fact (as complete and without any need for context), and an internal object.

He says we interpret a practical, logical limitation as a metaphysical difficulty; such as a physical barrier compared to a logical ”cannot” as "If we did that it would mean we cannot___”, or "When we do that, it's only in a situation where___”, or "We would first need to know___ if we were going to judge whether___”.

For example, we imagine your pain as a “hidden” object, interpreting you as an “insurmountable barrier”. But he says our not knowing another’s pain is not an inability, a “human frailty” (p.54), because knowledge is just not the logic of pain. Pain is not an object I “have” (p.53) like a gold tooth that is just hidden in our closed mouth, like “private” (unique) data (p.55) that we could (scientifically) identify or judge as equal to yours, like comparing two objects, made impossible because we each keep them only to ourselves.

An alternative example of the “experiential” logic (grammar)—taken from human experience, reflected in what we say—is that the “can/cannot” of pain is that it is hidden in the sense it is ours to reveal. Logically, in one usage/sense, we do not point to it (the object), but point it out (to you). For example, we think that “I can’t know your pain” because it buffers us from the fact that it can hurt me to think of you as cold, or that “you can’t know my pain” makes me unique, unknowable, constant.

The motivation for an “answer” is a desire for “reliability, and solidity”. To picture “what I mean” (p.65) as “information” is to need it to be in the framework only of knowledge. Our personal experience is pictured as an internal object to be “the very basis of all that we say with any sense about [being a human]” (p. 48). He also says we are “tempted to say that these personal experiences are the material of which reality consists.” (p. 45) The skeptic really wants to be “inhabited” by the exceptional, in a way that “others can’t see”. Thus the creation of the object, that is a 'mind' or 'subject', is to make me inherently important and unique; as if within me would be “that which really lives”.

Taking the framework by analogy from an object forces its criteria on meaning, thinking, and understanding, but he leaves it that the skeptic is compelled by a state of conviction, like a secret they see that we don’t, like they “had discovered… new elements of the structure of the world”.

But what makes them excited is not being trapped in the analogy, but the possibilities of the criteria for an object, which are generalizable, complete, concrete, verifiable, substantial, etc. They become so compelled because there is nothing in the way of them projecting/imagining what they want: knowledge, an answer, a justification, a foundation, something of which they can be certain.

The use of "philosophy" in this is almost an appeal to a commonly understood matter of fact like the others being used. — Paine

When he asks us to consider the question, the inflection of “Why should what we do here be called ‘philosophy’?” can change either between “I don’t care how you judge what is philosophy; I will do what I want” and “We can make philosophy what we will, so let’s find out what is distinctive, important, and what is the place for what we do here”. We can even simply go with the common understanding.

I do think a concept of self is the concern but deliberately inverted at the same time. — Paine

[Is he] suggesting that the concept of the self is at or near the centre of the network? — Ludwig V

It appears to me, thematically, that every mention of the self is in the same vein as saying there is no object that is the subject. The self is “suitable” under a number of parts of uses in various circumstances. So there does not seem to be much to call ‘the self’ as a fixed thing at all, even as a concept, though there is a sense of the self as conceptual, as in: a (logical) construct, rather than essential. This sense could fit the impermanence of being subject to “circumstances”, along with the reliance on society’s power to “give” or take of its “preservation” as it sees fit, or simply “wishes”. He waives off legitimacy because there is no preset, valid self, so we can be free of conformity (as an heir would not be), to decide what matters (what will be the criteria) for a self, to my self, in the creation and judgment of the self.

Thus, as implied in the last line, I take it that part of what he means is that: what we are going to call “mental” (as what is common among seeing, thinking, and pain) is not modeled after an opposite object from “physical”, in the sense that “I have pain” does not indicate (denote) a pain in a body, it is requesting help; “I have a thought” is not the sign of a referent, but is to get attention for something to add; and “I see a nightingale” does not indicate my point of view, it is to identify the bird.

On the other hand, that's a different question from "Who am I?" Is W trying to persuade us to drop the former question, perhaps in favour of the latter? — Ludwig V

Perhaps, on whose terms will I be judged? Do I have (own) a self?

Why interject the self-reference at all? — Millard J Melnyk

This is our desire that everything be subject to the method and implications of science, which is the basis of its facts. If you follow its method, and I (competently) follow the method, we come to the same answer—it doesn’t matter about the person. We want what we do to not involve the personal (individual) nor the human at all. Knowledge can have this form, but not everything involves knowledge (although still rational, as having intelligible reasons). And “I know” does not only have that sense, as “I know you are in pain” is not to know their pain but to tell you I see your pain. I accept (or reject) you as a person in pain (in response to “I am in pain”).

Most of what we know, we know on authority. Naturally, a good deal then hangs on the warrant for that authority, but it is not a marginal source for our knowledge. Of course, sadly, it is all to easy to misuse authority, once it is conceded, but that doesn't undermine its importance in practice. — Ludwig V

Yes, if a hypothesis were to be judged before being verified, authority (expertise) may put the odds in their favor, but they might not be privy to facts on the ground. But a claim to knowledge can be solely based on authority because it is transferable (in the sense of being aware of the answer). But in deciding what is the right thing to do (say, when we are at a loss), the authority is me, warranted or unwarranted, which does not hang on verification nor justification (it is not a necessity, categorically, but not thus “irrational”, as unintelligible—just a different “logic”). The State has its (supposed) own authority.

Is there a reason why we haven't mentioned Ryle? — Ludwig V

And of course as I am a terrible thinker that can’t imagine other arguments (nod to @Paine), this has blown my mind. The difference between Witt and Austin comes to mind first, in that the farthest that Austin gets in trying to figure out why Ryle is making his argument is logically, and even then he is pitying him either to explain what he believes Ryle is trying to say, or what Ryle wants his argument to do and then why it doesn’t or can’t. Witt alternatively knows that the skeptic is also him (from the Tractatus), but, since he hates that he got sucked into it, he wants to cut himself open and do a living autopsy to figure out how and why.

I do think a look back at “Sense and Sensabilia” (which we read here) would be interesting and helpful. Ryle is purportedly the same as Witt’s skeptic.

@Ludwig V @Paine

The language of the Blue Book pits his view of how "meaning' happens against how others do it. I read that as him seeing himself in an actual conflict over how to understand the world as we experience it. — Paine

I'm going to formally rescind my claim that Witt is not discussing thinking, meaning (understanding, seeing, experiencing, using language, etc.) in and of themselves, because he obviously is, and getting the correct sense of these things is part of what philosophy is about (but sadly where a lot of the conflict comes in). I guess I was only trying to fight the stream of opinion that I have encountered elsewhere that that is primarily what he is doing, or, more of a loss, that that is only what he is doing.

I welcome any discussion of these topics, because his conclusion that these are misunderstood as objects or mechanisms is important and changes the assumptions of philosophy for centuries.

Epistemically, belief and thought are identical. — Millard J Melnyk

Sorry there appears to be so much ancillary concern/interpretation here. I understand where you are coming from. In fact, philosophy is littered with discussion of rational/irrational (or "emotional" as it is sometimes called). There may be some piling on that could be cleared up. Is a more accurate first premise to say: "To the degree that a belief is semantically and epistemically as rational as a thought..."?

It's only that there are at least three senses (versions/options) of “belief”:

One is as you say, interchangeable with a certain sense of thought--though as @Banno points out, there are a few versions of thought as well--but I think we would agree the one you are employing is the same as "I know" to the extent that it is a claim (to be knowledge). This would be the sense that, if you are overly "confident", and it is not "warranted" (it is not true), you will be arrogant (I have no idea what that is like though) or lose credibility (though you may not know it) as @Ludwig V points out.

Another is as a hypothesis, as in a guess. Which may be verified as correct, but does not put me in the same relationship to you—I can guess with no justification because I am not making a claim to you that "I know" anything (true). "Is it raining?" "I believe it is." "Why?" ... and the next thing I say does not have to be verified or verifiable (though that it is raining can). A guess may be silly or crazy, but it is not judged as to whether it is "irrational" because it is not a claim to "truth beyond the limits of its epistemic warrant".

But I believe it is the third version of belief where we get all jumbled together: belief as something I am willing to stand behind (say, on principal), such as “[My belief is that] everyone is created equal” (A moral claim discussed here). Now this is not the same as a justified claim or a verifiable guess but is not without reasons ("irrational"), even if only what I will be responsible for, what I stake or promise my actions to reflect. This is a conviction, which is just not in the same ballpark as what you term "confidence".

Perhaps what we are hoping for is a certain definition of "rational", but I believe the hitch might be that in including the second and excluding the third as being "rational", you thus pile together what is "irrational".

All of that is to say that with a tweak or two to some premises, this is all well and good. Even to the extent, if made explicit, what it is that you feel/think is going on and how that justifies you to “dispense with accepted definitions and categories if they don't fit what's really going on.”

Unfortunately, without those tweaks, the relevance that you draw cannot apply outside a certain bubble, as "cannot" wishes to imply here:

You cannot create captive groups, cliques, cults, companies, “societies”, governments, nations, philosophies, or religions with just “I think”. — Millard J Melnyk

Now we could argue that "I wish you would...", or "You're an idiot to...", but, categorically, you cannot shift between think/belief as a claim or guess, and belief as a thing that creates nations. The leg we stand on is our consent to the social contract (even if implied). We are constituted in and by what we hold to be true--thus why countries don't speak of irrationality, or right or wrong, but treason. Now, if you want to talk political philosophy and about "authority and coercion", that is a timely matter, but, alas for all of us, not epistemological.

he’s diagnosing the impulse to construct “mind-models” as a grammatical temptation. Our very desire to “explain” thought as if it were a causal process is already the problem. Is this your interpretation too? — Joshs

Yes, roughly. I do agree with framing it as a discussion about logic, and thus, yes, grammatical in that sense**, but not to prove the logic of, for example, rule-following, or that the logic of rule-following explains how language is used, and particularly that rule-following takes the place of a "causal process" (foundational/justification). Though I don't take you as necessarily making those points.

I still take all of the discussions as examples primarily for the greater (philosophical) purpose of showing that our practices have entirely different "logic" (internal to them) than the skeptic's, and, most importantly, if we understand how the "why" of those ordinary criteria work--that they reflect our shared interests in our practices--then maybe we can find a way to understand the "why" that the interlocutor/skeptic has.

And I take this "why" as partly being railroaded by the analogy of the object (as a means), but, more to the point, to be them wanting a particular version of logic (generalized, imposed criteria) and that it is their interpreting the matter as an (empirical) "problem" (thus seeing the only response as an "answer") which propels them down their rabbit hole. I take this as similar to your point that "thought" is not something that is to be explained (as a cause), rather than, say, a logical judgment we make about an expression.

**I do think framing it as a "grammatical temptation" runs the risk of implying it only concerns language, thus the mischaracterization as the "linguistic turn", which I take as a confusion of his method of looking at the expressions we (all) say in certain situations as a means to facilitate understanding the logic of our practices, rather than just an explanation of the way language works (thus the misunderstanding of "use") or that it is just a matter that it runs us into trouble (that this is just untwisting the sense of words), although he does a bit of both of those too.

err

You have provided a description of the text as meaning to say X but the singular purpose you assign it is not an argument for it over against any countervailing view. — Paine

Well if I haven’t provided the evidence in the text (or examples) for what I read in it, then I haven’t been doing my job, but I tried to make that my priority (though, as I look back at it, there are a few transposed terms and perspectives from PI). And, as I say, there may be parts of the text that are of separate interest. I actually did even mention other readings that I would either count as too surface—too literal in a sense—(to have it about identifying color or equating pain*) or entire misinterpretations, that would take him to be providing an “answer” to the skeptic’s “problem” (for example, forms of life as justification**).

But I will grant you that I would be a better thinker if I could more easily put myself in the shoes of others, a la Witt himself, or Mill ( though he makes “On Liberty” three times longer than it needs to be fighting windmills). Actually, if Witt were just convincing us of something, it would be 20 pages, but he is trying to investigate to get to the bottom of “why” the skeptic looks at the situation as they do.

With the response here (“it would mean that all the apparent concern with other topics are rhetorical ploys put in place to distract the reader”*), I don’t mean to suppress discussion of color, pain, etc. in themselves, e.g., how feelings (the brain) actually do work. Witt even grants the line of inquiry into the “casual connections” of the brain. “Supposing we tried to construct a mind-model as a result of psychological investigations, a model which, as we should say, would explain the action of the mind…. We may find that such a mind-model would have to be very complicated and intricate in order to explain the observed mental activities….” (p.6)

But he does say that “the method of their solution is that of natural science” and that “this aspect of the mind does not interest us” which is related to one of two aspects of this lecture that I think is the hardest to wrap our heads around. This is just before saying that “For what struck us as being queer about thought and thinking was not at all that it had curious effects which we were not yet able to explain (causally). Our problem, in other words, was not a scientific one; but a muddle felt as a problem.” (Emphasis in original). I will try to address this problematizing in a summary, as it is tied to the projection of an object onto understanding thought, etc.

*And I do think the examples are important in actually showing how thinking, understanding, meaning, experiencing, “seeing”, are logical (not internal) practices, which I do see as more traditional philosophical topics, though, again, he gets into these with more breadth in the PI.

Also, as soon as I started talking about fear and desire (of the skeptic), that seemed to ruffle some feathers. As much as I do think that is relevant and evidenced here, it is more a matter of the PI, so I tried to back off that discussion as that is three steps deeper in this text (past where he ends at “conviction”). I would offer though that the resistance to seeing the skeptic as more than intellectual—that “want” is more than logical here—is to want (desire) reasons to just be of a certain type (only a certain “logic”), and to rule everything else out as “psychological”, which traditionally is termed “belief” or “irrational” (“emotional”), or, as you put it, “personal problems”, as if all of us do not have the skeptic within us. But that could, and it appears should, be an entirely different discussion.

Are you saying that Wittgenstein was not bringing in that reference as an important background to think about generality? — Paine

No, sorry to trivialize that. It does seem important, and interesting.

The introduction of "language games" is not the challenge it seems to be given to his contemporaries but is really just a diagnosis of a particular set of personal problems. — Paine

**I take it that ‘language games’ is just a way of referring to the imagined examples that he creates, but I don’t think they are just “rhetorical” though (there is a point). And, as I say above, ‘forms of life’ is just a way of pointing to our practices—which he more specifically terms ‘concepts’, like pointing, or following rules, etc.—but the reasons being their varied logic, and so about judgment, criteria and our interests in them reflected in our language (though I see this as one of my premature impositions of the PI here). And, yes, it’s just taken up by others as a challenge because they misinterpret it as a proposed solution to (or dissolution of) the skeptic’s problem (re: foundation, justification), which comes from applying the method of science to philosophy (p.6). I would suggest though, again, that the first part is more appropriately a separate topic of a discussion of the PI.

There something a bit odd about the mutual silence between Wittgenstein and the Oxford people. There must have been some sort of communication or awareness. — Ludwig V

Well now we’re just agreeing too much for this to be fun. But to this, I did read that Austin and Wittgenstein bristled at the mention of the other, taking some minor distinction and making it seem like a big deal, which is ironic that apparent ego trumped their mutual, vast ability to imagine the position of another, and a bit sad as Wittgenstein always thought no one would understand him.

I think, however, that the approach that argues that what the sceptic/solipsist/whoever wants to say cannot be said sometimes comes over as denying even the space to state a view. — Ludwig V

True, true. His method is to make the most sense of what they say even if that entails imagining a whole new world to do it.

But I think it is dangerous to take widespread agreement about logical differences for granted - it leads to complacency and dogmatism. — Ludwig V

Ah but allowing for the possibility of, even assuming, the agreement, is to necessarily allow for the outlier cases/possibility of aversion to conforming to society, even in every instance.

Are you referring to Socrates or Wittgenstein? I am familiar with the phrase "man-splaining" but don't know how to hear "man-listening." — Paine

Just that Socrates doesn’t hear anything as important unless it meets his criteria. Obviously a poor joke.

Your map has no place for the arguments against Russel and Frege. — Paine

True, there is more going on than just looking at how the interlocutor (the skeptic) imagines their claims, and thus why they are making them, but I would argue that it is the primary thrust of the investigation, starting here in the Blue Book, but of course we all have different things that catch our eye/interests. As far as Cavell and Austin, I tried to limit it to just cross-over instances of the same method, but I imagine my studies leaked into understanding this text.

@Paine

the study of the logic of our language and the study of how people actually use their language are different practices. — Ludwig V

I get that there is a difference between what Witt is doing and (cognitive) linguistics or the scientific study of our ability to communicate. I take his idea to be that learning language involves learning our shared judgments (lives), so the sense and meaning of language, its logic, is wrapped up in our practices. But yes, there is the confusion of turning this into a scientific/sociological enterprise, which I think comes from what Witt points out is the desire for an “answer”.

There's no problem about that. The meaning of "must" is specified by the context. — Ludwig V

Yes, but the logic of ordinary criteria provides a context-based sense of what is appropriate, etc., where the skeptic’s “must” is dictated beforehand by imposing the criteria of certainty.

Is there anything obviously wrong with the answer [to why the skeptic wants certainty] that we want/need to resolve the cognitive dissonance? — Ludwig V

Well I think there is more to learn from the skeptic in the PI than just a resolution. We know how they do it now in the Blue Book, but the question of why, I would think, calls for further investigation.

@Ludwig V

…what sticks out for me is when Wittgenstein complained that Socrates was being too complacent in his job of midwifery in the Theaetetus. Let's make finding out if an idea is alive harder.... — Paine

First instance of man-listening. I just couldn’t with the off-the-wall examples. I mean I know it’s hard to create a situation that matches the logic of the desire of the skeptic, but another’s pain in my body? And what’s “me” and “A.N.”? I can’t tell if it had to be genius or the guy’s imagination was wack.

On a serious note, I think Witt is coming to conclusions, making judgments, and even casting dispersions all over his work. I think people get confused about Witt not claiming “theories” (bad choice of words on his part), which I believe is because a) he is not responding in “answer” to the skeptic’s problematizing; and b) it just relates to the method, in that “what we mean when we say…” is only relevant if it is something we all accept. If we can’t accept the premise of what the logical difference is between an accident and mistake, we won’t see what Austin is trying to tell us about intentional acts.

And as far as bringing philosophy to a close, I don’t think philosophy is relegated to just responding to radical skepticism. And now we can investigate assumptions and connotations, and we learn what the commitments and ramifications are of what we do, and whether we are messing it up by putting ourselves in the middle of it. Sounds like solid thinking when something comes up we aren’t sure how to deal with—when “right” or “ought” are up for grabs.

@Ludwig V

Is the writing, Must We Mean What We Say, where Cavell introduces the central role of the skeptic in his reading of Wittgenstein? — Paine

“Claim of Reason” really but that’s a tomb. “Availability of the Later Wittgenstein” I think. There’s the example of method and evaluation of the skeptic in “Knowing and Acknowledging”, which offers the “truth of skepticism”. These essays are in the book MWMWWSay.

Is that to say it is a sort of last word for you even if it does not satisfy others? — Paine

Well I’m not sure I could explain better, but I’m willing to add more words, though I also think we would want to tie it into the language of his method here in the Blue Book, as he appears to be developing it as he goes along.

That being said, from PI: “599. In philosophy we do not draw conclusions. "But it must be like this!" is not a philosophical proposition. Philosophy only states what everyone admits.”

But my puzzle is what Wittgenstein means by "our real need"… So, in principle, what he is talking about can be spotted or revealed within our general practices and desires. — Ludwig V

The skeptic has a singular need (for certainty). Witt’s method shows society’s various interests (“desires”) in our “general practices”, thus allowing the question whether our personal needs and desires align with (conform to) society’s (“real” in contrast). If the skeptic’s desperation is for a foundation, are we really simply providing a better “answer”?

I think that Wittgenstein later discussion of "seeing an aspect" (interpretation) as in a puzzle picture — Ludwig V

But seeing the other as a puzzle seems to again want the issue to have an “answer”. But I do agree that seeing an aspect is related but in the sense of an “attitude” (PI, p. 178) or relation to another, rather than an “opinion” as contrasted to the sense of “conviction”, as we are not of the opinion the other has a soul (id), because the logic of it is that we relate to them, we treat them, as if they have a soul (or not). Perhaps the “conviction” in the Blue Book is the skeptic’s “attitude”, as it is used in the PI, not as a feeling towards, but in its sense of taking a position (not as an intellectual stance, believing in it) but our orientation in relation to something, our inclination to act in a certain way, as the skeptic has their inclinations.

Redo

I see three different uses of language games here. — Ludwig V

I take all three instances as used in the sense of the first. The teacher/student examples to work out the logic of our relation to others, not the social process of learning; and the histories are also imagined to point out our relationship to our culture, not as factual. Even the facts he brings up (say, about animals) are not factual “claims”.

I've come to think that there is a point buried in solipsism, just not quite the point they see. — Ludwig V

I take it as the topic under investigation in the PI—why do we/they want this logical purity?

We want to say that there can't be any vagueness in logic. The idea now absorbs us, that the ideal 'must' be found in reality. Meanwhile we do not as yet see how it occurs there, nor do we understand the nature of this "must". We think it must be in reality; for we think we already see it there. — PI, Witt. #101

And, not to discuss it here, but he does mention “conviction” again.

If I see someone writhing in pain with evident cause I do not think: all the same, his feelings are hidden from me…. "I cannot know what is going on in him" is above all a picture. It is the convincing expression of a conviction. It does not give the reasons for the conviction. They are not readily accessible. — Philosophical Investigations, Witt p.223 (my underlined emphasis)

@Ludwig V @Joshs @Paine

If there must be a further explanation that all of us can give examples of what anyone would say when X, and the logic of that, then I’ll leave it to someone else:

There are statements which produce instances of what is said in a language ("We do say . . . but we don't say-"; "We ask whether . . . but we do not ask whether-"). (2) Sometimes these instances are accompanied by explications-statements which make explicit what is implied when we say what statements of the first type instance us as saying ("When we say . . . we imply (suggest, say)-": "We don't say ... unless we mean-")…. Speakers of English… do not, in general, need evidence for what is said in the language; they are the source of such evidence. — Must We Mean What We Say, Cavell p.3

We do not accept a question like "Did you do that voluntarily?" as appropriate about any and every action. If a person asks you whether you dress the way you do voluntarily, you will not understand him to be curious merely about your psychological processes (whether you’re wearing them "proceeds from free choice . . . "); …"He wouldn't say that unless he . . ." then in the described situation we will complete it with something like ". . . unless he thought that my way of dressing is peculiar."… the fact remains that he wouldn't (couldn't) say what he did without implying what he did: he MUST MEAN that my clothes are peculiar. I am less interested now in the "mean" than I am in the "must." (After all, there is bound to be some reason why a number of philosophers are tempted to call a relation logical; "must" is logical.) — Id, p.9

Now of course this MUST does not convince the skeptic (these senses are not conflicting; this is not a fight with “common sense”), but it allows us the philosophical data/facts to compare and shed light on their “MUST” reasons.

what we desire isnt the same thing as this ‘why’ — Joshs

At this point (as it is taken up in the PI) I’m putting a pin in asking the greater ramifications or other reasons why the properties of an object (call it “objectivity”) give the skeptic such conviction—as it were, one step back. I think Witt does not here address the skeptic as explicitly arguing for objectivity, but just examines their (subsequent) claims as a function of the picture created by the analogy, but which does ultimately allow him to speculate on their attitude (position) towards their claims (their “conviction”).

why we desire what we desire cannot be located within the space of reasons, — Joshs

It then would make no sense to trace the genesis of something like a form of life to what we desire and what our reasons are — Joshs

I think Witt would say the criteria we (society) uses to judge within a practice (form of life) reflect our culture’s interests (desires) in that practice; thus why the skeptic’s singular interest in criteria for objectivity appears empty when made to apply to a particular sense and specific case.

But the way we frame the method, it looks very like an empirical/sociological argument. "We say.." "We wouldn't say..." Gellner got very hung up on this. The problem is that you have to buy in to certain ideas, ways of talking and thinking, if you want to have a debate with people - and that can look very like a clique. — Ludwig V

This would require much more explanation; Cavell takes this up better than I could a number of times in the essays in “Must We Mean What We Say”. It is not an empirical claim requiring observation and verification. They are claims about the logic (what it means) that “we” all can make as masters of our practices which he takes as reflected in the things anyone might say in doing them. This process in itself isn’t anything esoteric, but I understand seeing them as evidence in a debate about the implications and how that is philosophically relevant, would require some further explanation, agreement.

Agreed; he is not throwing in the towel. All I wanted to point out is that he is showing another option to compare to the skeptic’s, rather than engaging them within their framework.

@Ludwig V @Joshs @Paine

Section 20 - Finale! (p. 70-74)

Philosophers say it as a philosophical opinion or conviction that there are sense data. — (P.70)

This mention of “opinion” brings us back to where “The solipsist… is not stating an opinion; and that's why he is so sure of what he says.” (p.60) I take “opinion” here as what is thought of as a lesser version of knowledge; as “merely subjective, a matter of taste.” (p.48), as if it were unjustified, or isolated to just me.

But the solipsist “is so sure of what he says” that you can bring all the knowledge you have to bear, and tell them their position has no rationality, but they are “not stating an opinion”; they “say it as a…conviction”(p.60). But this is not as in a firmly held belief, i.e., that wants to be knowledge, but doesn’t quite meet the grade based on justification. It is in the sense of saying something with conviction. The solipsist is “so sure” about what they are saying because they have already been convinced, not of something (an opinion) that they are trying to justify to you, but by something, so they don’t care what you say.

Witt says they believe in something as possible but not here. I take the mirage to be created by the projection of the “mental” as imagined objects (by analogy), and I’ll grant to @Joshs that they are “gripped” by the picture, and are “inclined” (“tempted”) to say certain things as natural given their position once they have intellectually fortified it. But there is a why we have been chasing and I take it as the reason for picking (gravitating to) objects as the analogy.

Their conviction comes by a secret they see that we don’t, like they “had discovered… new elements of the structure of the world”. But what makes them excited are the possibilities of an object, which are generalizable, complete, concrete, verifiable, substantial, etc. They become so compelled because there is nothing in the way of them projecting/imagining what they want: knowledge; an answer, a justification, a foundation, something of which they can be certain. Any more beyond that I will let go as it is taken up in the PI, but listen to Descartes set his mind:

It is now some years since I detected how many were the false beliefs that I had from my earliest youth admitted as true, and how doubtful was everything I had since constructed on this basis; and from that time I was convinced that I must once for all seriously undertake to rid myself of all the opinions which I had formerly accepted, and commence to build anew from the foundation, if I wanted to establish any firm and permanent structure in the sciences. — Descartes, 1st Med., p.1

Thank you to @Ludwig V for hanging in there throughout this reading, and to all the others for your input. I hope to review, summarize, and draw lessons from all we have worked on separately.

Great quote; boring ol’ Kant can zing ya. "This method… to investigate whether the object of the dispute is not perhaps a mere mirage at which each would snatch in vain without being able to gain anything even if he met with no resistance"

And I think we could say that Witt is investigating skepticism's "object" as a mirage, and finds himself met with no resistance, at least nothing to push against, but it is an open question here whether and what there has been to gain. I would offer the contrasting logic of other senses has provided a way to step out of the ring and see the how and perhaps why of their framework. Obviously Kant’s skeptic, and Montaigne’s, and Hume’s at times, are a necessary part of reflecting on and examining the unspoken, assumed, implicit parts of our thinking and acts.

@Paine

I find myself thinking that examples are not fully described and so the proposed response is not entirely determinate in view of the unspecified circumstances. — Ludwig V

This is absolutely how it should be, and Witt does say that we can always layer on more complexity, and he himself regularly adds on or changes a situation or facts (tries on hats) to consider what it is about the context that matters (what criteria), and what is affected (or not) by the judgments that are made. But, of course, no situation is "fully" described, but it can be fun to play around with because we may be surprised what we learn, as I think you are doing in thinking beyond the sense of "They are in pain" as describing them (as Witt is using it), to the fact that we can feel another's pain (in our body Witt says), as "They are in (some serious) pain", in the sense of a recognition. I would say this is some of the (even if peripheral) benefit of Witt's method; Cavell talks about it as becoming aware of our commitments I think.

The most prevalent confusion I see is not seeing that this is a philosophical method, not an empirical/sociological argument. Now of course we do need to agree on the logic, i.e., the implications of what we say in this particular situation (as a judgment from the criteria that apply here), thus we could and should say things like: "We wouldn't say that", or "If we said that it wouldn't mean we'd have to...", or, as you mention as to context, "When we say that, it's only in a situation where...", or "We would first need to know... if we were going to say (judge whether)..."

But that is just the start, with the end being to see a further, philosophical, point (there is a reason for the example). It's not about how we follow rules, but the import of the example (basically: does the logic of this sense show us anything interesting). Other examples (different contexts) might be important to take into consideration. But sometimes we get stuck on the starting line, worrying over a tree and never getting to the forest (and Austin frankly seems to assume we'll understand when we get there).

One mistake I've seen is that two people are thinking of two different senses/usages, such as the different senses of "seeing", so we are basically talking apples and oranges. We are not fighting with the skeptic about a practice, because we are trying to differentiate two senses of a practice, not bring in every possible criteria (thus every context) from every sense--such as: being aware of, focusing on, identifying, assessing--as if to make one judgment about "what I see" (or how I make a mistake). This brings back the question of how we get any traction with the skeptic.

I think, along with most people, that he does expect his readers to draw certain conclusions. — Ludwig V

I think in answering that question with your thought: if the skeptic is (and we are) to draw a (any) conclusion, they are only going to do it by themselves, see it for themselves.

Bbbb

@Ludwig V

W does not say it is the only sense possible — Paine

Agreed; getting fixated on the topic of the example is a big problem, and of course at a certain point it gets to be a matter of what implications are of interest/focus, but I would hope I am not misreading the logical necessities of these "uses" of I. I found most interesting the difference between the logic of the self as object and subject, which I found echoed in the literal grammar.

The solipsist could be me, after all, — Paine

I think the idea is that we play each of these roles at different times; that it isn't a matter of knowledge as information. But then the question is of course, when do we play the skeptic? and, then, why?

thhhttht

@Paine @Ludwig V thanks for making it seem possible.

But how could that change [a new notation of ‘Only I really see’] be justified? — Ludwig V

I take him to be saying that we could agree to symbolically hold an “exceptional place” (p.66) for the solipsist, but also the antithesis, that they could be justified to be noted as exceptional, if judged so or known to be by us. But the solipsist really wants to be “inhabited” by the exceptional, in a way that “others can’t see”. Thus the creation of the object, that is a 'mind' or 'subject', is to make me inherently important and unique; as if within me would be “that which really lives”. I take Witt as ultimately claiming that there is nothing inherent in humans that makes us exceptional (from each other), unless we, say, make ourselves exceptional. Your basic human experience is not something you know that no one else can. If you do not live a life, you are not really alive; it is not a given.

He is also claiming there is no 'I' in my body. 'Mind' and 'subject' are not in the same framework but opposite of physical; they are logical. Logically I (or you) can identify and individuate my particular body from yours (others), which is the ‘object’ version. But in the subject usage, “To say, ‘I have pain’ is no more a statement about a particular person than moaning is.” (p.67) The statement does not “point to anything” (as the “object” sense does); the ‘subject’ version does not refer to a 'me', as if an object in me, say internally. What I am doing is not knowing my pain (which is not innately unique), not pointing to ‘me’, but, logically, pointing me out, in the sense of ‘Hey! It's me, I have [am in] pain’ (thus modeled “on the demonstrative”(p.68)—‘This person is the one in pain’.) It is not as if I “might as well only have raised [my] hand.” (emphasis added) In this case (and sense), that is exactly it. What I am doing in saying “I have pain” is (logically) trying to “attract attention”, get someone to respond to me. The error that is possible is not identifying someone else, rather than me, it’s that no one may recognize me as a person in pain. “I feel pain” is not a descriptor of “my pain”; this usage (logically) is meaningful because it is a cry (a moan) for help.

The point of all this I think is that we impose the logic of the object version, which identifies a particular body from others (‘Them; no, that one’) onto the subject version, which is not to identify a “bodiless” object. My feeling is not particular (as my body is among a crowd). I am not a “subject”, existing in and of myself alone, as object or cause, but in the sense: "about which something is stated" (Webster’s 4, grammatically). I put myself out there as the one who has (as in "is") feeling; to, in a sense, identify my self, announce myself as something. It is me that is asserting that I am: the one that sees and hears something of the world, tries to do an act, thinks what I say. I am standing up and differentiating myself, not by ownership of an object, but in the sense: 'It is I! the one who is owning (up to) what I am' (this is the sense of ‘have’).

Of course this sense of “subject” logically means that something can be judged (stated) about me by others. I am “subject to” scrutiny, description, accusation, etc., which is perhaps what the solipsist is trying to avoid, or at least is avoiding, in claiming or picturing the self as an object which would thus be unknowable. Thus the claim: “ 'But surely the word ‘I’ in ‘I have pains’ serves to distinguish me from other people...' " That your pain is not special also makes your feeling pain universal.