Wittgenstein vs Socrates on Definitions & Explanations (James Klagge)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 9 มิ.ย. 2021
- Wittgenstein described some of his views as being the opposite of Socrates'. Socrates famously sought essential definitions for concepts such as Truth, Justice, Knowledge, Goodness, Beauty, etc. This search for the definition or essential nature of things (i.e. the necessary and sufficient conditions for a given concept) is the very paradigm of philosophical or conceptual analysis. But according to Wittgenstein, such abstract terms do not have or do not need to have an underlying essence which all the particular instances have in common. We understand the meaning of such terms enough to be able to use them, even if we cannot spell out their precise conditions. Indeed, things of the same kind need not share any underlying universal or common nature, but only a variety of overlapping similarities, which Wittgenstein famously called "family resemblances". In this way, Wittgenstein was something of a nominalist, rejecting essentialism. So too, while Socrates was always looking for deeper explanations, Wittgenstein was quite skeptical of this sort of intellectualism. For although the unexamined life is not worth living, the endlessly examined life is something that isn't even livable. (My Description)
This talk was given by James Klagge at the Wittgenstein Archive at Bergen, University of Bergen, Norway, March 6, 2012. It is a version of an upload from the previous channel.
#philosophy #wittgenstein #socrates #plato
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I can't believe your old channel got deleted. I had been making use of it for several years and your content was absolutely top notch. I hope that even if you lost the uploads, you still have the original files somewhere. Great work and I can't wait for your uploads.
What was it called
what was the name of the old channel?
@@lokeshparihar7672 The name was also Philosophy Overdrive, you can't find it anymore
[33:15] "[...] while the unexamined life may not be worth living, the endlessly examined life on the other hand is not livable!".
Damn.
Your original channel was a gem. Devastating that it got deleted. I am wondering if you still have most if not all of the content from the previous channel. If you do have the content, will you upload all of it?
I was looking for a video on marx's theory of alienation and I think you uploaded it on your previous channel. It was an absolutely brilliant video dissecting the theory and I am wondering if you still have it.
Thank you so much indeed for all your work.
Best of luck and take care ♥️
what was the name of the original channel?
Thanks for this!
I think this is what Taleb calls Wittgenstein's Ruler. Measurement measures the observer not the observed.
This is brilliant.
Great video! What happened with the 1st chanell and all of its videos? :/
Hannah Arendt would suggest that the point of the aporetic Socratic dialogues was to show that Wisdom might be paring back the claims of Knowledge. Arendt's case for the banality of evil seemed to be that a studied doubt was a sign of an active mind, and that an active mind was more important than any one conclusion it could reach.
Other whole domains of philosophy center around statements that Wittgenstein's Tractatus would say should be passed over in silence. Even Plato's Forms, while a type of solution, were just imaginary and smuggled his own views into what was essential as the absolute.
Hi - do you know what the video series is, featuring a woman with black hair (in her 60s?) discussing famous philosophers? I am sure I saw her cover Plato, and maybe also Wittgenstein. The program is clearly from the 1970s. I have looked high and low for it but can’t find it again.
It's called "From Socrates to Sartre". TZ Lavine is the woman. It's on TH-cam.
@@ulyssesquixotewildcat4553 thanks very much. I’m really pleased PO re-uploaded some of them.
I like the definition of Axiom as a sekf evident truth. Thomas Jefferson , "these truths are self evidence"
Yeah, but those don't exist.
@@XboxxxGuy That's why I am glad to be an American. Blessings.
@@XboxxxGuy is that self-evident? If not what's it based upon?
Wittgenstein recognized congenial features in Plato that’s good.
Does anyone know in which Nagel's text is the speaker refering to?
Thomas Nagel, "The Absurd," Journal of Philosophy, 1971 and reprinted in Mortal Questions.
Goddamn this is dope
Accidental Etymologies: GAME "To and fro, not always a go or blow and yet a flow, foil, foul, aiming or intending AS IF 0-summoning one or all - yet none."
It is strange that philosophers never discover why there is no definition of such words as virtue, knowledge etc., even if it is what they are expected to find out. It is the same as knowledge of physics, which is hovering around the knowledge of quantum mechanics or GR, yet physicists never get to the center of the knowledge of physics. The truth seems to be that humans can never find out the essence of divine design. They can just hover around the center.
Did he say Nagal when he meant Wittgenstein or did I miss something?
In my opinion socrates is the highly intellectual and most influential person of all time. Every philosophy is somewhere around socrates idea
I think the Socrates of the Early Plato (aporetic) dialogues ( most likely to be the historical Socrates) was much closer to Wittgenstein than the latter realised. Even the Euthyprho ends in an aporea, notwithstanding that Socrates does (unusually) lean towards an answer. (God wills good because it is good).
The problem is articulated at the beginning of Middle Plato, in the Meno's question: you can't find a definition without knowing what you want to define and vice verse. And the solution here and in the following Phaedo is to find self-evident premises (not too far from Wittgenstein's neo-Pragmatism).
So Wittgenstein realized that noone had really answered Socrates in over 2,000 years, so he just gave in and said, let's start with a simpler question, what is this language stuff in the first place.
about the definition problem: as i read wittgenstein II i think he meant the futility of these definitions because of the ever changing language which kind of makes those definitions useless because of our different mental images (german: 'bild' i hope it translates like that) somebody has from a term. and those mental immages are not the same. you can see the 'bug analogy' he makes at one point.
and because this is not only intersubjectively uncomparable but as well changing over time its usless to 'define terms'. at least i think he means that.
No, that's almost exactly backwards. Wittgenstein makes it clear that mental images and other things in the mind do not determine meaning, and cannot determine it. The whole point that is being made throughout Wittgenstein’s later writings is that meaning is _not_ something private, and cannot be something private. Meaning has to be something public, something which is shareable and accessible to others. That’s why Wittgenstein says at one point that even if God had looked into our minds, He would not have been able to see there what we mean and what we are referring to. Likewise, the point about the beetle in the box is something similar. Whatever is in the box is irrelevant to the meaning. It plays no role in the language.
@@Philosophy_Overdose you know... i bet you are right. seems like you studied him deeper. i only read him once like 10 years ago and in german and in university he was only mentioned in some lectures i visited. it just scratched the surface.
so that would be very lengthy process to dive into it again and dealing with translation issues :) probably i get back to it one day ;)
anyways... i like your channel :)
angina is not a flue! by its definition its disturbed chest pain sometimes previous to a heart attack caused by a disturbed blood flow.
as i grew up about 60 km next to wittgensteins home i assume he uses the wrong slang of angina as a inflammation of the tonsils. thats basically whats an agina in our slang... when its the same 100 years ago :)
just sain'
😊
Generality is the essence of science -- and, indeed of rational thinking. You cannot understand a particular unless you are able to generalize it into a category, a class, a form, or a law that applies to all particulars of that kind. Whereas you can certainly be aware of a particular -- say, Socrates -- your whole understanding of him is in terms of generalities -- man, historical figure, philosopher, Athenian, martyr. You might know some particulars about his life -- say, his actual height or IQ. Still, these particulars would be mere trivialities except in relation to some generality which applied to him -- e.g. he was shorter than most men, or he was smarter than most men. Particular instances have no rational significance on their own ! Rational thinking is relating particulars to generalities -- this is also called understanding. What exactly would Wittgenstein put in place of this ? Does not Wittgenstein himself attempt to make a sweeping generality about the nature of philosophy ?
Show me a concept that lacks an essence, and I will show you a single word (or term) that is being used for different concepts. In other words, for every concept there is one, and only one, concept, and vice-versa.
Agnostic
Here is why the Plato's dialogues are inconclusive: to show how difficult it is to understand things. Which is then a criticism of democracy. Bottom line: for wisdom and true political guidance, you must turn to philosophers, not manipulative sophists. That is, the entire Platonic project is to eviscerate democracy.
Well its not like it isn't a form of mob psychology. It's first contribution to science was the guillotine!
LMAO at defining flu as "presence of virus in the bloodstream" @8:58
presence of a virus that negatively impacts the hosts health more specifically. What's interesting is meaning is subjective to each owns experience but also depends on context and area and whether or not each person agrees to refer to a source of the definition as valid. It's fluid, and relative at the same time with certain references acting like little pins holding it to one point, which is more about whether people more so collectively believe it is a valid source or definition, or agreeable maybe? rather than it being more accurate or something idk
Viruses pass through us every day it's more about whether they harm us or not. Though I guess many viruses aren't flu lol
See what I mean though it depends on ones own knowledge and place in the world, and time and is just a form of measurement that is relative. Some measurements broad, some small it's infinite both ways
I think socrates would win, wouldn't be very tough to wrestle Ludwig down
You can't define a thing if you don't know what that thing is, and you can't know what a thing is if you don't have a definition for it. Defining a thing would require you to know what the thing is before you know what it is.
If we were trying to define love, and i said that violence is love, you can't say that im wrong, because to say that you would need to already know the definition of love, while we're in the process of creating it.
Does an animal need to know the definition of "food" in order not to starve?
@@kvaka009 No, but humans need definitions to do discourse. What's you point?
@@cerwile1 do we need definitions to do discourse? Do we learn language by first learning definitions? My point is that there are different senses of "know". Practical know-how and theoretical knowledge. We can know the meaning of a word practically before we know it theoretically. The former does not require the latter. And it is how we avoid the seeming paradox of knowing something before we know it. The way a child learns color words is by doing stuff with them in an intersubjective language game. This is not unlike how more complex animals learn what is edible and what isn't (bears learning to fish or to look for various berries). Granted human language is much more elaborate, but not because it is built up from definitions. Rather definitions have discourse as their object, and so cannot be its foundation.
@@kvaka009 Practical knowledge can't be the basis of theoretical knowledge or definitions, because we all have our own experiences, opinions and attitudes. If i say that violence is love, you can only answer with your subjective practical knowledge. Its your word against mine. Its the same as a rabbit insisting to a wolf that grass is food.
And then there's the fact that even if we had agreed upon definitions, the subjective ideas still seep in. The word "socialism" simply won't mean the same thing when said by a college student, or someone who experienced the gulag. So when i say that we need definitions to do discourse, what i should say instead is that to do discourse, we need to agree that definitions are kinda bullshit and that the definition alone almost never captures what is actually meant by a word in context.
@@cerwile1 have you tried reading Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations? You really should, if you haven't yet. Practical know how need not be completely subjective, it is inter-subjective, which is what language is. I don't want to try to rehash my approximation to LW argument, and butcher it in the process. He was a genius. And you couldn't do any better than spend the next month or so reading Philosophical Investigations very very carefully. Good luck.
A logician that hasn't read Aristotle, the discoverer of Logic (of which he wrote in the Organon). No wonder the fellow is not known other than in the circle of Vienna...
So reading a bad philosopher makes you a good philosopher?
Theaet. True.
Soc. Then motion is a good, and rest an evil, to the soul as well as to the body?
Theaet. Clearly.
when the inverse of live which is generally thought to be a day time activity of motion
when the reverse of live is live in reverse then rest would be evil live evil the reverse is
the reverse not an interpolation of the reverse the reverse defined
you live or you evil
No conclusion reached other than rest is an evil the reverse of rest is active activity time
gnow that you gknow how to read the instruction book which is designed to be used as an instruction book you can read the last passage and enjoin the other prizoner in your cave and understand who is saying what about what is what and what non sense is other than the
sense isolated and from all possible viewpoints pointed to as itself rather than the self of it which is naming nothing and a nothing name
Theod. True.
Soc. Then let us obtain, not through any third person, but from his own statement and in the fewest words possible, the basis of agreement.
Theod. In what way?
Soc. In this way:-His words are, "What seems to a man, is to him."
Theod. Yes, so he says.
Soc. And are not we, Protagoras, uttering the opinion of man, or rather of all mankind, when we say that every one thinks himself wiser than other men in some things, and their inferior in others? In the hour of danger, when they are in perils of war, or of the sea, or of sickness, do they not look up to their commanders as if they were gods, and expect salvation from them, only because they excel them in knowledge? Is not the world full of men in their several employments, who are looking for teachers and rulers of themselves and of the animals? and there are plenty who think that they are able to teach and able to rule. Now, in all this is implied that ignorance and wisdom exist among them, least in their own opinion.
Theod. Certain
In the hour of danger,
when they are in perils of war, or of the sea, or of sickness,
do they not look up to their commanders as if they were gods,
and expect salvation from them, only because they excel them in knowledge
and expect salvation from them, only because they excel them in knowledge
Is not the world full of men
and there are plenty who think that they are able to teach and able to rule
Is not the world full of men
who are looking for teachers and rulers of themselves and of the animals
Now, in all this is implied that ignorance and wisdom
exist among them, least in their own opinion
where ignorance and wisdom are offset by wisdom and ignorance
in offsetting quantities where each is deficient and thus the seller
of the sale able sells what can be sold for the price which can be
paid the slave labor agreed to by the wage slave able to provide more
than more and less than instructed when the instructor needs to be paid
more for less instructional material than the best laid plans of mice and many
Soc. And are not we, Protagoras, uttering the opinion of man,
or rather of all mankind, when we say that every one thinks
himself wiser
than other men
in some things,
and their inferior
in others
Now, in all this is implied that
ignorance and wisdom exist
among them,
least [which is meant to mean most of all]
in their own opinion.
yes they excel them the lemon juice test the blind leading the blindered
the operative words to determine the ignore ants level of the ignorer
people who are easily bored and antsy can not compute language which is not
fitting into the pre scribed pro gram at the gram level or the pound bevel
in knowledge who fall short in knowledge fail to complete humpty with out which dumpty
has no brother from another mother...the broken sine singing a sob song to the cosine of
broken geometry never describing anything more efficiently than {c/([y-x]+[y-x])}={3.14159etc...} stirred
after shaking the rocks out of the roost revealing the raw of war to the dogs of daylight
read and read the words after ideas have replaced the words re ye read the words again as the words are written
they are written the way they are written in the words in which written they are for reason by reason of reason with reason
to show geometric lineation the space without reason within which reason resides within which without reason can be or as the case has proven itself to be the case in case you were not looking at boxes of boxes bagged up all oveer the plaace
to prove over the 3000 or so years since this 24000 mach per 31.4159 mile glue ball of know it all turned a greek olive into oil
kuffituppddutiffunk.blogspot.com/2022/09/mach-speed-of-sound-is-time-of-wind-3.html
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