Great Minds - Part 5 - The Latter Wittgenstein: The Philosophy of Language
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 22 พ.ค. 2024
- You can find Philosophical Investigations here amzn.to/3w3KkSh
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Dr. Michael Sugrue earned his BA at the University of Chicago and PhD at Columbia University.
No needless props, no whizzing slides, no flashy TED pretentiousness - just the pure distillation of knowledge.
haha, he is a master though - there is no way I could teach my undergrad class (anatomy, physiology and pathophysiology) without slides and it's definitely easier for students if they have a diagram of organs etc. I wouldn't even try his method - he truly is a class unto himself. I am in awe of his ability and love watching his orations.
In my experience at least this method of teaching is discouraged, the lecturer would be hauled in and asked why his student feedback described his style as 'boring' 😁😕
As an educator, I teach students according their learning abilities. This method works with some top students; with some mediocre ones, visual aids are quite necessary.
Another method that helps kids learn is hitting them.
Very few TED talks are "flashy." Most are simple talks that attempt to distill complex subjects in an understandable way. I love these lectures, but there's no need to insult one format to prop up the other. To each their own.
The other day just by pure coincidence, I happen to find Professor Sugrue's lectures. What a treasure! There are no words describe how immensely emotional I get when I hear this man speak. I learn so much and realize the extend of my ignorance. I give thanks to God in giving me the honor and opportunity to listen to him.
19.11 This seems similar to the concept of archetypes, or the innate thing that manifests as degrees of perfection depending on the quality and activity of the mind observing it.
Now, I very well may be insane, but if we have an innate sense of something, anything really, does that not mean that we have it in us, and that unconscious sense of it, is what guides our direction, a little like a magnet offering subtle residences and rewards? If so it's more like a voice calling inward no?
I think of it as harmony and dissonance these days. Both are nice in moderation but the real moment of awe is that moment in any piece where they annihilate each other perfectly and collapse while still singing.
That's what most people describe as a moment of beauty or intense emotion or spiritual experience. It's just being still in the face of all, staying in that perfect sacred silence and let yourself be overcome with the sheer awe inspiring beauty of it all.
We should continually strive to be aware of that sense for perfection and follow it like hunting dogs, worst case you're a better human being and hurray for you, best case you might even become a transcendent one.
Sorry this is little off course for this lecture, but there's so much in each 5 minute segment, I'd nearly need to start writing books just so I can capture some of them and I don't have a pen to hand now.
Exactly man!
God doesn't exist
How do you know?
Well if there are no words to describe it, I don't wanna hear about it!
Wittgenstein's brief career as a primary schoolteacher offers the most interesting insight into his thought.
oh yeah, good point!
"Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by language." That made me reconsider Philosophy as a whole and how I view it's purpose. Excellent lecture, as always.
Of course, there’s a difference between what philosophy was intended to be and what it became. Now it’s a weapon being used as a tool to undermine the mind of man.
Philosophy teases out the categories of being and non-being that are part of a subject; philosophy removes the debris from the path one must go to find an answer to the questions concerning a subject; philosophy delineates problems within the subject; philosophy sometimes points to potential solutions or contingent solutions to a problem in the subject; but some philosophical utterances are convoluted or confused for various reasons, as is the case sometimes with all human utterances, but philosophy is similar to the sciences in that over time it is self-correcting. Wittgenstein made a necessary midcourse correction to philosophy.
@@JackPullen-ParadoxI've always thought language philosophy is the ultimate philosophy because it's the meta-narrative for the greatest meta-narrative which is philosophy. Explanations for the explanations.
Has anyone ever heard someone summarise philosophers ideas better than this guy? Genuine question.
NO
Daniel Robinson
Ridiculously good summary of the Later W. I have read and watched dozens and also completed half my PhD on the topic and this is the best I've found. Just as W brought common sense back to many of these issues you've brought common sense back to the understanding of the man's ideas.
_The Tractatis_ - Solving all philosophical problems
A theory of what can be put in a proposition
Mathematical Rigor
2:14 “The World is All That Is The Case.”
3:36 “What we cannot speak about we must Passover in silence.”
4:36 Thought needs Language, hard to have a thought without proper sentences
7:12 Enjoy adornment? No
Writes a book📕 self-critiques it himself
9:03 Print = finality, philosophy feels like a process
9:17 _The Logical Investigations_
Trying to uncloud our understanding
11:37 Language is a Picture of The World
• X is X, This is This
Elegant, Overly Simple
13:15 Language Game, no 1 unification 14:12
14:48
15:07 How is a word learned? How do you teach a word? How is a word used? Use tells Meaning.
16:16 What is a Game?
16:59 What’s the definition of definition? What is Justice? What is Beauty? What is Love? What is Virtue? 18:23 No one can tell the universal form.
19:01 We can’t do the impossible
What does Game O have in common with Game C?
20:43 No Johnny, a pencil is not a game.
Essential Definition - Socrates, boil it down to its essence
Extensive Definition - Wittgenstein, use it in a sentence
23:33 What makes Beauty Beauty?
Is that a reasonable demand?
25:24 Uncertainty at the edges of definitions, examples
26:30 Stop Demanding Absolutes
27:28 Talk comes before Logic
Beauty of ____
28:46 What Holds Our World Together?
29:16 Family Resemblance
Chair Family
Sharing something enough to group them
Categorizing
“It depends on what game you are playing.”
“Sort-of like…”
32:35 Stand There ->
Where exactly?
-> There
33:23 _If I can use the term you use in the way you use it,_ I understand you.
(You do what you Know)
(You say what you Think)
36:22 I’ve done addition in my head, I know Swedish but I don’t use it
If you cannot show what you know
You might not actually know
38:19 Language is quirky, odd,
ASK FOR THE USE, NOT THE MEANING
43:09 Self-Critique
Unflattering
Concious misgiving
How many channels do you do this for? 😭
@@nathanielbeha833For real I’ve seen this mostly for Grateful Dead setlists. Never for a Philosophy lecture this is the black belt of idiosyncratic nerdiness and I love it.
@@frimports I've seen him on audiobooks, philosophy lectures, and video essays. Very versatile explorer
Summary is flattery
3:36 is not "Passover" it is "pass over".
I have been reading Wittgenstein since the 1980s. This is a tremendous introduction to his thought. At last, an accessible yet uncompromising synopsis!
I think the most profound thought that Wittgenstein produced was that there are certain things in life- the realm of the emotions, the meaning of music and art, psychological states of mind- that are inexpressible irreducible very real and beyond the reach of the power of language.
Sans “states of mind”. Much of his middle philosophy countered “mental states” and misunderstandings that spring from the idea. You are right they aren’t simply shown with language in that they are shown in action. “The case” is not always ‘reducible to’ action either but displayed by it in a myriad of ways that include language acts (to borrow from the tangential J.L. Austin).
I have to say- I very much disagree with the idea that Wittgenstein's later thought centered on an idea that an "in-expressible" beyond is behind language; this is far more Freudian in my view. I would highly highly recommend (not just to you but all in the comments) checking out Stanley Cavell's "The Claim of Reason: Wittgenstein, Skepticism, Morality, and Tragedy" if this subject interests you. Would love to hear what others think!
To me it just means that these things are inexpressible in words only. This is why communication over text is so lacking. Art and music are some of the communication techniques of these "inexpressible" things. For me the song "Tom's diner" captures this perfectly. The music in combination with the words capture an aesthetic, an experience, perfectly
But listen to two musicians or artists talk to each other and you will hear words that sound like uninformative, metaphorical or approximate language that the two seem to understand implicitly. Maybe they have had a similar emotional reaction and the correlates of the words they use serve to bridge the gap between the two minds. One should try to express the inexpressible. Someone may be listening.
I am vehemently blown away by your presentation and deliverance. Very powerful and I’m left wanting more at the end. 😊
One can clearly see how much Wittgenstein has impressed Prof Sugrue.
Brilliant. I never thought I'd come close to even vaguely understand great philosophers. I didn't even know I wanted to.
向Sugrue博士致敬！货真价实的哲学家、教授、演讲者！聆听您的讲座是一种享受。谢谢教诲！
Thanks Professor Sugrue!
Thanks ! A Man with a beatiful mind
I read Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations 1985 and it blew me away. He's had the greatest influence on my intellectual development.
Really opened my eyes! I wish I could get them all on DVD so that when everything is gone from the internet i can still watch it.
Don’t they keep copies at the Blockbuster of Alexandria?
@@MarcosElMalo2
This comment is great.
Well done Sir
@@MarcosElMalo2 Sadly it was burned to the ground by the Visigoths, or the Russians. I forget which.
Download bro. Keep on thumb drive in a Faraday cage for when the EMPs fly.
One of best lectures I have listened about late Wittgenstein thoughts. His concept of learning by example look a lot about how computer scientists are trying to create machine learning.
Wittgenstein believed that philosophy is an activity which is incoportated in language. So without language there will be no philosophy. He also wrote "in logic there isnt any coincidence" because logic is a construct that stands on certain principles. These principles are described in the tractatus. Later in his philosophical investigation he denounced his previous statement that philosophy is only incorporated in language but also in impressions, intuition, and emotion. However it is still an activity but in his mind now this activity is focused on solving philosphical problems as if they are sickness, thus it is like a therapy.
@@Impaled_Onion-thatsmine Wittgenstein and his family were all deeply afflicted by depression while living, during which they all, at face value, lived extravagant lives. Summarizing Wittgenstein's work and his untimely death through a cynical lense is on its face insufficient, and at worst needlessly callous. Then you say he did both of these things to to blame others? Are you okay?
So basically what Sartre did. Funny how Wittgenstein wrecked analytics, yet it's still so popular in the Anglosaxon sphere.
I’m not sure impressions, intuition, and emotion gets one wholly outside language. pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/2181180017/st_400x400.jpg
And if it doesn’t, what is the nature of the relationship?
@@allisonandrews4719 I’m not sure what that means, to get outside language. The rap on the table happens, perhaps drawing our attention before a thought forms and language is engaged. We experience a physical sensation. Is there a moment of the sensation that precedes our interpretation of it? “Outside” is spatial, and perhaps that’s my difficulty. It might make more sense to a use temporal framework. Certain things, sensations, experiences, precede language. We can still talk about them and think about them-even as a sensation continues-but there might be a gap before language enters the picture.
I'm absolutely fascinated to listen to this lecture in the age of AI.
Thanks again professor...It's simply awesome to keep hearing you teach again anda again..!
Thank you, Prof Sugrue, for a great lecture.
Outstanding. Triumph of a lecture. Thank you.
Amazing, fast and concise history and description of Wittgenstein’s philosophies.
Very nice job.
Discovered your lectures recently. They are a feast for the mind.
Thank you Dr. Sugrue! This is one of my favorite lectures so far based solely on content. Wittgenstein is a man after my own heart. In IT, we call the level of precision of an algorithm "granularity". The level needed is based on what the algorithm needs to do and the characteristics of the information upon which it acts. I love language and especially simple, accurate definitions, however the precision should indeed be scaled for practical usage.
I've asked a couple of mathematicians for a single concise definition of mathematics that embraced all levels from arithmetic to calculous. At least one of them had a PhD and none of them could do it. I told them it was "the study of quantities". They both thought about it and agreed it was a correct definition, but they didn't see any use for it. I told them that the need for the simple definition was to teach mathematics to children so they know what they are learning. Many people don't actually know what math is and think it's much more difficult than it is. Furthermore, each new level of math simply adds another dimension. Arithmetic produces a single value, zero dimensions. Algebra produces a line, one dimension, Geometry, 2 dimensions, etc. If these simple definitions were shared with students as they embarked on each new level of math, it would make a great deal more sense to them and would be easier to learn.
Furthermore, confusion is caused by the wrong level of precision in language. If a philosopher's language confuses others, it doesn't mean the philosopher is smarter, just that his communication failed. Ditto with art. If the artist has to explain the work, it failed to communicate.
Just wow
@@Andrew_Cotton Thanks for getting it! Also, I left a bit off of the definition of mathematics. I should have been "the study of quantities and their relationships".
@MR. Phoenix I don't speak or read German, which is what this language looks like. It translated to: "I enjoyed your step-by-step, interdisciplinary case studies". Is that correct?
If so, why thank you! That makes my musings and observations sound much more sophisticated than ever occurred to me :)
To be a bit facetious, you could also say numerology is a "Study of quantities."
@@CrowsofAcheron I'm pretty sure it's not. From my research into numerology, it's like comparing astronomy to astrology.
23:32 Sugrue's pursing of his lips after he say "a scholar, who has spent his entire life -". its like yep, that's me
This is the eternal Form of the Professor. I use it as an example to satisfy both Socrates and Wittgenstein.
This a wonderful to watch. He really goes directly to the heart of the questions. “Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by language!” “If it isn’t broke, don’t fix it.” (Don’t even try to fix it!!!). But why the reservations against behaviourism? If you want to know what I know, watch what I do!! But This is just first class. Never seen better.
I think behaviorism for all intents and purposes takes the mind out of the equation. Or reduces it to unknowability and thus not worth investigating. I think this view reduces the amount of things we can know about the mind and psychology of people too much. Did Freud and Jung say anything worthwile? I think they did.
@@davidd854 Not everything, but Freud and Jung did say worthwhile things. Essentially, we don’t want to go down the rabbit-hole of “do you see the same red as I do?”. Just watch to see if I stop at a red traffic light. That’s a pretty good test.
@@martinstent5339 Okay, so you use empiricism with regards to behaviour to find out what's going on in someone's mind. But I think it becomes problematic when someone follows that up with everything that cannot be tested in that way does not exist or is not worth investigating.
sugrue is an unsung hero
I learned a lot about Wittgenstein and pikabu, what a great day.
Mike Tyson was also a big fan of pikabu.
What a brilliant, outstanding lecture.
Magnificent. Gracias. You have made an art of philosophy!
This lesson is absolutely wonderful
There is this divine flow in you Sir
I am filled with respect, even awe, for this exposition of Wittgenstein.
These lectures make me happy
So, the proper use of language as the basis of a philosophical understanding... I'm starting to understand. Thank you for sharing this information....
Thanks for posting these brilliant lectures
These never disappoint me, what an amazing lecture once again
What a terrific lecture!
Brilliant entertainment and display of a great mind in total command.
Wittgenstein was the most remarkable man of philosophy .He gave away his father's fortune and volunteered for dangerous missions in W.W. 1 and taught children before going to England and transforming philosophical thought. How can a man such as that exist, I often wondered.
He gave the money to his sisters who then gave money back to him when he needed some. He didn't give it to charity or anything like that.
@@coscanoe True, but still…
Fantastic lecture! This was one of the most clear, no-nonsense expositions of Wittgenstein’s thought I have yet to hear. I especially liked his Juxtaposition of it to Platonism. That really made things very clear.
Thank you for these great posts!!! 👍
Simply remarkable, I read the tractatus and although I doubt I am among the few able to make full sense of it as Mr. Sugrue said , I was able to understand enough to recognize the genius of Wittgenstein and to listen to the lecture of a true expert is just marvelous 👌🏾👌🏾👌🏾.
AMAZING LECTURE THANK YOU SO MUCH
It's my favourite lecture.
Philosophy is a flow of thoughts and ideas.
Wittgenstein contracted plato/spinoza but he read them and was influenced by them. How beautiful and marvelous it that.
One of the best lectures I have seen in my entire life. This particular lecture is truly remarkable. I am at awe and moved by the passion of Professor Michael Sugrue for philosophy.
Only 11k subscribers? This is buried treasure!
Uao. Absolutely BRILLIANT again. 🌹
Obsessed thank you
Wittegenstein: "Stand roughly there."
Me: "Soooo what direction should I look? I'm so confused."
Don’t feel bad, Sugrue student. At least you’ve entered into a Socratic dialogue with Wittgenstein. (This was in one of the more recent podcasts, iirc.)
Brilliant!
Professor hit Star Power around 40:00
Wittgenstein was the destroyer of analytic philosophy. Based
I read the Tractatus, thought it was very pretentious, and then I was glad to find out Wittgenstein was critical of it himself. Philosophical Investigations is amazingly interesting to read, but you get the gist of it in just the first 50-100 pages. Everything is a game. Language is fluid. So logically, that means philosophy is fluid as well. Analytical philosophy, therefor, isn't philosophy. It is pure science, and even in some sense, antisocial.
I was also reminded of Zen and The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance while watching this lecture. It is a great novel on a man who tried to define "Quality", and got mad doing so. The story is told in a flash back narrative while he's on a road trip to re-acquaint with his son after undergoing electro-shock therapy. He calls his old self, the Philosophy teacher who tried to define Quality, Phaedrus, an obvious nod to Socrates' dialogues, but he also uses games to describe his friends as being "romantic", because they don't care about how motorcycles work, while he calls himself "classical", because he obviously does care and maintains his own motorcycle. He uses this as the first argument on how some people don't care about being authentically engaged with the world and even perform poorly at their jobs, which kinda segways into the story of his great quest to define Quality.
After watching these lectures, it became obvious to me that this character had his head buried way too deep into the philosophical sands. He rehashes all kinds of ideas (Kierkegaard's Either/Or, Plato's dialogues, Kant's a priori, Wittgenstein) to make himself look somewhat superior, or worthy of telling you a story, taking you on this trip where he will reveal to you what is the stuff that makes up Quality, but as you probably guessed the great value lies in discovery; in the pleasure of reading how well he handles the motorcycle, the American vistas they interact with both on and off the bike, the people they interact with down the road, how a psychologically unstable man tries to inflate his flawed ego through philosophical investigation, and in turn tries to control his environment by defining it through language instead of experience.
You describe the Tractatus as “pretentious” and you are, obviously, entitled to your opinion, but I think you should give it another shot (using the later, not the first, translation into English).
First off, Wittgenstein was one of the least pretentious people I’ve ever read about and a completely unpretentious person is unlikely to produce pretentious work.
He was the scion of the richest (by far) and most powerful family in Austria. He could have lived a life of ease, but gave his entire fortune away shortly after he’d inherited it. Additionally, he was living in England and could easily have evaded military service in the Austrian army during WW I but instead chose not to evade conscription and volunteered to serve in the most dangerous positions on the eastern front.
During WW II, as an honored professor in his fifties living in England, he quit the university and went to work as a lowly orderly in a public hospital.
For me, the Tractatus is like a long drink of the cleanest, purest mountain water. The diamond cutter’s precision that he brings to the analysis of what a proposition is changed my mind and my life.
I don’t think of his later work of the thirties and forties as being a refutation, much less a repudiation, of the Tractatus, but rather an ongoing development of his thought. “Philosophical Investigations” is exactly the right term.
@@simonstuddert-kennedy8854 I read it in German and I found it pretentious for the same reason most people will say, simply that it tries to solve Philosophy as if it were a riddle. It's interesting to read, but taking it as a definitive work, would be a grave mistake. For the younger Wittgenstein to think he could "solve" philosophy was pretentious, and that's how I use that word when I say the Tractatus is a pretentious work. Perhaps arrogant would be a better term for this context?
You can see Investigations as a continuation, but at the same time it delves much deeper, away from the positivist attitude Tractatus had, and thereby breaks the silence, speaking of that which cannot be spoken clearly, encouraging nonsense and a fluid evolution of language as a social game.
It takes no Wittgenstein to realize that most words are inherently fuzzy. Often their meaning is only (ormore, clear in context. Thank God most words are not precisely defined, as mathematical entities are. Words like beauty, good, honest, fair, freedom, greed, god, rational, emotional, intelligence, moral, humor, friendship, love and so many others. Popper realized this when he was just 15 [his book Unended Quest).
Games are contracts.
Game theory and mind games.
Resisting the enchantment with our intellect. Really love this lecture despite my not sureness.
Thank You!
While I was watching this. Karl Popper came to my mind because he proclaimed himself as the nemesis of Wittgenstein saying that his philosophy is only a trivial matter talking about language.. I hope Dr. Sugrue would make a video regarding philosophers of science especially my favorite one Thomas Kuhn.
Thanks for these.
Brilliant.
chatgpt puts it well in the style of Robbie Burns!
Ludwig said, "A game is like a language, ye ken,
A set of rules and symbols that we all comprehend.
We play by the rules, but we can change them, it's true,
And the meaning of the game is what we construe."
A game, ye see, is a social affair,
Wherein we all participate and share.
It's not just the rules, it's the players, too,
And the meanings we create as we pursue.
Wittgenstein argued that we create the game,
And its meaning depends on who's playing the same.
A game can be a battle, a joke, or a test,
And its meaning can vary, depending on the contest.
So, Robbie Burns, ye see, Wittgenstein's theory is grand,
For it shows us that we create the world we understand.
We shape our language and games, and they shape us,
And that's the key to the meaning we discuss.
Thank you
Less eloquent summary: It is what it is, y'know?
Worth a watch. You can tell this guy's passion. You can tell that at a party this guy brings a casserole and a joke you can cry laughing about on an existential level.
The wig, the glasses, the catchphrase... Brilliant!
TH-cam recommendations can potentially tells everything about your personality and behaviour.
That's the reason why we are here.
Impressive guy this Wittgenstein. How he critiqued himself. So humbly wanting to aid our thinking and add meaning to our language, accepting a degree of language ambiguity is needed in order to reduce that which we should remain silent about.
“Remaining silent” was his early philosophy and he was critiquing himself in his later philosophy. Language by mid-philosophy was a tool so ambiguity is usually irrelevant as description (true, false, ambiguous…) is only one use of language among many. -Hopefully that makes sense.
Sugrue - the Guru's Guru
@39:00 , the discussion of solving questions to the human condition by reworking language reminds me a lot of Heidegger...
Thanks!
Brilliant
1:10 - the theory of the declarative sentence. The limits of our language are the limits of our knowledge. What we cannot speak about, we must pass over in silence.
5:30 - positivist philosophy as "physics uber alis" - the "physics over everything." Sort of like Hawking's idea of the Theory of Everything.
11:50 - two kinds of facts in the Tractatus: deductive and inductive. Deductive facts are logically deduced from a priori propositions, are either true or false, and are all tautologies (in the sense that 2 + 2 = 4 is a tautology). Inductive facts are inferred patterns from a set of examples, tell us about individual facts about the world, and describe contingencies of the world, not tautologies.
13:20 - language not as a picture, but as a game. cf. Piaget and the Socratic dialogues. The idea that you can be able play a game and act out its rules without being able to articulate the rules - and that you in fact learn the rules by playing the game.
15:50 - figuring out a word's meaning by analyzing how it is used. Connected to the idea of discovering whether a word is "good" by investigating what it is good for - which implies that there are multiple circumstances in which a word may or may not be useful, and therefore multiple interpretive lenses of the world in which a word may be meaningful or not. Connected to my idea of the different paradigms of what makes a good law: the "Pragmatic" (is it feasible), the "Utilitarian" (is it beneficial), and the "Just" (is it right) - as well as my different paradigms of thought: the Phenomenological (things merely as they appear to us), the Empirical (things as they can be physically observed and experimented on) and the Philosophical (things as they can be reached through reason).
18:50 - there are some things that cannot be described with absolute mathematical precision and certainty. Perhaps Socrates is playing intellectual sleight-of-hand by asking for such a thing in his dialogues? And further, is this sleight-of-hand conscious or unconscious - or perhaps somewhere in between?
21:10 - essential definition vs. extensive definition. Essential definitions describe the essence of a thing and are exhaustive. Extensive definitions provide examples of a thing and are open-ended.
23:00 - the "revival of common sense." Philosophy is a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by language. (32:58)
23:35 - the analogy of the scholar trying to discover the principle of beauty, the thing that makes beautiful things beautiful. But perhaps there is no observable singular quality that is common to all the examples. Perhaps the problem is not with the intrinsic ambiguity of our language, but that the demand for absolute logical precision is in this situation itself an illogical ask. Imagine two different Venn diagrams: one has multiple circles that have one spot on which they all converge, while another has no spot where they all converge. It may have some circles that overlap with several others, it may have some that overlap with only one, it may have some that overlap with none - perhaps even they all connect in a looped chain, pointing to some unseen center of the circle. The fact remains that there is no spot that all overlap on - no observable common essence.
26:10 - is a blurry photograph a photograph? In some sense, yes. Is it an adequate photograph? It depends on what you're using it for. Goes back to the previous idea of analyzing a word according to its use to determine its meaning. The question then becomes, is there a way to integrate all the interpretations of a word at once, or do we have to hold onto some and discard others according to the situation? And if so, is that even feasible? And even if it is, is it right? Seems to come dangerously close to 1984's doublethink. cf. also the Noble Lie in the Republic.
26:35 - "there is no such thing as the essence of chair-ness . . . there's an intrinsic ambiguity in our definitions along those lines that's exactly like the ambiguity of a fuzzy photograph." This observation helps us see the usefulness and aptitude of Aristotle's categorization of causes into Matter, Form, Efficient, and Final. In a theoretical sense, a chair is a rigid piece of furniture with a seat, four legs, and a back (matter and form). But in a practical sense, a chair is Something To Sit Down On (final). Theseus' boat problem, and so and so forth.
26:50 - ". . . if we need more resolution, we can add that resolution as it's necessary in the language games we are engaged in. . . but we don't need an a priori essential definition of all the words in our language in order to talk." Perhaps the pithiest, most pertinent, and most salient observation of the lecture. Gets around the problem of inaction inherent with consciousness (cf. Underground Man).
29:15 - the idea of "family resemblance."
30:25 - when learning or teaching a language, we don't start with the most obscure examples, but the most clear ones. We go from the more known to the less known.
37:45 - the problem of only accepting behavior as a subject of analysis is that it locks us within our own psyches.
39:45 - the idea that the process of philosophy is never-ending. Lines up with Gadamer's conception of the hermeneutic circle as an unending dialectical process. Perfect knowledge is an asymptote that we approach but never reach.
And remember: "Language is intrinsically a social enterprise." (Wittgenstein) In order to philosophize properly, we need a social group to philosophize with.
Perhaps cf. Gerard Manley Hopkins' conception of the world (the wonder and incomprehensibility of everyday objects)?
Amazing resemblance to David Koresh
Thanks
Wittgenstein was a student of William of Occam.
I wonder what Wittgenstein would say about quantum physics uncertainty principle in light of his logical positivism.
The failure to do does not conclude the impossibility of something. We struggle with finding the common meaning but that doesnt mean there isnt one.
Game and chair can be defined in a clear and stable manner.
Summary of this lecture, don’t worry about anything, just keep going..
I think Wittgenstein is showing a preference for connotation over denotation, which is odd since both are necessary. While it may be generally useful for daily use to just know the connotation of the word game, it is important to elucidate a certain meaning to it so we can have serious discussion rather than a potentially confused one with mistaken understandings of meaning.
"Beware the man of one book"- St.Thomas Aquinas
"As I was going up the stair/I met a man who wasn't there/ He wasn't there again today/ I wish, I wish he'd go away"-Anonymous
Until now, I deliberately avoided Wittgenstein. From the little I had read, there seemed to be a skull and crossbones on the bottle. Then tonight, this lecture turned up in my TH-cam recommendations.
Professor Sugrue continues the process I highly admire, trying in each lecture to try and explain the philosopher in question's train of thought, rather than his own. Still, I am puzzled. An early statement, something like "Then it's not philosophy or logic, but poetry or religion or other nonsense." This idea , sad to say, is quite common among physicists, mathematicians, and those specializing in logic. Which begs the question of how Aristotle, who created logic as we know it, describes Friendship as the ultimate human happiness, and is interested enough in the subject to do a thesis on Poetics. Also, the idea that Plato was only after strict reasoning- if we look at Socrates' speech in Symposium, then Love, Beauty and Truth may revolve around the same fulcrum, but I do not believe Socrates went home that night knowing he had spoken the last words on love, or given the ultimate definition of the word. To toot my own horn, more than one person has asked me "Colleen, why are you so smart?" And my reply of reading the Bible, King James Version, many times, complete; everything Shakespeare wrote- all 37 plays, plus poems; and doing a healthy amount of reading Plato- this gave me a great foundation for understanding otherwise difficult reading material of other authors. I will try to end without "throwing stones." Reading literature, including Poetry, Novels and Plays- opened a window on how other people think that is unavailable through strict reasoning and logic. Literature helped me understand the outlook and view of the world inhabited by those in historical periods I never lived in. The world of Homer, or Tolstoy, or F Scott Fitzgerald I experience by reading them that can't be through the writings of Historians alone. I speak this even with a degree in History, Summa Cum Laude. And for a post note, there is the word eneffable. Why did God keep sending prophets to Ancient Israel, warning them to stop sinning, when God knew The Carrying Away into Babylon was in the future? That's where the word eneffable comes into play.
Wow! Just…wow.
Not a pro philosopher here, but this gave me a notion of the connection between Wittgenstein and Heidegger here.
Cool Adam
Do you have a lecture on Schopenhauer?
Game; to play with rule/s. What we cannot say we can pass over in silence and/or provide some other stimuli inducing method. Symbol for breaking down understanding, greys and ranges for covering scope.
“Pointing at the pencil ‘this is a game’”😂
I write my interpretations to help others understand and also to see if I understood anything. I also expect and encourage someone pointing out my potential mistakes.
If it isn't broken, don't fix it. When you can't fix what's broken, you go insane. But if nothing is broken, then why do you go insane? Just as tautology limits our knowledge about the world in terms of our knowledge about ourselves, or the way we use language to describe the world, the drive to universals we all feel again tells us only something about ourselves. Wittgenstein posits that we are demanding unreasonable precision in our knowledge, ie, that our ontological thirst is misplaced, because our drives can only be accounted by our behaviors. The earlier Wittgenstein is the culmination of the logical positivism, which is essentially (if I may use this word when talking about logical positivists) skeptical and materialistic.
Unsatisfied with his own conclusions, he latter viewed language as a set of games: what things mean really depends upon the games we play, that is, 1. the set of rules we impose on the function of the words we use, and 2. the actual consequences or expectations we can, with relatively safety, predict. In other words, the meaning of things comes first from their relevance to our desires (we learn how they can be used), but essentially from their relations with other words, as we really learn with many examples, we internalize them, then we act accordingly. We successfully manage one particular game, living and playing as we go, ie we first get thrown into the world, then we start to get acquainted with the infinitude of games. This strongly resembles Piaget's theory, a game inside a game inside a game, and so on.
One difference between the earlier and the latter Wittgenstein is that the latter “betrays” the other logical positivists by positing that there is an ego/self, which goes against the anti-realism - although we cannot access it, there is an ontological correspondent to ourselves: only I really know what I mean when I use some word. Ayers posited that the self was just another posit with practical usage. Wittgenstein, therefore, not only leaves the metaphysical door open, but he opens the Pandora's box of metaphysics open, as when he acknowledges that there is something outside the material realm - which can't be reduced to what logical positivists would assume as truth - he resembles Gadamer's hermeneutics and even Heidegger posits, expressed by his theory of language-games, to which his previous conclusions of the Tractatus were merely another mode of interpretation, aka another game.
That said, whenever I get the feel that I don't want to have to learn the rules until I die, ie I want to know a universal set of rules that will safely get me through all the games I may encounter, Wittgenstein would say I'm not being reasonable, that the problem is not that the world has an infinite array of games, and also not that I could do fairly well focusing on my particular set of games; the problem is that I really don't want to play, at least not by these rules (lato sensu), whenever I search for universals. In a way, whenever the logical positivists assure their own dogmatic dominance over any array of possible knowledge, it is really just a form of reduction to methodological approach, which does not convey the “whole” truth, that can't ever be propositionally contained. Philosophy didn't end - as being reduced to a subset of logic, unable to ever bore new knowledge by itself - and it will never end, as it is the means to articulate (not really solve) problems that language can't solve by itself.
Wonderful.what year is this lecture?
This man knows it all!
Amazing talk. Re: 35:50, another question could be that if knowing how to do addition amounts to performing actual additions, does a calculator knows how to do addition?
That is easy. A calculator does not know anything.
Thank you so much for your amazing lectures Dr. Sugrue. I wonder what Wittgenstein would think of Husserl's extreme phenomenology. It makes me wonder what is science without philosophy, and therefore philosophy without science. What did Wittgenstein think of Zoroaster's logicism. What would it have been like if Wittgenstein never equated the meaning of life with verbiage. Is logicism just a phenomenological attitude --- What if Wittgenstein's Tractatus was cryptographically analyzed.
Did Wittgenstein believe the purest abstracta could transcend language. Is the language of thought a Platonic Form, and can it be analyzed according to Tegmark's pluriverse model. Does the Tractatus correspond to the language of Kosmogony. Are language games essential to all branches of philosophy.
Is a language game merely an algorithm of mereology, or mereotopology. Is virtue essential to the foundation of language games, and why is that the case. Finally, I ask, what is the instantiation of instantiation, and why is the instantiation of language essential for Beinghood, or Embodiment in the Lebensworld --- to overlap Merleau-Ponty and Wittgenstein. Is the set of all sets a linguistic attitude, and are all objects in the pluriverse language games, ultimately.
24:18 they all have in common a high value in aesthetic quality
I believe Wittgenstein gave some credit to his correspondences with F. P. Ramsey for the development of his views expounded in PI.
Professor Sugrues passing is a tragedy. I feel now that the world has become a lesser place.
I'm always looking for new interesting lectures on Psychology/Philosophy, please let me know if you guys have any recommendations, would be highly appreciated
This channel is really good if you want to listen to older content th-cam.com/video/KKg--SyKH-M/w-d-xo.html
This channel is really good for contemporary psychology and physiology th-cam.com/video/8IWDAqodDas/w-d-xo.html
Old lectures, but Pierre Grimes and the Noetic Society's channel has great lectures on Platonism.
So what happens after Wittgenstein & the Philosophical Investigations? Is there a particular standout author who takes his baton? (great lecture, thanks)
J.L. Austin until 1960. Then Stanley Cavell.
"Don't ask for the meaning, ask for the use"-utilitarian approach to logos.
I would love to know your take on Russell's disagreement with Wittgenstein. Wittgenstein is new to me and after the video I can't see how anyone can disagree with his ideas. This is probably due to your crystal clear explanation and convincing presentation and my lack of knowledge. Thanks for another great video.