Customer Reviews

Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus: German and English (International Library of Psychology, Philosophy, & Scientific Method)

5 star:		(34)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Since most of the reviews of the Tractatus here contain either fawning praise or vituperation without much expository content, it may perhaps be useful to give an account, in reasonably clear terms, of what this book is actually about. Granted that my account is somewhat simplified, it will still be better than quasi-mystical gushing praise or bitter unargued criticism. The central idea of the Tractatus is expressed very clearly at proposition 4.01 and certain comments following it:

"A proposition is a picture of reality.
A proposition is a model of reality as we imagine it." [4.01]

"At first sight a proposition--one set out on the printed page, for example--does not seem to be a picture of the reality with which it is concerned. But neither do written notes seem at first sight to be a picture of a piece of music . . . And yet these sign-languages prove to be pictures, even in the ordinary sense, of what they represent." [4.011]

"A gramophone record, the musical idea, the written notes, and the sound-waves, all stand to one another in the same internal relation of depicting that holds between language and the world.
They are all construed according to a common logical pattern." [4.014]

So, Wittgenstein's basic view in the Tractatus is simple: statements ("propositions") are pictures or models of the situations they are about. The sequence of words "The cat is on the mat" would be taken by him to picture the situation that consists in one object (the cat) standing in a certain relation (being on) to another object (the mat). Or rather, this would be the way to understand this proposition if the cat and mat themselves were indivisible atoms, without any smaller parts. Since, actually, the cat is made up of a great many smaller parts, as is the mat, the full analysis of "The cat is on the mat" would be much more complicated. But basically, a proposition is a picture of the situation it describes just as the notes on a sheet of music depict a melody, and just as the written letters "pop" depict a certain sound. In breaking down the cat and the mat, we must eventually come to a point where things can't be broken down any further, with objects that are the basic constituents of reality. The relationships between these basic objects, which Wittgenstein just calls "objects", but which others have called "logical atoms", constitute the most elementary situations. These situations are described by what he calls "elementary propositions". Given a bunch of elementary propositions, we can combine and re-combine them by certain basic operations, called truth-functional operations, which are explained in any textbook of elementary formal logic. Two such operations are conjunction and negation. So, given three atoms, a, b, and c, and a relation R (R might be the relation "being on", as with the cat and the mat), we have, as elementary propositions, for instance:

aRb ("a is on b")
bRc ("b is on c")
aRc ("a is on c")

Then we can make new, compound propositions like

(aRb & bRc)
~aRc
(aRb & bRc) & ~aRc

Where "&" just means "and", as in "The cat is on the mat and the cherry is on the tree", and "~" means "It is not the case that", as in "It is not the case that the cat is on the mat". So the first of the above three compounds means "a is on b and b is on c", and the second means "It is not the case that a is on c", that is, a is not on c. You can easily work out the third one for yourself.

By means of operations like this (actually, Wittgenstein uses a different, but equivalent operation), one can build up an enormous stock of compound propositions. In fact, according to Wittgenstein, anything that can be said at all can be said by taking elementary propositions and applying operations like this repeatedly (albeit you might have to apply such operations infinitely, or to an infinite collection of propositions). Basically, then, given the simplest pictures of the world, we can stitch them together into more and more complicated pictures, and these yield all the statements and thoughts we can make, or at least all the ones that make any sense. Every meaningful statement ultimately breaks down to elementary propositions, propositions entirely in terms of simple signs or names (like "a" and "b") that stand for logical atoms. Everything that can be said meaningfully can, in principle, be broken down like this. This is the basic idea of logical atomism. Most of the technical work in this book consists of machinery for reducing all propositions of science and mathematics to combinations of elementary propositions. In the process, Wittgenstein shows you, he thinks, how to reduce claims with notions like "all" and "some" (like "All whales are mammals", "Some lawyers are crooks") and numerical claims ("There are four books on the shelf") to combinations of elementary propositions. If Wittgenstein succeeds in this, he considers himself to have shown that his "picture theory" of language is correct.

Okay, now you want to know, what's the *philosophical* point of all this? Well, for one thing, it means that anything you *can't* picture cannot be expressed by a meaningful proposition. If you try to speak of things that can't be pictured in Wittgenstein's way, you end up talking nonsense, in that what you are saying won't be true or false. Such utterances may express how you feel, or they may serve some other function (besides saying something) but they won't *say* anything that can be true (or false), and so there won't be any point in *arguing* about it. And what "things" are these, that you can't meaningfully talk about? The short answer is, all of traditional philosophy. Take ethics, for instance: "things" like right and wrong, or good and bad, can't be pictured, and so ethical "propositions" like "Murder is wrong" don't say anything. Maybe they express your feelings, or reflect some psychological fact, but they are not true or false. Likewise for religious claims that defy picturing, like "God is love" or "Brahman manifests itself in all things". Likewise for metaphysical claims about God or substance or causation or any underlying non-empirical reality. Likewise for epistemological worries about justification or rationality; these cannot be pictured in the requisite way either (hence Wittgenstein dismisses skepticism as nonsense). Wittgenstein's views of language are *so* restrictive that most of what philosophers have wanted to talk about turn out to fall into the category of the unspeakable, what he calls "the mystical". The mystical is what cannot be pictured, what is therefore beyond the realm of logic, reasoning, and articulate speech. About it, Wittgenstein claims, we cannot speak, and therefore we should be silent.

Oddly enough, Wittgenstein's own book turns out to be an attempt to talk about the mystical. For one of the things that cannot be pictured, is the very fact, as Wittgenstein takes it to be, that propositions are pictures of reality. (Think about it: how can you make a picture that says that propositions are pictures of reality? There's no way to do it along the lines of "The cat is on the mat", is there?) In fact, every attempt to talk about the relation between language and reality is itself an attempt to speak of the unspeakable, to attempt to characterize what can't be pictured. Wittgenstein recognizes this and responds thus:

"My propositions serve as elucidations in the following way: anyone who understands me eventually recognizes them as nonsensical, when he has used them--as steps--to climb up beyond them. (He must, so to speak, throw away the ladder after he has climbed up it.)

He must transcend these propositions, and then he will see the world aright." [6.54]

Wittgenstein's Tractatus itself, then, is a violation of his commandment to be silent in the face of the mystical. And once it is *recognized* as a violation, Wittgenstein hopes you will throw the book away and return to the ordinary, empirical world, free of any further desire to do philosophy, having gotten a clear vision of language and the world that makes it obvious to you that philosophy is a mistaken attempt to speak of the unspeakable. (You can now see why this book provokes bitter hostility in those who cherish traditional philosophy--after all, it says they're wasting their time!) But if so, how can Wittgenstein himself be right in writing the book? Isn't *it* a mistaken attempt to speak about the unspeakable? Yes and no. Yes, it *is* an attempt to say what can't be said--hence, once you understand it, paradoxically, you see that it's nonsense! But it is not a *mistaken* attempt, rather it is a self-conscious attempt, made necessary by our confusion and unclarity about the world while we are still enmeshed in the tangles of traditional philosophy. While that nonsense imprisons us, we cannot recognize it *as* nonsense, and as such, like mentally deranged people, we have to be approached *with* nonsense if we are to be cured--nonsense is all we respond to. So this book is a kind of curative "nonsense", like a purgative for the soul; it is meant to cleanse the mind of philosophical confusion (that is, of philosophy itself) and, at the end, to remove itself as the final piece of "confusion". To use a computer metaphor, the Tractatus is a program that wipes your whole philosophical "hard drive", and erases itself as its final operation. And after that final erasure, we return to the ordinary world, free of philosophy, in the deafening silence that is our acknowledgement of "das Mystiche"--the mystical in, and above, the ordinary.

Wittgenstein's first published work. Should be as famous for Russell's misunderstanding of it, made obvious in his introduction, as for it's effect on the positivists and modern philosophical logic. Absolutely essential reading for studying Wittgenstein's later work. The Investigations can be read as a refutation of the Tractatus, and thereby, as a refutation of much of contemporary philosophy of language. While Wittgenstein doesn't help his readers with either references or explanatory preamble, the effort of reading this book will be well rewarded to anybody studying contemporary issues in philosophical logic, philosophy of language or philosophy of science. Whatismore, Wittgenstein's poetic style is a joy to read and many of his aphorisms will come back to you in other studies.

Just wanted to warn you all that the free Kindle version of this text has quite a few scanning errors in it that were not caught by an editor. If this especially annoys you, you might want a paid version.

As for the actual work in question...it's not my cup of tea.

Tracatus is the only book Wittgenstein published during his life. He was an odd man, with an odd lifestyle, and he published it with the idea that it would be the "book to end all books" philosophically.

Ironically, in his later years he denounced the book and called himself naive for writing it.

On the below review: Tractatus focuses on an empirical ontology. Where the review below goes wrong is the assumption that Wittgenstein is denouncing all non-objective and materialistic reality. The final line in the book (which is probably the books most poignant, and oft-quoted line) is "What we cannot speak about, we must pass over in silence." demonstrates Wittgenstein is aware of the context that he's covering: the empirical, and objective realm of sensorimotor and rational experience. Wittgenstein was quite the mystic (to the horrors of Bertrand Russell), so one cannot be polemic towards his implied intentions; Wittgenstein was simply attempting to comprehensively cover the only realm in which he felt was capable of being written about: the objective realm.

It is under this context the book must be appropriately reviewed. The following paragraph will review the book within those parameters.

The book is quite thorough. It is a mere 90 pages or so, but every statement is concise, to-the-point, and unwavering in its objective quantification and observation of reality. It is laid out like an old mathematical textbook with decimal numbers annotating each statement in relation to every other statement. Thorough it is, but the book also requires a great deal of effort. Wittgenstein assigns a seemingly endless list of nouns to vague and ambiguous ideas (i.e., fact, thought, picture, proposition, internal property, composite name, sign, etc.) This may be a problem you just have to read the book to understand. When he states something like: "An elementary proposition consists of a nexus of names," where he's previously assigned arbitrary values to "proposition," "nexus," and "name,"--which have been defined by even MORE arbitrary terms--things get very garbled and inconceivable about 1/3 of the way through. It's almost too concise and blunt for its own good, as Wittgenstein offers NO examples, contexts, pretenses, or elaborations... at all!

The book accomplishes what it sets out to do, albeit in an inefficient manner. But honestly, I found the 600-page "Essay Concerning Human Understanding," by Locke to take less effort and to be more comprehensive and effective than the 90-page Tractatus.

Some people swear by this book though, and I suppose it comes down to what kind of thinker you are. If you are a very logical thinker that is willing to sit down and digest every sentence for 5 minutes, then you might get something out of this book. This NOT a book that is meant to have a page turned more than every 10 minutes.

I read this book in college and loved it. It's beautiful, but you have to know a bit about symbolic logic to appreciate it. The last few pages are really elegant. He writes of ethics: "the world of an evil man must be different than the world of good man." And of mysticism that "the fact that the world exists, that is the mystical."

Wittgenstein's mysticism can be summed up like this. The word "hornet" connects somehow with the real insect, but, when I try to explain what the connection is, I am left with nonsense--this is the mystic--it is how the world is "this is the mystical."

He writes only a few lines about God, but I think he acomplishes more than most writers on this subject, since, as he points out in his "motto": "All that a man knows can be said in three words."

That is the only word to describe this book, even if some of the ideas are erroneous. That is not the only basis to judge a book's importance. His work seems to be an expansion of an aphorism found in Nietzsche's All Too Human, that people have always assumed words have an unchanging meaning, or have meaning at all in some cases. Ludwig compares our language to a mirror, which must represent something in reality to be truthful. This is not a rejection of what is thus deemed "mystical," but in fact is more respectful of it, in freeing it from refutations or proofs based in language. Ludwig perhaps states this better in his later work. He also shows that the idea of an absolute is nonsensical, that something must exist in relation to something else; to prove an absolute you would have to find a symbol that would no longer be a symbol. Not every proposition can be based on the criterion of truth or falsehood. This makes all previous philosophy nonsense. The symbols used are used to say something that cannot be said. His style is impressive in its force and simplicity. The book is an eclectic mix of logical proofs and regular prose. Now whether all philosophy is made suspect by Wittgenstein is debatable. There are some philosophies that do not repeat the previous errors of the Platonic tradition, such as existentialism. In any case, the study of language is profoundly shown to be integral to a full study of philosophy. Some knowledge of logic would be helpful, but not absolutely necessary to understand the import of his main ideas.

There's a lot going on in this little book. I take it, though, that at its core the thesis of the book is fairly straightforward (even if controversial):

What can be said (i.e. what can be meaningfully uttered, i.e. what can be said in such a way as to have an unambiguous meaning) can be said clearly (i.e. can be said in such a way as to make perfect sense and be easily understood). Nothing else should be said. This has the implication that instead of doing philosophy, we should let scientists do their things, we should talk about things around us ("warm weather today, huh" "There is a red tailed sparrow on the top of that tree!"), and not sully our feeling that there is something more by talking about it in ways that will not make sense.

The argument fits nicely with a style of poetry and art that is contemporary with Wittgenstein, that consists of simply painting things as they are seen, and calling attention to the ordinary everyday around you in such a way as to summon its power to astound (e.g. Rilke or Proust). The aim ultimately, for W., is to stop theorizing about things and to just live in the moment. In that way, it is close to Buddhist and other insights.

Great book, well worth reading. Not an easy read though.

To date, most reviews of this book have reflected digestion of Wittgenstein's philosophy rather than addressing the quality of the edition. The translation is often terribly tacit or outright incorrect. Unfortunately, Seven Treasures seems to be capitalizing on how few editions remain of this work remain in print. This is not a source that should be used for any scholarly work. Hopefully we will see a Blackwell edition comparable to their PI anniversary printing, with the original German text included.

The Tractatus was Wittgenstein's attempt to solve all philosophical problems. Believing he was successful, he retired from Philosophy after publishing this text to become a schoolteacher for several years in Austria, before returning to philosophy.

The Tractatus is one of the most important intellectual works of the 20th century, arguably as important as Bertrand Russell's and Whitehead's 'Principa Mathematica', Heidigger's 'Being and Time', and Husserl's 'Logical Investigations.' This little work, beautiful in its logical simplicity and purity, can be regarded as the manifesto of analytical philosophy in the 20th century.

The Tractus is essentially a work dealing with epistemology, what we can and cannot know about the world. However, rather than looking at the mind or conciousness or sensations, Wittgenstein instead looks at how we use language and logic to describe the world. If we can solve the inherent logical ambiguity of language, we can then solve philosophical problems which are in fact simply faults which come from lack of logical coherence or clarity when we use language to make certain statements about things and the relationship between things.

Wittgenstein's approach is somewhat reductionistic. The propositional format of the work mirrors the Ethics of Spinoza, though for Wittgenstein the world is made of certain basic atomistic components which have fairly simple relations to each other. These arrangements may change in space and time but the world remains the same.

A number of propositions deal with logical problems explored by Russell, Frege and others. Some of these are very abstract and subtle and require careful study to properly understand.

Towards the end of the treatise Wittgenstein's concerns seem to border on the mystical. 'It is not what the world is, but that it is, which is mystical' and 'What we cannot speak of, we have to pass over in silence.' These Zenlike statements seem to hint at a deep mystery about things which crops up when we reach questions beyond the scope of language and logic, which can only be approached with silent contemplation, somewhat like Nicholas of Cusa's approach to the mystery of God. While Wittgenstein was not a religious man, his statements in this sense have often been quoted by philosophers and scientists whenever a metaphysical question which seems unanswerable arises in their discourse.

Wittgenstein later abandoned many of the statements he made in the Tractatus when he returned to philosophy, instead focusing more on problems with language rather than logic. This is somewhat unfortunate, given the elegance and beauty of this work from the philosophical viewpoint.

While the ambitions of Wittgenstein to solve all problems by clearing up our usage of language may seem excessive looking back, the clarity and precision of this work is admirable and the project worthwhile. For this and for many other reasons, it remains a work worth studying carefully and with sympathy, even after a century or so after its publication.

Much that has been written about Wittgenstein has been wildly irrelevent. I would ignore commentaries and concentrate on the fact that Wittgenstein himself calls the propositions in the book nonsense - no doctrines are given only the idea that we are prey to philosophical confusion. The Tractatus in engaged in what it calls "elucidation" - an activity of showing disguised nonsense (what we think make sense) to be in fact plain old nonsense. How - by offering us nonsense we believe we can make sense of and then trying to show us that it is nonsense.

Definitive reading, to understand Wittgenstein is to realise the book teaches us nothing except about ourselves.

When read in this light the later Philosophical Investigations become not a refutation of this work but rather a different view of how elucidation can be used in a philosophical work.

Enjoy!