Ludwig Wittgenstein 18891951

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Ludwig Wittgenstein(1889-1951)

• Knowledge is in the end based on
  acknowledgement.

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Language Games   65. When language-games
change, then there is a change in concepts, and
with the concepts the meanings of words
change.   94. But I did not get my picture of
the world Weltbild by satisfying myself of its
correctnessNo it is the inherited background
against which I distinguish between true and
false.   97. W distinguishes between the
movement of waters of a river and the shift of
the bed itself.  
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  162. ..a world-picture is the substratum of
all my enquiring and asserting. The propositions
describing it are not all equally subject to
testing.   105. All testing, all confirmation
and disconfirmation of a hypothesis takes place
already within a system..   341. the questions
that we raise and our doubts depend on the fact
that some propositions are exempt from doubt, are
as it were like hinges on which those
turn.   457. ..certainty resides in the nature
of the language game.   378. Knowledge is in
the end based on acknowledgement.   256. ..a
language game does change with time.
 
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Truth   199. The reason why the use of the
expression true or false has something
misleading about it is that it is like saying it
tallies with the facts or it doesnt, and the
very thing that is in question is what tallying
is here.   130. on experience experience does
not direct us to derive anything from
experience.   83. The truth of certain
empirical propositions belongs to our frame of
reference.    
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141. When we first begin to believe anything,
what we believe is not a single proposition, it
is a whole system of propositions. 92.
Remember that one is sometimes convinced of the
correctness of a view by its simplicity or
symmetry, i.e., these are what induce one to go
over to this point of view. One then simply says
something like thats how it must be.   88.
all enquiry on our part is set so as to exempt
certain propositions from doubt, if they are ever
formulated. They lie apart from the route
traveled by enquiry.  
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115. If you tried to doubt everything you would
not get as far as doubting anything. The game of
doubting itself presupposes certainty.   160.The
child learns by believing the adult. Doubt comes
after belief.   140. On judgements We do not
learn the practice of making empirical judgements
by learning rules we are taught judgements and
their connection with other judgements. A
totality of judgements is made plausible to us.
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The importance of use   In the beginning was
the deed (Goethe)   In 510 W introduces concept
of taking hold Zugreifen (like taking hold of
a towel) dont I take hold of a things name
like that, too?   10 Is 2x24 nonsense, W.
asks? the spoken or written sentence 2 x 2 4
in Chinese might have a different meaning or be
out and out nonsense, and from this is seen that
it is only in use that the proposition has its
sense.  
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11. We got to know the nature of calculating by
learning to calculate.   61. A meaning of a
word is a kind of employment of it. For it is
what we learn when the word is incorporated into
our language.   196. Sure evidence is what we
accept as sure, it is evidence that we go by in
acting surely, acting without any doubt.
  229. Our talk gets its meaning from the rest
of our actions.
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(Political) Implications?     Philosophy (bad
philosophy, sloppy thinking, sloppy speech)
happens when language goes on holiday, when it
is taken away from its everyday functions. Good
philosophy is in a way therapeutic, a process of
patiently assembling reminders of how terms
function within language games, of the importance
of language games, of the impossibility of
assimilating terms in one language game to
another language game..of coming to terms with
the realisation that there are no all-embracing
criteria of assessment of things and people in
the world, to which we could appeal, with
absolute certainty, with complete conviction,
the total absence of doubt (194), outside the
nest of propositions in which we dwell..
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The results of philosophy are the uncovering of
one or other piece of plain nonsense and of other
bumps that the understanding has got by running
its head up against the limits of language.
(119)   Where does our investigation get its
importance from, since it seems only to destroy
everything interesting, that is, all that is
great and important? (As it were all the
buildings, leaving only bits of stone and
rubble.) W answers What we are destroying is
nothing but houses of cards and we are clearing
up the ground of language on which they stand.
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166. The difficulty is to realize the
groundlessness of our believing.   336. But
what men and women consider reasonable or
unreasonable alters. At certain periods men and
women find reasonable what at other periods they
found unreasonable. And vice versa.   366.
Suppose it were forbidden to say I know and
only allowed to say I believe I know?   562.
..it is important to imagine a language in which
our concept knowledge does not exist.   443.
Suppose that in a certain language there were no
word corresponding to our know. The people
simply make assertions
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