• Shawn
    12.6k
    After starting my topic on the Tractatus Logico Philosophicus I was wondering if anyone would be interested in a reading group on the Philosophical Investigations? We already have a lot of content from @Sam26 on the topic and I suppose I can ask @Banno to help us with this thread on the Investigations.

    Thoughts, comments, ideas welcome.
  • Valentinus
    1.6k
    I am interested.
    Sam26 has done an excellent job but he just left the forum. I am slowly reading that thread.
    I guess my first question is why you want to start over.
  • Shawn
    12.6k
    Sam26 has done an excellent job but he just left the forum.Valentinus

    Did he leave for good? Oh dear, this is news to me. What a loss if it is permanent. I know he's busy writing a book and all; but, I do hope he can visit us once in a blue moon.

    I guess my first question is why you want to start over.Valentinus

    I think just to get a better grasp on the book. I was unsure if I should skip it after my Ongoing Tractatus-Logico-Philosophicus thread and delve into Naming and Necessity by Kripke.

    What do you think?
  • Valentinus
    1.6k
    My experience may be a bit of an outlier.
    I read Philosophical Investigations before I even knew about or had read the Tractatus. So my engagement with the work is not concerned with completing a project or something like a replacement to other systems. The charm in PI, if you will allow me the expression, is the possibility that we need not be captive to certain problems.
    In saying that, I am not dismissing Tractatus. I am not interested in establishing a circle of the only things that can be said.
    The idea that we can stop repeating certain arguments is attractive.
  • Shawn
    12.6k
    The idea that we can stop repeating certain arguments is attractive.Valentinus

    Hit the nail on the head with this comment. Philosophy was never the same after the PI.

    Do you have any recommendations for a companion to use alongside the PI?
  • Valentinus
    1.6k
    Do you have any recommendations for a companion to use alongside the PI?Posty McPostface

    That is a great challenge. I need to think about that.
  • Shawn
    12.6k
    That is a great challenge. I need to think about that.Valentinus

    Okay. I have someone in mind. Like PMS Hacker. I also think something from Routledge might be appropriate with the audience. In fact, I'm recommending something simple, as the book is long and can be a challenge. (I doubt we'll get through the whole thing, for the matter.)
  • macrosoft
    674
    Do you have any recommendations for a companion to use alongside the PI?Posty McPostface

    If I can pop in, I am reading Groundless Grounds right now. It concentrates on what Wittgenstein and Heidegger have in common. It's written by Lee Braver, whose two favorite philosophers are...Wittgenstein and Heidegger. Beyond that it's just very good so far.

    So I'd say it's worth considering. (And I am interested in looking at PI again and joining the thread..)
  • Shawn
    12.6k
    If I can pop in, I am reading Groundless Grounds right now. It concentrates on what Wittgenstein and Heidegger have in common. It's written by Lee Braver, whose two favorite philosophers are...Wittgenstein and Heidegger. Beyond that it's just very good so far.macrosoft

    Interesting recommendation. I might have to pick up that book myself, heh.

    So I'd say it's worth considering. (And I am interested in looking at PI again and joining the thread..)macrosoft

    Awesome to have you on board.
  • macrosoft
    674
    Interesting recommendation. I might have to pick up that book myself, heh.Posty McPostface

    I don't know if you've checked out Heidegger, but it's probably a great way in for a Wittgenstein fan.

    Awesome to have you on board.Posty McPostface

    Thanks!
  • Shawn
    12.6k
    Heideggermacrosoft

    The ambiguity of what he writes about has scared me from treating him seriously. I value preciseness in meaning and clarity in thought above all else.

    Thanks!macrosoft

    :up:
  • NuncAmissa
    47
    Sadly, I have no philosophical background. No books, no authors, no whatsoever.
    Do you have any good philosophies out there that you might recommend to a beginner like me?
  • Shawn
    12.6k
    Sadly, I have no philosophical background. No books, no authors, no whatsoever.
    Do you have any good philosophies out there that you might recommend to a beginner like me?
    NuncAmissa

    Well, you're in the right place. I hope to begin this reading group in two days when this thread dies down. Friday we'll be starting. Personally, I would recommend Bertrand Russell. Others will differ obviously.
  • I like sushi
    4.3k
    How exactly are you going to go about this? I’m interested.
  • Banno
    23.1k
    Did he leave for good?Posty McPostface

    He'll be back. Might be a while.
  • Shawn
    12.6k
    How exactly are you going to go about this? I’m interested.I like sushi

    By astutetly following a companion on the topic.
  • Shawn
    12.6k


    Oh, okay. Hope all goes well.
  • macrosoft
    674
    The ambiguity of what he writes about has scared me from treating him seriously. I value preciseness in meaning and clarity in thought above all else.Posty McPostface

    I relate to the quest for clarity and precision --as much as can be had without betraying the object being investigated. If, however, the object itself does not exist as a crystalline structure, the demand for clarity no longer makes sense. Or rather we can ask that the thinker/writer make it easy to follow their investigation but not that her results be simple to digest --especially if those results themselves offend our taste for the crystalline and unambiguous. I think this is the case with PI. It's a hard pill to swallow.

    I think Witt hammers us with examples, so that we generalize some theses. Heidegger (among other things) really does try to present his results abstractly, with few examples. Yet (to some degree) they seem to be pointing out the same kind of sub-theoretical background that makes the theoretical foreground possible. Maybe it's like a foundation of 'animal thinking' which is mostly automatic. Then our bright-light theory can't see its own legs and gets into trouble trying to invent artificial legs, walking all the time on its living legs to do so without wanting to see it.

    I just ordered On Certainty. When I first read that book (many years ago, and lost my used yellow copy who knows when), I thought it somewhat boring. Now I think I know what he was after, so I'm looking forward to reading it in a new light. I think the idea is (sorta-kinda) that our practice is far more complex and inexplicit than we can grasp with an explicit theory. Language is a primary example. The fantasy is that we can capture what is 'infinite' in listening and speaking in a finite set of propositions. This dark infinity of the space from which we listen is a mundane infinity, though. It's too close and not too far away to see well.
  • Shawn
    12.6k
    I just ordered On Certainty.macrosoft

    Oh dear. That book is impenetrably dense.
  • I like sushi
    4.3k


    A “companion” meaning what?
  • Streetlight
    9.1k
    On Certainty is fantastic. Every time I came back to it, I'm blown away. The sensitivity with which Witty approaches language is just unmatched in it.
  • Shawn
    12.6k
    A “companion” meaning what?I like sushi

    Meaning, a reading guide to the PI. We would follow one chapter or less at a time.
  • Shawn
    12.6k
    Not a fan?macrosoft

    No, just haven't made it through the book. It's a difficult book by my standards. I mean, nobody discusses the philosophy of mathematics by Wittgenstein either due to the gravity of the material.
  • macrosoft
    674
    No, just haven't made it through the book. It's a difficult book by my standards. I mean, nobody discusses the philosophy of mathematics by Wittgenstein either due to the gravity of the material.Posty McPostface

    I like his philosophy of mathematics. It's weird and piecemeal, but illuminating. Braver considers some of it among his best work.
  • Shawn
    12.6k
    I like his philosophy of mathematics.macrosoft

    What is that? I'm interested in your input on the matter.
  • Terrapin Station
    13.8k
    Ooh, ooh, I'll participate as Statler and Waldorf.

    hqdefault.jpg
  • Shawn
    12.6k
    Ooh, ooh, I'll participate as Statler and Waldorf.Terrapin Station

    Oh, great. Now, we have the jokester on board too. :)
  • Shawn
    12.6k
    I want to inform that I won't be able to handle the managerial aspect of the reading group. My role here is only that of an orchestrator for it.

    Anyone up for the job?
  • macrosoft
    674
    What is that? I'm interested in your input on the matter.Posty McPostface

    It's hard to sum up. It fits in with the later Wittgenstein as I remember it. One example was his idea that the 'paradise' of Cantor's set theory wasn't really that exciting (demystifying tendency.) He had intuitionist , finitist, and formalist leanings at different times.

    I must say that math is a rich territory for philosophy. It is the ideal language in some ways and yet no one is quite sure what it is talking about. Given the form of the TLP, you can imagine why Witt would have thought about it. (Turing was one of his students, btw.)
  • Shawn
    12.6k
    I must say that math is a rich territory for philosophy. It is the ideal language in some ways and yet no one is quite sure what it is talking about.macrosoft

    Doesn't it talk about reality? Here's me hovering around Platonism.
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