The meeting is October 25th

The first part of this paper does a good job of laying out Cavell’s claim about the truth in skepticism: that knowledge is not our only connection, and that our relation is also based on our need to respond to each other. It amounts to a series of quotes of Cavell, so I am not going to try to reiterate or do the work of explaining it, though I can if anyone is interested or has trouble with any particular point.

The most interesting part of the paper to me is the connection to Rhees’ view of the place of conversation in understanding at page 17. Instead of explaining “my” “understanding” to you, as a goal which I could be more or less effective at (Sophistic persuasion); nor as something that (only) I have of myself, call it (Socratic) knowledge, Rhees is suggesting a back and forth process, a conversation. Not to equate each of “our” “understandings” (what Minar calls sophistry’s “passing-by of private wills”), nor even to come to a separate agreement (like a contract), but to work to move forward together, to learn about the other (and ourselves) through self-growth. And so not a pragmatism, nor teleology, nor ontology, because not a result, nor meeting a predetermined requirement, nor just accurately transferring information. These “solutions” all fear the truth that everything can fall apart, or come to not, but not because of the fault of language or that we are somehow unknowable (accepting skepticism’s conclusion). Minar says in conversation we are “speaking for oneself”, which I take to involve that our judgments reflect our lives, our interests, and so we are expressing our commitments, without assurance that my life continues on with yours. Thus Rhees’ sense of understanding involves an ongoing responsibility to be intelligible, to others, and for ourselves (Minar says “one takes on the burden of responsibility for what one says”). And, even if we go separate ways, we may be the better for it anyway. Cavell calls this the possibility of rational disagreement, even when there is no authority; because we now have made explicit the terms upon which we differ.

Serendipity? In an apparent dovetailing may I point out this book, The Hermeneutics of Original Argument, Demonstration, Dialectic, Rhetoric with a very good preview feature, here:

https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Hermeneutics_of_Original_Argument/H9K_rU1gvfUC?q=&gbpv=1#f=false

From the introduction, "...originally, and in Aristotle still, hermeneutics was the process itself of making things clear in talking about them. As such, logos, or speech,... is privileged insofar as for it alone bringing about aletheuein is possible, i.e., making unhidden what was previously hidden and covered up and putting it 'there,' in the open and at our disposal" (1).

Worth a look!

I did attend the meeting; some heavy hitters (Cora Diamond included, along with Marie McGinn, who took Minar to task about his characterization of a quote of hers--fireworks!). There was a lot of misunderstanding and underestimating the constant continuing threat of skepticism (that there is no fact ensuring understanding) in one way calling skepticism just a confusion (that Wittgenstein dissolved), but also not understanding that we can "live skepticism", from the desire to have something foundational and certain that removes my responsibility (right, rules, "forms of life"), or that we give up (believe we will, or can, never understand each other) and retreat to just "my" understanding, which is measured by simply comprehending words (or not), or fails because language cannot encompass "me".

Skepticism was also simply considered a philosophical problem and not a part of the human condition that is shaping modern society; that we live in a picture of the self which is based on the fear of others' separateness, cynicism about what is possible, and the human tendency to avoid responsibility. The paper is not just admonishing us (ethically) to do things differently, but is showing how our picture of the world and others (based on the adoption of classical philosophy's conception) is getting in the way of the recognition of the possibility--much less the duty--we have to make our interests intelligible through our commitment to be judged, and seeing what matters to you in what you say, rather than as an intellectual argument about opinions.

Some comments echoed my interest in the paper's unexplored hinting at "speaking for ourselves"--that an expression is sometimes the claiming of a self, who I will be (which ties into my discussion here about "when", and thus how, we have a self). Even though there may be a situation where there is no claim to authority (like knowledge), I am not just only trying to convince you of an opinion, but I am claiming the authority for me to give life (live in) our ordinary criteria, or commit to a new world by being its representative, answerable for my interests in it.

Nice. Would that I could have been there. As it stands I am having trouble tracking the various threads through the paper, especially given my only passing familiarity with Cavell and Rhees. But the piece set me to puzzling over the apparent desire to give priority to either scepticism or to certainty. We are not "always uncertain"; much of our daily living takes place within a frame of certainty. Our use of criteria in an attempt to justify certainty or scepticism only enters into a small portion of our world, those few occasions of hesitancy. Those criteria are public; or they are nothing. Hence we tend to talk about the stuff of which we are hesitant, the things about which we disagree.

But this seems to me to accord with the final quote.

But the piece set me to puzzling over the apparent desire to give priority to either scepticism or to certainty. We are not "always uncertain"; much of our daily living takes place within a frame of certainty. Our use of criteria in an attempt to justify certainty or scepticism only enters into a small portion of our world, those few occasions of hesitancy. Those criteria are public; or they are nothing. Hence we tend to talk about the stuff of which we are hesitant, the things about which we disagree. — Banno

There was actually a lot of skepticism about skepticism in that group. I understand where you are coming from (even if I don’t get it quite right here), but “certainty” with Cavell is not in the sense of everyday, say, confidence, punctuated by being lost as to what to do (when philosophy turns to examine our unspoken criteria). Certainty here is basically in the sense of a term, catching Wittgenstein’s “crystalline purity”, math-like knowledge, an outcome of scientific method, formal logic, “objectivity”, etc. The opposite side is the cynical acceptance that we cannot, or may never, be intelligible to each other (morally, artistically, individually), creating the internal idea of “my understanding” which I can then only hope to persuade you of, or that it is language that fails us in communicating it; in any event, that I am at least certain of myself, my unknowable specialness.

Both cases are projections of Wittgenstein’s insight that our criteria for judging something (reflected in—“shown” by—what we say in a situation) are an expression of our (public) interests in that thing, what matters to us (as a culture) about it, how we would judge it. Wittgenstein’s “diagnosis” is not of a sickness that is cured, but is his getting at the root causes creating these “lives” (pictures) of skepticism: our fear of relativism and our desire for foundation. In one case we deny criteria (judgment, of us), in the other, we impose and require only one (an answer with certainty).

The important part here is that “understanding” then is recognizing the interests and needs of the other because we can extrapolate those from what they say, rather than only making sense of the words on their face, ending in us just arguing about who’s right or retreating to just “my opinion”, detached from our reasons for committing to our words expressing us, our commitments, etc. Yes, our criteria are public, but they are nothing without our living in them, by them, or against them. As you point out, it is a rare instance when our criteria themselves run afoul or are extended into a new situation. But it is part of the human condition that everyday we take (or avoid) the responsibility to back our words and actions with our life (though, again, we may not be held to account), and thus it is an ongoing temptation for everyone to avoid that responsibility.

creating the internal idea of “my understanding” — Antony Nickles

If Wittgenstein draws a picture of such a thing, it is only to reject it - no?

I would hope that such august folk would reject the idea of some private understanding that was made manifest in word and deed, in favour of word and deed being one's understanding.

I'll pause at this point since it seems pivotal.

I’m going to say, not to reject” it, but to investigate it, through the criteria for it, as he found that those show what matters to us—is “expressed by grammar” PI#37—what judging it that way gets us, why we want “privacy”. If he is rejecting it, it implies he has a better picture, or that it doesn’t have any reason behind it, and Cavell’s basic claim is that Wittgenstein shows that skepticism haunts us all the time. Here, that the desire to be unknowable, or the attempt to control how we are known, or judged, is ever-present as a temptation which we can “live” by; thus everyday people retreat to saying they are entitled to their opinion (as if it were their identity), or that “they didn’t mean” what can only be construed as a passive-aggressive insult (when there is no other interpretation; no criteria or context for any other sense). But yes, the paper is differentiating from a private “understanding”, but not exactly trading it for a public one—though yes we are understood in our expressions and actions, judged through them. It is exactly because of that, if we conduct ourselves in a manner with that responsibility in mind, that we can “understand” the other because we can acknowledge or learn about their “reasons” for saying or doing something, in the sense of what matters to them in having done so (even despite what they say or didn’t “intend”). But this is a process of putting ourselves in their shoes in a sense, and not just judging them by our criteria.

creating the internal idea of “my understanding” which I can then only hope to persuade you of, or that it is language that fails us in communicating it; in any event, that I am at least certain of myself, my unknowable specialness. — Antony Nickles

@Banno this is not a claim (not how I see it) but just drawing the picture that is created from acquiescing to the skeptic’s conclusion, say, through cutting off the possibility of failure we may have, by creating a barrier for us from every being able to have had a chance, in an attempt to retain something certain about ourselves, our control.

If scepticism "haunts us all the time", then so does certainty. Consider our acceptance of the paper, the workshop, all the conversations therein, and then this thread; all showing the certainty within which this discussion occurs. Our certainty here is not the result of rational considerations of criteria.

It's what we do.

If scepticism "haunts us all the time", then so does certainty. — Banno

Right, but, as I said, we are not talking about ordinary certainty opposed to regular doubt. It’s a kind of story. We actually are scared of the ever-present truth of our human condition: that we are separate, that there is no guarantee that we will work out our differences, or that our criteria will always be sufficient, or that we won’t be wrong even after working to (pre)determine what is right, that we might still be guilty (or lost) after following all the rules, etc.

And in response to that (what is basically change, the future, etc.), philosophy turned our situation into Radical (world-destroying) “Skepticism” (do we “really” know…). But it’s a trick. We are the ones who turn our human condition into the “problem” of skepticism because then it can be “solved” by (mythical) “Certainty”, which will stand in for us and be universal, abstract, generalizable, infinite, perfect, foundational, etc. It is this convoluted desire to remove the need for the human that leads to the fantasy of metaphysics, positivism, essence, the thing-in-itself, “Real” as an objective quality, etc.

But these fantasies have a real-world point; we can’t just solve or dismiss the reasons for them. When Cavell is saying we can “live our skepticism”, it is because he is placing “skepticism” back in the frame of our ordinary lives (not as a philosophical problem). The fear still remains of our fallible human condition, and we still want “Certainty”; but he sees this as the desire for knowledge to take our place, when part of being human is taking responsibility for the future, changing who we think we are, accepting not another’s claim (as in argument) but taking on our duty when who they are is a claim on who we will be. That there is a grammar to the other, the moral realm, our selves, that requires something of us: changing how we see (judge) the other (our attitude, to their aspects), relinquishing our assumptions, acknowledging they are a person in pain and helping them, etc. and, in the case here: understanding their interests and desires through what they say, what matters to them in the criteria they use to judge, which is different from the picture of me having “my understanding” and you having yours and we either equate or not (only being happy with Certainty). I have tried to explain this as the difference between Wittgenstein’s depiction of “private” and the ordinary sense of something personal (as what matters to me).

and Cavell’s basic claim is that Wittgenstein shows that skepticism haunts us all the time. — Antony Nickles

If "us" refers to humanity, well I think this is a bit of an overstatement about what Wittgenstein is claiming. We can gain some insight if we take a look at a misunderstanding another philosopher had concerning this skepticism.

In the book by Norman Malcolm "Nothing is Hidden", Chapter 9 "Following a Rule", Malcolm presents Saul Kripke's view of the Private Language Argument with the following quote, "Wittgenstein has invented a new form of skepticism. Personally I am inclined to regard it as the most radical and original skeptical problem that philosophy has seen to date." Furthermore, Malcolm goes on to say, "According to Kripke this new form of skepticism carries the astounding implication that 'there can be no such thing as meaning anything by any word.'" Malcolm believes Kripke put forth this idea that Wittgenstein's "new form of skepticism" can be found in PI 201 in which Wittgenstein presents the paradox: "no course of action could be determine by a rule, because every course of action can be made out to accord with the rule." But for Malcolm, Kripke seem to ignore what follows when Wittgenstein continues with "It can be seen that there is a misunderstanding here from the mere fact that in the course of our argument we give one interpretation after another; as if each one contented us at least for a moment, until we thought of yet another standing behind it. What this shews is that there is a way of grasping a rule which is a not an interpretation, but which is exhibited in what we call "obeying" the rule" and "going against it" in actual cases. Hence there is an inclination to say: every action according to the rule is an interpretation. But we ought to retract the term "interpretation" to the situation of one expression of the rule for another." So is Wittgenstein capitulating to this "new form of skepticism"? Malcolm would say No. Malcolm says, "If an interpretation is not sufficient to fix the meaning of a rule, what more is required? Wittgenstein's answer is that what fixes the meaning of a rule is our customary way of applying the rule in particular cases. There is a way of acting that we call 'following the rule'. Indefinitely many other ways of acting are possible: but we do not call them 'following the rule'. Who is this we? It is virtually all of us who have been given the same initial explanation and examples. It is a fact that everyone, almost without exception, will apply the rule in new cases, all agreeing that this is the right way to apply it....If there was no we - if there was no agreement among those who have had the same training, as to what are the correct steps in particular case when following a rule- then there would be no wrong steps, or indeed any right ones."

Malcolm presents further analysis saying that Kripke was incline to think Wittgenstein endorsed this form of philosophical skepticism because he was working under the conception that "when one applies a rule, or a word, one is guided." He quotes Kripke "Normally, when we consider a mathematical rule as addition, we think of ourselves as guided in application of it to each new instance." But the "we" for Malcolm and Kripke is referring to people "when they are engaged in philosophical reflection about rules." Malcom continues "Kripke is trying to do something which, according to Wittgenstein, it is necessary to do in philosophy, namely 'to give a psychological exact account of the temptation to use a particular kind of expression' (PI 254). But as Wittgenstein also says: "Being unable - when we surrender ourselves to philosophical thought - to help saying such-and such; being irresistibility inclined to say it- does not mean being forced into an assumption, or having an immediate perception or knowledge of a state of affair. (PI 299)."

In summary, Wittgenstein is not addressing humanity but the philosophical minded. This "skepticism" is the result of the philosophical minded puzzlement and search for deeper explanations. But all is well with humanity. Because they keep talking, acting, and judging in similar, expected, and harmonious ways; we have meaning and understanding.

y

If "us" refers to humanity, well I think this is a bit of an overstatement about what Wittgenstein is claiming. — Richard B

I would take issue with Malcolm’s characterization of skepticism by way of Kripke, but there is already a discussion of rules and Kripke (a reading by Cavell coincidently) and those quotes of Wittgenstein’s, here. Imagining Wittgenstein somehow “solves” skepticism or dismisses it, does not take into account that his investigation destroys everything that is built in response to it only to see that part of it is true. There is no fact that will stop things from going sideways, from us turning out wrong about what we thought was right, in following a rule yet still being guilty because whether a rule was followed doesn’t take into account who we are.

And the concerns of philosophy do shape our culture; think of all the times you hear “that’s subjective”, or “just your opinion”. The desire for quantification, DNA evidence, and the mistrust of anything that requires our judgment, comes from our fear of being responsible for our relation to the world that is outside of knowledge. You follow a rule or not (that’s how we judge that action), but our reasons for doing so, our interests in it, are not “ determined”, as Wittgenstein here is saying. In the same way, there is no “fixed meaning” to the self, because whether we are “ourselves” (or just some brainwashed political mouthpiece) is gauged by our relation to the conformity (say, rules) that we desire to take away our responsibility, by simply following them. We want to “know” the other without having to respond to their otherness; we want to imagine we know their pain, rather than having to acknowledge them as a person in pain that needs help.

…all is well with humanity. Because they keep talking, acting, and judging in similar, expected, and harmonious ways; we have meaning and understanding. — Richard B

“All is well with humanity”? Sure we act (judge) in accordance most of the times, but we don’t always, as we don’t always understand each other. We (commonly) believe in the myth that for you to see my “point of view” all I need to do is speak “my understanding” of a subject, and you will, if I have spoken well, understand in the same way I do, but that picture allows me to hold my cards behind my back. To call this “skeptical” is because I am imagining “my understanding” as something precise and knowable and equatable, and I do that out of fear that I may never be understood, or because, when I say something, I am judged by it, regardless of something I imagine is left over for me to claim control, as “I didn’t mean that”. We are separate; philosophy has classically turned that into an intellectual problem (which you believe is solved), and not seen it as a basic condition (working situation) of being human (or not).

Did Wittgenstein change his mind on this:

T 6.36311 That the sun will rise to-morrow, is an hypothesis; and that means that we do not know
whether it will rise.

T 6.37 A necessity for one thing to happen because another has happened does not exist. There is only logical necessity.

T 6.375 As there is only a logical necessity, so there is only a logical impossibility.[/quote]

Did Wittgenstein change his mind on this:

T 6.36311 That the sun will rise to-morrow, is an hypothesis; and that means that we do not know
whether it will rise. — Fooloso4

I would say his thinking deepened. When he says “hypothesis” he is referring to a sense of “believe”. And it is satisfied in the case of the sun (as with believing it is raining outside), because we can know whether we are right or not when the sun comes out (or checking on the rain). This is a sense of belief, and thus a picture of knowledge. Later he realizes that not everything is subject to this sense of knowledge, and, in fact, that part of our lives (with others) does not involve this kind of knowing at all.

T 6.37 A necessity for one thing to happen because another has happened does not exist. There is only logical necessity. — Fooloso4

This craving for “necessity” was the driving force in the Tractatus (the only standard that was allowed). He later finds that there are other criteria for different things, and that, in the case of our relation to others, the goal that necessity would want: your knowledge of “my” understanding, works despite necessity, in fact, despite it not being a matter of knowledge at all.

T 6.375 As there is only a logical necessity, so there is only a logical impossibility. — Fooloso4

But this is only the way some things work (the criteria for some things), such as whether a rule was “followed” or not (you either do it or don’t). What he found was that the criteria for a thing reflect our interests in that thing. Here, we want assurance. What Rhees’ observation is (following later Wittgenstein), is that “understanding” one another is to see how things matter to the other by examining how we are judging a thing (our interests in it).

And it is satisfied in the case of the sun (as with believing it is raining outside), because we can know whether we are right or not when the sun comes out (or checking on the rain). — Antony Nickles

We can know that the sun rose today, but can we know that the sun will rise tomorrow? It seems clear that he did not think we could.

a picture of knowledge. — Antony Nickles

I think his picture of knowledge takes this into consideration. Perhaps his best expression of this is the river of knowledge from On Certainty.

We can know that the sun rose today, but can we know that the sun will rise tomorrow? It seems clear that he did not think we could. — Fooloso4

Yes, the sun. One type of thing. To the point here, we not only do not have a relationship with others based on knowledge, but our relation to the world at times is also not one for which the criteria of judgment is certainty of the future. My guess is that you are imagining every example leads to a conclusion about our approach to everything (that there is only one form of skepticism: the problem of a foundation for a particular criteria for knowledge).

I think his picture of knowledge takes this into consideration. Perhaps his best expression of this is the river of knowledge from On Certainty. — Fooloso4

It is unclear what your "this" is referring to. Also, again, I take you to be framing it that he only has one "picture of knowledge", and, for that matter, that there is only one sense of "certainty". We are here specifically talking about "understanding" and the workings and criteria for that, and also the picture of that which comes from the fear of skepticism and the desire for knowledge to be the sole criteria in that case. That is to say that I don't find where this is relevant to the matter at hand.

@Banno @Richard B @Fooloso4

Understanding "strange" people

"[In a country that is strange to us because we do not understand the traditions of the people (even knowing the language)]...one human being can be a complete enigma to another. ...We do not understand the people. ...We cannot find our feet with them." — Investigations 3rd, p. 223

Here it might appear Wittgenstein is saying that, once we understand their traditions, we will understand the people. But it is not a matter of learning a practice, but of "find[ing] our feet with them". I am taking this as the process of understanding others that Minar is claiming Rhees is drawing out from Wittgenstein. My point is that this sense of putting ourselves in their shoes is not to learn, say, how to do a practice correctly, but in grasping what is important to the people by learning what matters to them about the practice, because their interest in it is based on how they judge it (as a note on method: the criteria they use as seen through what they say when doing it).

On page 181, Wittgenstein casts "strange" as not just outside the workings of a practice (as if it were just a matter of knowledge of those workings themselves (that our options are only a judgment of normal or not), but that we may judge that "This is a different type of [person]." (simply substituting "man"). Trying to make some sense of this: we see them as a person, but of a different "type" (then us), apart from just different (surprising) behavior or (unknown) practices. The structure of this judgment opens up the possibility that we can be, and thus become, the "same" type of person.

What "type" means here (and even "same") is in need of some unpacking, but I would first say that, as it relates to "understanding" others, "same" is not an equation of some "understanding" each of us have (thus not an agreement in that). If people are judged as a type, what separates classes of people is not their, say, different opinions or conclusions, but the grouping of people with similar interests, or, as Wittgenstein analogously says elsewhere: that we do not agree on definitions to communicate, we share judgments. Thus, here, to understand the other, we must find out their interest in--reflected in their criteria for--judging as they do.

What I feel remains to be explored further is the process of "finding our feet with them", say, as a matter of imagining ourselves as them, getting at why one might want to judge as they do. Maybe: in taking them seriously; allowing another's reasons to be or become intelligible; respecting their interests by taking their expressions as a commitment of their self, their character as it were (what "type" of person they are). I take this not as a matter of critique, but of letting them be "strange" to us without rejection (tolerating but not assuming/resigned to difference); with open curiosity, (cultural) humility (that my interests and context are not everyone's). In a sense: understanding as empathy; understanding in the sense of: being understanding (Websters: vicariously experiencing the [interests] of another; imagining the other's attitudes as legitimate; the imaginative projection of [myself] into [the other] so that [they] appear to be infused with [me, being a person]).

Yes, the sun. One type of thing. — Antony Nickles

There are several issues raised including what a law of nature establishes, the problem of induction, contingency and necessity.

It is unclear what your "this" is referring to. — Antony Nickles

Contingency, certainty, science, nature ...

My guess is that you are imagining every example leads to a conclusion about our approach to everything (that there is only one form of skepticism: the problem of a foundation for a particular criteria for knowledge). — Antony Nickles

You should be skeptical of imagining what I am imagining. What you are imagining that I am imagining is wrong.

I take you to be framing it that he only has one "picture of knowledge", and, for that matter, that there is only one sense of "certainty". — Antony Nickles

Again, you are wrong. It is counterproductive to make conjectures and argue against them rather than addressing what I have actually said.

The problem of skepticism can be framed in terms of the question of what can be known, which leads to the question of knowledge. If you are interested in what I have said, the thread An Analysis of "On Certainty" would be a good place to start.

That is to say that I don't find where this is relevant to the matter at hand. — Antony Nickles

Based on the title of the workshop:

‘Disappointment with criteria – Cavell, Rush Rhees, and skepticism’. — Antony Nickles

I don't see why you would think that what I quoted from Wittgenstein is not relevant.

Imagining Wittgenstein somehow “solves” skepticism or dismisses it, does not take into account that his investigation destroys everything that is built in response to it only to see that part of it is true. There is no fact that will stop things from going sideways, from us turning out wrong about what we thought was right, in following a rule yet still being guilty because whether a rule was followed doesn’t take into account who we are. — Antony Nickles

This "skepticism of meaning" is a sickness of the philosophical minded whose intelligence is bewitched by means of language. Wittgenstein is neither solving it nor dismisses it, but through demonstration dissolving the puzzlement the philosophical minded have created.

Because we have agreement in definition and in judgment, we have a means of communication, this is called a language. This does not mean, at times, things will not go "sideways.", but in principle, must work most of the time. If this agreement does not mostly occur, we do not have a language at all; thus, there is nothing to be skeptical about.

From On Certainty 115 "If you tried to doubt everything, you would not get as far as doubting anything. The game of doubting itself presupposes certainty."

You should be skeptical of imagining what I am imagining. What you are imagining that I am imagining is wrong. — Fooloso4

I didn’t realize you were that guy. I stand by my earlier offense and decision. Please don’t address me until you can treat other people with respect and apologize for what I hope you can at some point see is regrettable behavior.

If this agreement does not mostly occur, we do not have a language at all; thus, there is nothing to be skeptical about. — Richard B

I agree that most of the time doubt is not an issue. I also agree that philosophy has a certain (radical) version of skepticism. As Descartes says, “Some years ago I was struck by how many false things I had believed, and by how doubtful was the structure of beliefs that I had based on them.” Wittgenstein sees that the pictures that philosophy creates are based on a desire for knowledge (“purity”) that will solve what philosophy framed as the skeptical “problem”. However, Wittgenstein goes on to see that the workings of our relationship to others is not one of knowledge, but that the desire (for our relation to be based on something other than me) is a basic human response to (the fear of) the fact that we are separate from others, that this is part of the human condition (and not just an intellectual problem). My claim is that because we are always in this (limited, uncertain) condition to others, the fear of it, and the desire to remove ourselves from it, have affected our culture and lives and how we “understand” each other. This is set out better and more thoroughly in the paper, and, with hope, above.

However, Wittgenstein goes on to see that the workings of our relationship to others is not one of knowledge, but that the desire (for our relation to be based on something other than me) is a basic human response to (the fear of) the fact that we are separate from others, that this is part of the human condition (and not just an intellectual problem). — Antony Nickles

I like to make a couple points here. First, Wittgenstein is not commenting on the human condition, but focuses on the intellectual problem the philosophical minded get themselves into. For example, from On Certainty 467, "I am sitting with a philosopher in the garden; he says again and again "I know that that's a tree", pointing to a tree that is near us. Someone else arrives and hears this, and I tell him: "This fellow isn't insane. We are only doing philosophy." Notice, he did not pull this "someone" over and explain, "hey, this discussion we are having, it is really important to understand, it leads to the truth of skepticism, and because of that we just have to accept an unknowable world and acknowledge other minds." Second, how this idea of "our relationship to others is not one of knowledge" that Wittgenstein supposedly puts forth, is a bit misleading. For example, from On Certainty 10 "I know that a sick man is lying here? Nonsense! I am sitting at his bedside, I am looking attentively into his face.- So, I don't know, then, that there is a sick man lying here? Neither the question nor the assertion makes sense." Again, this is another clue that Wittgenstein is not accepting "the truth of skepticism." What he is doing is showing how the concept "to know" does not make sense in this circumstance. Additionally, I do not think he is carrying out some sort of psychological investigation that when people are faced with the truth of skepticism of other minds that they will become detached from their fellow human beings, he is performing a philosophical investigation.

[ redo ]

Wittgenstein… focuses on the intellectual problem the philosophical minded get themselves into. — Richard B

We agree on that. I’m only trying to say that there was a purpose: the “investigation” is to find out why they get themselves into it (why he did), why they want it to be a problem they can have a solution for. It looks like insanity, but this is exactly my point: it is our duty to humanize the Other, even the Skeptic, to find and imagine intelligible interests they may have. This is Wittgenstein’s struggle with his interlocutor, his fight with himself (the author of the Tractatus).

"I know that a sick man is lying here? Nonsense! I am sitting at his bedside, I am looking attentively into his face.- So, I don't know, then, that there is a sick man lying here? Neither the question nor the assertion makes sense."

What he is doing is showing how the concept "to know" does not make sense in this circumstance. — Richard B

This is a perfect quote to bring up, and you are absolutely correct, but there is a point to it—other than just “hogwash!”. You say he does not say there is a truth to skepticism (he also does not “show it” as some hold over from the Tractatus is his only means). He is showing us examples of what we ordinarily might say and do as evidence of the structure of something (it’s “grammar”), here: our relation to the Other.

In order to see the point of a Wittgensteinian example, you must see it for yourself; your assent is the only proof. Most of the time he asks a question that you must stretch your way of thinking to see; to see it from a different position—take a different interest in it. (Nietzsche will do this too; they court misunderstanding so that you can’t get the point unless you change who you are, how you see the world). Wittgenstein here is enacting an Interlocutor, who is playing the part of someone who wants our relationship to the Other to be one of knowledge.

When Wittgenstein says “Nonsense!”, what he says next is not that this is a situation where we cannot doubt, or that we must know, or that we are certain (because none of those need be the case); what he says is that he is “attending” to the person. He does not have knowledge that they are sick, he is responding to the person being sick. The point is that knowledge is not how we relate to other people; it is not how it works. What is essential about others is that we acknowledge them. Right there is a person in a state that is making a claim on you to accept or deny, respond to or ignore.

The truth of skepticism is that knowledge cannot solve the fact of the other’s… otherness, their separateness, their opaque quality to us. As he says elsewhere, if we see someone in pain, we don’t ask whether we know it or not (PI 3rd, p.223), and that is because we help them (or not). We are not of the “opinion” people have a soul (p.178), not because we “believe” it, but because it’s not a matter of knowledge (or not) at all. The way it works is that we treat them as if they have a soul or not, as a human or not (we have an “attitude towards [them]”). The truth is, however, that it is not only philosophy that fears doubt and craves certainty, but all of us, thus why Rhees is trying to make us see that understanding is not a matter of epistemology, but of ethical behavior.

The above can be summarized by saying that "other minds" is an oxymoron.

Epistemic uncertainty is meaningful when identifying a behavioral disposition - for example one can doubt whether or not another person's behavior is receptive, competent or genuine, but to empathise with another person isn't to feel or think on their behalf, even if the practice of empathy lends insight with respect to their behavioral disposition.

Nevertheless, one's beliefs concerning a person's behavioural disposition effects the course and extent of one's empathy towards that person.

@Banno @Richard B

The above can be summarized by saying that "other minds" is an oxymoron. — sime

Well I hope I get more credit than that, but I understand the confusion. I put “other minds” in the OP (I have changed it now) only because traditional philosophy had named the issues surrounding our relations to others: “the problem of other minds”. That someone has a “mind” is not the picture of the other I am arguing for; what I am doing is continuing on from Wittgenstein’s investigation into why philosophy looked at it that way, and from Cavell’s reading of him that that desire (for knowledge to be the “answer”) actually shows something about our situation as humans and thus affects our ordinary relation to other people. To catch up on all that would, I would suggest, at least take reviewing all the posts here, if not also reading Minar’s paper.

But let’s just stick with how your post relates to and interprets this issue. I take “behavioral disposition” to mean the other’s (outward) expressions (let’s set aside our history with them, the situation we find ourselves in, and how different types of things are handled in different ways, e.g., pain, opinions, excuses). I take you to be claiming that it only makes sense (is meaningful to us) to doubt another’s expressions in so much as we are judging that they are lying, being fake, making stuff up, etc., and that we have nothing to go on to make that decision other than their expressions. I agree. However, the resolution of even just that doubt may not be possible, or we can just be wrong, which shows that, in an ordinary way, “knowledge” of the other cannot do what we want it to (ensure our judgment of the other; remove or answer our doubt). But Wittgenstein shows us that expressions are not just information about the other; that they reveal us, what is essential to us. What we say reflects our interests in what we are talking about. Our criteria for judgment show what matters to us, is meaningful to us. The idea is that we can “read into” a person, not to get at an object of knowledge, e.g., their “mind” or “their understanding”, but to understand where they are coming from.

You frame Rhees’ version of understanding as if he wants you “to feel or think on their behalf”. But to feel on their behalf is to sympathize with them, in the sense of coming to a common feeling (as if this kind of understanding were not a rational process). To think for them is like putting words in their mouth (rather than reasons behind their words); as if it were a matter of just the right articulation; or, as Socrates emulates, making the strongest argument we can for another’s claim to knowledge. Of course it is good practice not to judge what someone says too quickly, not to be dismissive, or think we know what someone is trying to say immediately, or from, say, the title of a discussion ;) . However, just understanding, in this version of making another’s words make sense, is to treat what we say to each other as removed from who we are, what it says about us, and our responsibility to our saying it. Wittgenstein makes this point in his use of the term “expression”, in that what we say expresses (reveals) who we are, why we are saying it, what we are committing to and standing for. As you say “the practice of empathy lends insight with respect to their behavioral disposition.”

…one's beliefs concerning a person's behavioural disposition effects the course and extent of one's empathy towards that person. — sime

Yes, this is the flip side of the coin. That we can understand a person through what they say and do (that this is the mechanics of it, logically, structurally) means that it also works inversely that we can take them for what we would have them be. Thus that we can have no willingness to see another’s expressions as intelligible of interests other than ours (or what we simply assume theirs are) because we already have a judgment about people who act a certain way or say certain things (or look a certain way). We refuse the conversation Rhees is suggesting; another way to put this is that we refuse our friendship, any possible community with the person.

[delete]

That someone has a “mind” is not the picture of the other I am arguing for; what I am doing is continuing on from Wittgenstein’s investigation into why philosophy looked at it that way, and from Cavell’s reading of him that that desire (for knowledge to be the “answer”) actually shows something about our situation as humans and thus affects our ordinary relation to other people. — Antony Nickles

One area I believe we can agree on is Wittgenstein's pointing out the importance "of natural actions and reactions that come before language and are not the result of thought." From Wittgenstein: A Religious Point of View, Malcolm says the following:

"A leading problem of philosophy for many centuries has been the existence of other minds. Here it has seemed that it requires very sophisticated reasoning for a person to assure himself that those other 'walking and speaking figures' have minds and souls, just as he himself has. But in fact a normal human being does not have this doubt that those other creatures, which resemble him, might be automatons; nor does he go through subtle reasoning to remove doubt. Wittgenstein dismisses the famous 'argument from analogy':

'You say you take care of a man who groans, because experience has taught you that you yourself groan when you feel such-and-such. but since in fact you don't make any such inference, we can abandon the argument from analogy' (Zettel, 537)

Instead of this supposed reasoning, which could be carried out in language, Wittgenstein calls attention to natural actions and reactions that come before language and are not the result of thought.

'It helps here to remember that it is a primitive reaction to tend to treat the part that hurts when someone else is in pain; and not merely when oneself is - and so to pay attention to the pain-behavior of others, as one does not pay attention to one's pain behavior.'(Zettel, 540)

The notion that those people around me might be automatons without minds or souls cannot get a foothold with me. I react to the expressions in their faces of fear, joy, interest-without the mediation of any reasoning."

What I feel remains to be explored further is the process of "finding our feet with them", say, as a matter of imagining ourselves as them, getting at why one might want to judge as they do. Maybe: in taking them seriously; allowing another's reasons to be or become intelligible; respecting their interests by taking their expressions as a commitment of their self, their character as it were (what "type" of person they are). I take this not as a matter of critique, but of letting them be "strange" to us without rejection (tolerating but not assuming/resigned to difference); with open curiosity, (cultural) humility (that my interests and context are not everyone's). In a sense: understanding as empathy; understanding in the sense of: being understanding (Websters: vicariously experiencing the [interests] of another; imagining the other's attitudes as legitimate; the imaginative projection of [myself] into [the other] so that [they] appear to be infused with [me, being a person]). — Antony Nickles

I am a little unclear what you mean by "Wittgenstein's strange people", but based on the cited paragraph, it could mean people who you may find difficult to understand.

In "On Certainty", sprinkled through out the book, Wittgenstein imagines meeting with all sorts of "strange" people. In these passages, the people hold positions, reasons, beliefs, ideas that differ or conflict with the positions he holds. Here are just some I came an across: 85, 92, 106, 108, 231, 239, 336, 338, 430, 608-612, 667, and 671. In these examples, the positions under examination are fundamental to how one looks at the world, that guides how one acts and reacts in the world. For example,

OC 92 "However, we can ask: May someone have telling grounds for believing that the earth has only existed for a short time, say since his own birth? Suppose he had always been told that, - would he have any good reason to doubt that? Men have believed that they could make rain; why should not a king be brought up in the belief that the world began with him? And if Moore and this king were to meet and discuss, could Moore really prove his belief to be the right one? I do not say that Moore could not convert the king to his view, but it would be a conversion of a special kind; the king would be brought to look at the world in a different way. Remember that one is sometimes convinced of the correctness of a view by its simplicity or symmetry, i.e. there are what induces one to go over to this point of view. One then simply says something like: "That's how it must be."

or

OC 231 "If someone doubted whether the earth had existed a hundred years ago, I should not understand, for this reason: I would not know what a person would still allow to be counted as evidence and what not."

In both of these cases, it is difficult to comprehend how empathy is going to lead to understanding. How we view the world, how we react to the world and to others, how we make judgments in particualr circumstances, can differ dramatically. Understanding through language would be almost or just impossible in these scenarios. But what about "understanding as empathy"? The problem I see here is if I am to picture myself in the other person's "shoes", what am I to think about the picture? I can't utilize my concepts to articulate what I think, they may have no application whatsoever. What we have here is simply a conversion to another way of life. We would need to start over again, as a child who is born into this world, to wipe the slate clean so to speak and start anew.