A "slab" can refer to a slab of concrete used in a builder's yard or a slab of cake used in a cake shop. If it is the type of slab used in a builder's...
If the assistant had no intrinsic theory in their mind as to the meaning of words, they would be bringing onions as often as they brought slabs. This ...
Cavell in The Later Wittgenstein makes the point that Wittgenstein never denied that we can know what we think and feel. Other philosophers, I believe...
Exactly. I can say to a robot "bring me a slab", and it would be able to do so, even though it didn't know the meanings of the words. But it can only ...
Yes, the successful use of language requires several things, of which one is using words in the correct context. Another is knowing the meaning of the...
I agree that only part of my personal experience is that of a concept. If I have a personal experience as a consequence of looking at a wavelength of ...
As regards the thing the assistant brings to the builder, are you a Platonist, such that the slab is a Platonic object that exists independently of th...
True, if I said "xx xyx yyxx yxyx", and neither of us knew the meaning of any of the words used, would anything meaningful arise from our conversation...
We cannot learn the meaning of every word we use in language just from the dictionary, otherwise none of the words we use would have any connection wi...
True, they don't have the same meaning, only similar meanings. As Wittgenstein said, family resemblances. For the listener to understand the meaning o...
True, once "peffel" has been defined as "part my pen and part Eiffel Tower", anyone can use it in language regardless of my personal concepts of eithe...
How can a child successfully use the word "mwanasesere" if they don't know what is means? It is true that I can define "peffel" as part "pen and part ...
In the world is something X that has been named "X". The foreman experiences this something X in the world in his mind as the concept Y. His assistant...
There are different uses of the world "meaning". The absence of pain means a lot to me and "pain" means "a sharp unpleasant sensation usually felt in ...
We have to learn the meaning of a word before we can use it successfully. Consider the word "angst". We could use the dictionary, where "angst" is def...
The experience within my mind caused by a wavelength in the world of 700nm is a private experience, inexpressible to others, in the same sense as Witt...
A two way process, language shapes reality and reality shapes language. Richard Gaskin discusses Linguistic Idealism in the YouTube Determinate Conten...
Similar and same mean different things. "The Eiffel Tower is similar to the Blackpool Tower" is true. "The Eiffel Tower is the same as the Blackpool T...
I agree that in today's terms, a pre-language Neanderthal would surely be a Realist, with an instinctive belief in the reality of the world with all i...
Yes, if me and my assistant are talking facing a pile of things on the site, when I point to one of them and say "Bring me that", he will know exactly...
As definition i) is your definition of a slab but not mine, then we don't agree as to the definition of a "slab". For me a "slab" can be "a large or s...
I appreciate your pointing out that as I don't understand the Investigations, I should be learning from people wiser than me. The word "private" has m...
How can you know my concept of Slab? How do you know that our concepts of a "slab" are the same? My Form of Life has been unique to me, the jobs I hav...
Yes, it may be that Wittgenstein was opposed to theories as any theory can later be shown to be either wrong or incorrect. But if that advice was foll...
I agree that the Investigations refers to a world of board games, athletic games, ordinary life, civic life, teachers, pupils, communities and other f...
Cavell in The Later Wittgenstein writes that self-knowledge and ordinary language are two major themes in the Investigations. p 68 - for the nature of...
As Cavell wrote in The Later Wittgenstein, for Wittgenstein, knowledge starts with self-knowledge, not just simply adopting a method and then blindly ...
According to Wittgenstein's PI, what is the purpose of language? Wittgenstein may intend it to have other purposes than as described in the PI, but if...
True, whether I agree or not with the PI is in a sense secondary, as I am using it to help me develop my own understanding of the relationship between...
What textual evidence in the PI is there that the PI is not taking the position of Linguistic Idealism? Linguistic Idealism is the position that langu...
As @Banno wrote a while ago: I haven't paid this thread much attention, because definitions are not all that helpful, but further, any definition of a...
In Philosophy, some questions are more important than others Yes, it's as if I asked Wittgenstein how to get to Paris and rather than say that he didn...
Taking a few references at random, it does not seem to be the case that it is the reader's problem that they have difficulty in understanding Wittgens...
The word "unicorn" in language cannot refer to something in the world, as no unicorns exist in the world. But rather, the word "unicorn" refers to oth...
Yes, as private sensations such as pain drop out of consideration in the language game, as with the beetle in PI 293, objects in the world also drop o...
PI 43 For a large class of cases—though not for all—in which we employ the word "meaning" it can be defined thus: the meaning of a word is its use in ...
Yes, it is very difficult to make sense of the PI when we don't even know whether the objects he refers to, such as slabs, are those of the Nominalist...
PI 40 reads that a word such as "slab" doesn't get its meaning from corresponding with a slab in the world, as the word "Mr N N" doesn't get its meani...
As the meaning of "unicorn" in language doesn't depend on the existence of a unicorn in the world, then why should the meaning of "slab" in language d...
If only PI 43 subsection A had been "For that reason, I call this thing in front of me an "apple", even though "apple" is a universal concept and the ...
1) "the meaning of the word "slab" does not depend on the existence of slabs" 2) "slabs do exist in the world" Sentence 1) As the word "slab" does not...
As Wittgenstein writes in the Preface, a vagueness in the PI is inevitable, as he admits himself that he was unable to weld his results together. Pref...
You write that "slabs exist in the world", and also write that there can be the word "slab" in language even if there is no slab in the world. So what...
I agree. I feel I have clarified my own ideas about language and the relationship between the mind and world by studying Wittgenstein. He did raise im...
Yes, that is Wittgenstein's position, in that the meaning of the word "slab" does not depend on there being a slab in the world. It depends what you m...
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