By the author of WAVERLEY
Mikhail Zeleny
<DA...@psuvm.psu.edu> (Dennis Beach) writes:
|Andrew Dinn says:
||I would guess so. In all my (extensive) trawling of recorded
||Ludwiggery I never yet found mention that he attended classes by
||Russell, let alone walked out of one. One might justly claim that he
||walked out on Russell's philosophy.
|One might also claim that he justly walked out on Russell's philosophy.
"The whole of Anglo-Saxon philosophy has undergone Russell's influence,
for better of worse. This is, moreover, the only living philosophy
today. It is sufficient praise of an author to state that a philosophy
that ignores him is a dead philosophy." -Jules Vuillemin
By contrast, Ludwig Wittgenstein stands in the same reciprocal relation
to middlebrow anomic impotence, as Ayn Rand -- to lowbrow resentment.
|- - - - - - - - -
|Dennis Beach
|da...@psuvm.psu.edu
cordially, | Why is it that all those who have become eminent
mikhail "el desdichado" | in philosophy or politics or poetry or art
zel...@gevalt.mit.edu | are clearly of an atrabilious temperament?
KRESSJA
>In article <93251.01...@psuvm.psu.edu>
><DA...@psuvm.psu.edu> (Dennis Beach) writes:
>
>|Andrew Dinn says:
>
>||I would guess so. In all my (extensive) trawling of recorded
>||Ludwiggery I never yet found mention that he attended classes by
>||Russell, let alone walked out of one. One might justly claim that he
>||walked out on Russell's philosophy.
>
>|One might also claim that he justly walked out on Russell's philosophy.
>
>"The whole of Anglo-Saxon philosophy has undergone Russell's influence,
>for better of worse. This is, moreover, the only living philosophy
>today. It is sufficient praise of an author to state that a philosophy
>that ignores him is a dead philosophy." -Jules Vuillemin
>
>By contrast, Ludwig Wittgenstein stands in the same reciprocal relation
>to middlebrow anomic impotence, as Ayn Rand -- to lowbrow resentment.
Not very accurate M.Z. Almost all the analysts I know consider Wittgenstein
to be of greater consequence than Russell. Do you have the same sort of
grudge against Wittgenstein as you have against Arendt?
-JK
P.S. Hello Dennis. Good to see you here.
____________________________________________________________________________
| | |
| John Kress | "The last thing *I* should promise would be to 'improve' |
| | mankind. No new idols are erected by me; let the old |
| | ones learn what feet of clay mean." |
| | -Nietzsche, Ecce Homo |
|________________|___________________________________________________________|
Mikhail Zeleny
kre...@ctrvx1.vanderbilt.edu (KRESSJA) writes:
|In article <26lb0f$b...@senator-bedfellow.MIT.EDU>:
|zel...@gevalt.mit.edu (Mikhail Zeleny) writes:
||In article <93251.01...@psuvm.psu.edu>
||<DA...@psuvm.psu.edu> (Dennis Beach) writes:
|||Andrew Dinn says:
||||I would guess so. In all my (extensive) trawling of recorded
||||Ludwiggery I never yet found mention that he attended classes by
||||Russell, let alone walked out of one. One might justly claim that he
||||walked out on Russell's philosophy.
|||One might also claim that he justly walked out on Russell's philosophy.
||"The whole of Anglo-Saxon philosophy has undergone Russell's influence,
||for better of worse. This is, moreover, the only living philosophy
||today. It is sufficient praise of an author to state that a philosophy
||that ignores him is a dead philosophy." -Jules Vuillemin
||
||By contrast, Ludwig Wittgenstein stands in the same reciprocal relation
||to middlebrow anomic impotence, as Ayn Rand -- to lowbrow resentment.
|Not very accurate M.Z. Almost all the analysts I know consider
|Wittgenstein to be of greater consequence than Russell. Do you
|have the same sort of grudge against Wittgenstein as you have
|against Arendt?
Well then, you might try spending less time on the couch, getting
your philosophical values instead from the people who practice
living philosophy. In this instance, a good first approximation
will be found in Vuillemin's point, incidentally made to a French
audience. Think about Russell's contributions, as exemplified by
the reflexive paradox, ramified type theory, logical analysis of
definite descriptions, theory of acquaintance, or logical atomism.
Note that it is in the nature of these contributions to extend our
knowledge by encouraging further developments along their lines.
By contrast, Wittgenstein's work ineluctably leads to a conception
of philosophy that is powerless to resolve any substantive issues,
a discipline forever condemned to reiterate Oakeshott's "eternal
conversation of mankind". In other words, bullshit, on which see
Harry Frankfurt's eponymous article. As for my attitude, what you
misinterpret as a grudge, is but contempt for what Ernest Gellner
aptly called "the Soft Porn of Irrationalism". My own preference
in that genre is for the hardcore, exemplified by the apophthegms
of Gorgias and the narratives of Foucault. Framed between these
two, LW looks wan and otiose, much as a coy closeted toilet queen
looks next to an in-your-face leather fistfucker. Now go forth
and tell *that* to your analysts.
|-JK
|
|P.S. Hello Dennis. Good to see you here.
| ____________________________________________________________________________
|| | |
|| John Kress | "The last thing *I* should promise would be to 'improve' |
|| | mankind. No new idols are erected by me; let the old |
|| | ones learn what feet of clay mean." |
|| | -Nietzsche, Ecce Homo |
||________________|___________________________________________________________|
KRESSJA
As I have remarked before, your personal animus, however trenchant,
is insufficient to justify such things as the consigning of L.W. to
the pits of "middlebrow anomic impotence."
>Harry Frankfurt's eponymous article. As for my attitude, what you
>misinterpret as a grudge, is but contempt for what Ernest Gellner
>aptly called "the Soft Porn of Irrationalism". My own preference
>in that genre is for the hardcore, exemplified by the apophthegms
>of Gorgias and the narratives of Foucault. Framed between these
>two, LW looks wan and otiose, much as a coy closeted toilet queen
>looks next to an in-your-face leather fistfucker.
Your aesthetic judgements are colored by your own bias vis a vis L.W.
IMPO Wittgenstein seems bright and mordant compared to Russell and
Whitehead, et al.
-JK
Mikhail Zeleny
|In article <26lr96$g...@senator-bedfellow.MIT.EDU>
|zel...@gevalt.mit.edu (Mikhail Zeleny) writes:
|||||Andrew Dinn says:
What personal animus might you be talking about, dear boy? In
calling the post-Tractarean LW a bullshit artist, I am alluding to
the well-known *technical* sense of the term, obliging you with a
reference thereto. You would do better to think about the issues
involved, which are laid out in plain sight, before rattling off
yet another tiresome condemnation of my alleged personal biases.
Likewise, you might try reflecting on the means wreteby you purport
to distinguish the latter from rational judgments based on detailed
and considered knowledge of the subject matter. In the meantime,
here is a free sample of Frankfurt for your personal delectation:
The contemporary proliferation of bullshit also has deeper
sources, in various forms of skepticism which deny that we
can have any reliable access to an objective reality and
which therefore reject the possibility of knowing how
things truly are. These ``anti-realist'' doctrines
undermine confidence in the value of disinterested efforts
to determine what is true and what is false, and even in
the intelligibility of the notion of objective inquiry.
One response to this loss of confidence has been a retreat
from the discipline required by dedication to the ideal of
{\it correctness} to a quite different sort of discipline,
which is imposed by pursuit of an alternative ideal of {\it
sincerity}. Rather than seeking primarily to arrive at
accurate representations of a common world, the individual
turns toward trying to provide honest representations of
himself. Convinced that reality has no inherent nature,
which he might hope to identify as the truth about things,
he devotes himself to being true to his own nature. It is
as though he decides that since it makes no sense to try to
be true to the facts, he must therefore try instead to be
true to himself.
But it is preposterous to imagine that we ourselves are
determinate, and hence susceptible both to correct and
incorrect descriptions, while supposing that the ascription
of determinacy to anything else has been exposed as a
mistake. As conscious beings, we exist only in response to
other things, and we cannot know ourselves at all without
knowing them. Moreover, there is nothing in theory, and
certainly nothing in experience, to support the
extraordinary judgment that it is the truth about himself
that is the easiest for a person to know. Facts about
ourselves are not peculiarly solid and resistant to
skeptical dissolution. Our natures are, indeed, elusively
insubstantial -- notoriously less stable and less inherent
than the natures of other things. And insofar as this is
the case, sincerity itself is bullshit.
||Harry Frankfurt's eponymous article. As for my attitude, what you
||misinterpret as a grudge, is but contempt for what Ernest Gellner
||aptly called "the Soft Porn of Irrationalism". My own preference
||in that genre is for the hardcore, exemplified by the apophthegms
||of Gorgias and the narratives of Foucault. Framed between these
||two, LW looks wan and otiose, much as a coy closeted toilet queen
||looks next to an in-your-face leather fistfucker.
|Your aesthetic judgements are colored by your own bias vis a vis L.W.
|IMPO Wittgenstein seems bright and mordant compared to Russell and
|Whitehead, et al.
Read more carefully, John. Neither I, nor Jules Vuillemin, Harry
Frankfurt, or Ernest Gellner, are offering any aesthetic judgments.
|-JK
| ____________________________________________________________________________
|| | |
|| John Kress | "The last thing *I* should promise would be to 'improve' |
|| | mankind. No new idols are erected by me; let the old |
|| | ones learn what feet of clay mean." |
|| | -Nietzsche, Ecce Homo |
||________________|___________________________________________________________|
KRESSJA
I was merely noting that your remarks have yet to be justified, as I'm
sure your capable of doing. It remains to be seen whether or not you
have a stronger case than allusion. It is clear that you do not find
Wittgenstein of great worth; however, calling him a "bullshit artist,"
and linking his name with that of Ayn Rand is simply to be insulting;
such is certainly your perogative; as it is mine to note it.
>Likewise, you might try reflecting on the means wreteby you purport
>to distinguish the latter from rational judgments based on detailed
>and considered knowledge of the subject matter. In the meantime,
>here is a free sample of Frankfurt for your personal delectation:
I made no such distinction. I'm sure you have reasons for what you
say. I just think that it were better if you mentioned a few of them
instead of leaping straight to your own scintillating conclusions.
Read more carefully, M.Z. I was referring only to your expressed preference
for the so-called "hardcore" of the genre, which, as you have presented it,
certainly does seen to be a matter of taste.
-JK
P.S. I have no intention of debating the (non-) importance of Ludwig
Wittgenstein, as I could really care less about it. Nevertheless,
might you not, in the future, edit your posts down to a reasonable
size?
______________________________________________________________________________
| | |
| John Kress | "Could it be that this sensuous chaos the rational mind |
| | overcomes is the trace of the tragic essence of nature, |
| | economy of glory and of horror, solar economy, that which |
| | which was disallowed by the natural philosophy of Aristotle?"|
| | -Alphonso Lingis, Excesses |
|______________|_______________________________________________________________|
Mark Taranto
> Wittgenstein himself acknowledged the immense debt his works owed to
> Frege, a far deeper thinker than Russell (whose only claim on Frege's
> ideas was to have popularised them).
Frege wa certainly a great, and I do not mean to minimize his
importance, however, Russell's work in logic is unparrallelled. In
addition, he *did* discover the major flaw in Frege's work.
In related areas, Frege's theory of descriptions was *greatly* flawed,
while Russell's "On Denoting" (the paper that discusses "The author of
Waverley" is a seminal piece in the field.
Mark
Andrew Dinn
zel...@gevalt.mit.edu writes: quoting, in defence of his attacks on
Wittgenstein, an attack on anti-realism
Mr Zeleny presupposes that the claims of anti-realists are equivalent
to the claims of Wittgenstein's later work. Given his pretentious
advice in a previous posting to read very sparingly, if at all, of
Wittgenstein's works, I suspected he was not in a position to comment.
Now I know he is not.
>Read more carefully, John. Neither I, nor Jules Vuillemin, Harry
>Frankfurt, or Ernest Gellner, are offering any aesthetic judgments.
No, but you, Mr Zeleny, no doubt enamoured of your own image, are
holding up straw men to spatter with your own black bile.
>cordially, | Why is it that all those who have become eminent
>mikhail "el desdichado" | in philosophy or politics or poetry or art
>zel...@gevalt.mit.edu | are clearly of an atrabilious temperament?
Oh, now I get it. The more bile Mikey spews the more preeminent he
becomes! Poet, philosopher, artist... politician?
Andrew Dinn
-------------------------------------
Dans ce bordel ou tenons nostre estat
John McCarthy
philosophy by a mere 30 years, while Wittgenstein single-handedly set
philosophy back 50 years.
--
John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
*
He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
Andrew Dinn
>Frege wa[s] certainly a great, and I do not mean to minimize his
>importance, however, Russell's work in logic is unparrallelled. In
>addition, he *did* discover the major flaw in Frege's work.
>
>In related areas, Frege's theory of descriptions was *greatly* flawed,
>while Russell's "On Denoting" (the paper that discusses "The author of
>Waverley" is a seminal piece in the field.
Funny you should mention "On Denoting" in the context of *the* major
flaw in Frege's work. Not so much
"Exists X s.t. X in Frege's Work and flawed(X)"
as
"Exists X, Y, Z, A, B, C, D, ..."
I would agree at least that Principia is unparallelled in the field of
logic. Have you read any of it? Makes finnegans wake look small beer
by comparison. And if you find joyce's spelling mistakes(?)
problematic, oh boy! Just see how long it takes before you identify
the misplaced bracket on p37. Adds a whole new dimension to the notion
of proof-reading!
Andrew Dinn
-----------------------------
Our Motto - A Proper Lisp Now
Andrew Dinn
>In article <93251.01...@psuvm.psu.edu>
><DA...@psuvm.psu.edu> (Dennis Beach) writes:
>
>|Andrew Dinn says:
>
>||I would guess so. In all my (extensive) trawling of recorded
>||Ludwiggery I never yet found mention that he attended classes by
>||Russell, let alone walked out of one. One might justly claim that he
>||walked out on Russell's philosophy.
>
>|One might also claim that he justly walked out on Russell's philosophy.
>
>"The whole of Anglo-Saxon philosophy has undergone Russell's influence,
>for better of worse. This is, moreover, the only living philosophy
>today. It is sufficient praise of an author to state that a philosophy
>that ignores him is a dead philosophy." -Jules Vuillemin
>
>By contrast, Ludwig Wittgenstein stands in the same reciprocal relation
>to middlebrow anomic impotence, as Ayn Rand -- to lowbrow resentment.
Mr Zeleny, I am sure I should hesitate to indulge in argument with a
highbrow antinomian like your good self. However, I am not yet so
impotent that I fail to recognise nonsense. I believe that you and
Jules Vuillemin are both wrong here. Wittgenstein himself acknowledged
the immense debt his works owed to Frege, a far deeper thinker than
Russell (whose only claim on Frege's ideas was to have popularised
them). Wittgenstein's early work was immensely influential on the work
of the Vienna Circle whence arose your own arid transatlantic school
of mathematicized meaning that now predominates in the so-called
`philosophical sciences'.
>cordially, | Why is it that all those who have become eminent
>mikhail "el desdichado" | in philosophy or politics or poetry or art
>zel...@gevalt.mit.edu | are clearly of an atrabilious temperament?
Sorry to hear you have been disinherited. Does that account for your
flight from the `tour aboli' of husc.harvard to gevalt.mit? Someone
knocked you out of your ivory tower? Or are you just trying to dodge
the flame mail? Learn a lesson from Capaneus.
Andrew Dinn ...senza tema d'infamia
Jack Campin
> Frege was certainly a great, and I do not mean to minimize his
> importance, however, Russell's work in logic is unparalleled.
> In addition, he *did* discover the major flaw in Frege's work.
No he didn't. The first paradox in Frege's system was discovered by
Burali-Forti in 1897 (this has never been a very fashionable one for
Hofstadter-chatter, but one contradiction is enough). And the "Russell
paradox" was discovered by Zermelo shortly before Russell in 1902, though
he wasn't as quick off the draw in telling Frege about it.
There's a remark somewhere in Wittgenstein's later notes that Russell
suffered from "loss of problems"; he cited Wells as an example of the same
syndrome. It's what makes all of Russell's later work so uninteresting
now; the mechanical churnings of a system turned in on itself.
--
-- Jack Campin -- Room 1.36, Department of Computing & Electrical Engineering,
Mountbatten Building, Heriot-Watt University, Riccarton, Edinburgh EH14 4AS
TEL: 031 449 5111 ext 4192 FAX: 031 451 3431 INTERNET: ja...@cee.hw.ac.uk
JANET: possibly backwards BITNET: via UKACRL BANG!net: via mcsun & uknet
Torkel Franzen
(Jack Campin) writes:
>No he didn't. The first paradox in Frege's system was discovered by
>Burali-Forti in 1897
Why do you call the Burali-Forti paradox a "paradox in Frege's system"?
>It's what makes all of Russell's later work so uninteresting
>now; the mechanical churnings of a system turned in on itself.
Russell had no "system".
Bill Riggs
><DA...@psuvm.psu.edu> (Dennis Beach) writes:
>
>"The whole of Anglo-Saxon philosophy has undergone Russell's influence,
>for better of worse. This is, moreover, the only living philosophy
>today. It is sufficient praise of an author to state that a philosophy
>that ignores him is a dead philosophy." -Jules Vuillemin
Oh, what the devil. Word games appear to be in order. It is
sufficient damnation of a dead author to state that a philosophy that ignores
him is a philosophy.
Was it from Russell's _History of Philosophy_ where Mikhail got the
notion that the logos resides outside history ?
>
>By contrast, Ludwig Wittgenstein stands in the same reciprocal relation
>to middlebrow anomic impotence, as Ayn Rand -- to lowbrow resentment.
And Russell, to highbrow intellectual arrogance. But Stalin bilked
Bertie out of something much more valuable than ten bucks.
Bill R.
--
"And I would ask you to think of the truth "My opinions do not represent
and not Socrates; agree with me, those of my employer or
if I seem to you to be speaking the truth; any government agency."
or if not, withstand me might and main, - Bill Riggs (1993)
that I may not deceive you as well as myself
in my enthusiasm, and like the bee,
leave my sting in you before I die."
- Plato, _Phaedo_, 4th Century B.C.
Hardy Hulley
: Mikhail Zeleny wrote:
: >
: >"The whole of Anglo-Saxon philosophy has undergone Russell's influence,
: >for better of worse. This is, moreover, the only living philosophy
: >today. It is sufficient praise of an author to state that a philosophy
: >that ignores him is a dead philosophy." -Jules Vuillemin
: >
: >By contrast, Ludwig Wittgenstein stands in the same reciprocal relation
: >to middlebrow anomic impotence, as Ayn Rand -- to lowbrow resentment.
: Not very accurate M.Z. Almost all the analysts I know consider Wittgenstein
: to be of greater consequence than Russell. Do you have the same sort of
: grudge against Wittgenstein as you have against Arendt?
On the basis of what I've read, I have to disagree. It is true that upon
Russell's return to Cambridge following WW2, Wittgenstein was regarded as
the greatest philosopher around by many people. It seems as though this had
more to do with his personality and his effect on other people than with
his philosophy, however. As was the case with Ayn Rand, I think a lot
of Wittgenstein's popularity can be described in terms of a personality
cult. Now, however, I think that Russell's work has grown in stature,
whereas (upon critical reflection) it is hard to determine whether
Wittgenstein actually made any contribution to philosophy at all. As a
matter of fact, there is a fairly vocal group of people who claim that
Wittgenstein was simply a charlatan (and they do have a point - I mean,
what else should one think about a philosopher who claims that reading the
work of other philosophers is unimportant, and who, himself, takes pride
in not having done so?).
There is the story (described in Ray Monk's biography of Wittgenstein) of
a certain bright student at Cambridge (I forget his name) who later did
a Phd under Godel and himself became a fairly prominent logician. Whilst
at Cambridge he came under the spell of Wittgenstein, but in later years
claimed that being influenced by Wittgenstein was the worst thing that
ever happened to him and accused Wittgenstein of having a very detrimental
affect on philosophy. This view was endorsed by a number of prominent
philosophers (including Russell, Moore at times, and Popper), and more or
less sums Wittgenstein up for me.
Hardy
Gordon Fitch
| I agree that Witgenstein was more influential than Russell. Russell advanced
| philosophy by a mere 30 years, while Wittgenstein single-handedly set
| philosophy back 50 years.
I think you're underrating Wittgenstein; I would say 2500 years,
at least, and a good thing, too. In any case, say what you will,
poor earnest Russell could never have written a belly-buster like
_Tractatus_.
--
)*( Gordon Fitch )*( g...@panix.com )*(
Gordon Fitch
| ... and linking [ Wittgenstein's] name with that of Ayn Rand is
| simply to be insulting....
On the contrary, it's a compliment. Randism functions very well
for those for whom it's designed. Zeleny got the class wrong --
it's middle-brow rather than vulgar -- but he was probably so
excited by the allusion to fist-fucking that was even then
heaving up in his mind that he got the shakes, and we can cut
him some slack for that.
Mikhail Zeleny
ri...@descartes.etl.army.mil (Bill Riggs) writes:
|In article <26lb0f$b...@senator-bedfellow.MIT.EDU>
|zel...@gevalt.mit.edu (Mikhail Zeleny) writes:
||"The whole of Anglo-Saxon philosophy has undergone Russell's influence,
||for better of worse. This is, moreover, the only living philosophy
||today. It is sufficient praise of an author to state that a philosophy
||that ignores him is a dead philosophy." -Jules Vuillemin
| Oh, what the devil. Word games appear to be in order. It is
|sufficient damnation of a dead author to state that a philosophy that
|ignores him is a philosophy.
Please observe the followup line.
| Was it from Russell's _History of Philosophy_ where Mikhail got
|the notion that the logos resides outside history ?
Does this gem come from the genius who quotes Plato next to
his own moniker?
||By contrast, Ludwig Wittgenstein stands in the same reciprocal relation
||to middlebrow anomic impotence, as Ayn Rand -- to lowbrow resentment.
| And Russell, to highbrow intellectual arrogance. But Stalin
|bilked Bertie out of something much more valuable than ten bucks.
Your valiant attempt to take the high moral ground is duly
noted. Ayn Rand would be proud of your effort. However, you
would do much better by utilizing a more direct and earthy
approach. For instance, you might pursue my own favorite line
of character assassination, by making transparent allusions to
Bertie's recurring halitosis and prostate troubles. Indeed,
it is painfully obvious that Lord Russell's effete shriveling
aristocratic dick could never satisfy a strapping populist
vulgarian like yourself. Perhaps you ought to try sitting on
one of Thomas Jefferson's cannons instead. Let me know, so I
can oblige you with a match for your fuse.
|Bill R.
|
|--
|
|"And I would ask you to think of the truth "My opinions do not represent
|and not Socrates; agree with me, those of my employer or
|if I seem to you to be speaking the truth; any government agency."
|or if not, withstand me might and main, - Bill Riggs (1993)
|that I may not deceive you as well as myself
|in my enthusiasm, and like the bee,
|leave my sting in you before I die."
|- Plato, _Phaedo_, 4th Century B.C.
cordially, | Why is it that all those who have become eminent
Torkel Franzen
(Hardy Hulley) writes:
>There is the story (described in Ray Monk's biography of Wittgenstein) of
>a certain bright student at Cambridge (I forget his name) who later did
>a Phd under Godel and himself became a fairly prominent logician. Whilst
>at Cambridge he came under the spell of Wittgenstein, but in later years
>claimed that being influenced by Wittgenstein was the worst thing that
>ever happened to him and accused Wittgenstein of having a very detrimental
>affect on philosophy.
I suspect that the above refers to Georg Kreisel, in which case it is
completely garbled, and inaccurate in almost every particular.
Mikhail Zeleny
and...@cee.hw.ac.uk (Andrew Dinn) writes:
|In article <26lb0f$b...@senator-bedfellow.MIT.EDU>
|zel...@gevalt.mit.edu (Mikhail Zeleny) writes:
|||Andrew Dinn says:
I am not sure just what you are driving at here. Are you claiming
that since Wittgenstein owed an immense debt to Frege, it follows
that he was influential? As for the Vienna circle, surely their debt
to Frege (and Schlick) far exceeded any borrowing from the Tractatus
that they might have indulged in at a later date. The rest of your
paragraph has no debatable content.
||cordially, | Why is it that all those who have become eminent
||mikhail "el desdichado" | in philosophy or politics or poetry or art
||zel...@gevalt.mit.edu | are clearly of an atrabilious temperament?
|Sorry to hear you have been disinherited. Does that account for your
|flight from the `tour aboli' of husc.harvard to gevalt.mit? Someone
|knocked you out of your ivory tower? Or are you just trying to dodge
|the flame mail? Learn a lesson from Capaneus.
I think you got your literary sensibilities almost as screwed up as
your philosophical faculties. The prince of Aquitaine never flees
from the _tour abolie_. In any event, please note that "la tour"
is of the grammatical gender opposite to that of "le cul" and "le
culte". As for my disinherited predicament, it has nothing to do
with my activities in this venue.
|Andrew Dinn ...senza tema d'infamia
In article <1993Sep9.1...@cee.hw.ac.uk>
and...@cee.hw.ac.uk (Andrew Dinn) writes:
|In article <26m49v$j...@senator-bedfellow.MIT.EDU>
|zel...@gevalt.mit.edu writes: quoting, in defence of his attacks on
|Wittgenstein, an attack on anti-realism
|Mr Zeleny presupposes that the claims of anti-realists are equivalent
|to the claims of Wittgenstein's later work. Given his pretentious
|advice in a previous posting to read very sparingly, if at all, of
|Wittgenstein's works, I suspected he was not in a position to comment.
|Now I know he is not.
||Read more carefully, John. Neither I, nor Jules Vuillemin, Harry
||Frankfurt, or Ernest Gellner, are offering any aesthetic judgments.
|No, but you, Mr Zeleny, no doubt enamoured of your own image, are
|holding up straw men to spatter with your own black bile.
Perhaps instead of indulging in your customary flatulent griping,
you could be so kind as to bring your superior mind to bear on the
question of exactly what distinguishes Wittgensteni from the unnamed
targets of Frankfurt's argument?
||cordially, | Why is it that all those who have become eminent
||mikhail "el desdichado" | in philosophy or politics or poetry or art
||zel...@gevalt.mit.edu | are clearly of an atrabilious temperament?
|Oh, now I get it. The more bile Mikey spews the more preeminent he
|becomes! Poet, philosopher, artist... politician?
Depending on exactly what it is that you take Aristotle to be
asking, you are committing at least one of the following fallacies:
(i) a dicto simpliciter ad dictum secundum quid;
(ii) a dicto secundum quid ad dictum simpliciter;
(iii) non causa pro causa;
(iv) asserting the consequent;
(v) converting a conditional.
Please elaborate the reasons that compel you to "get" your conclusion.
|Andrew Dinn
|-------------------------------------
|Dans ce bordel ou tenons nostre estat
cordially, | Why is it that all those who have become eminent
jw...@key.amdahl.com
studying other philosophers is irrelevent in regards to being a philosopher
is most interesting. There are some people who get inside philosophy and
raise it to an art, and there are others who simply improve their forgery.
Most true acts of genius come from outside the system, where alternate
perspectives are allowed to flourish through infancy before being trampled
underfoot. Wittgenstein, for all your insistance that he wasn't hardcore
enough to your liking, presented a truly unique and original way of seeing
things. All hardcore theories become soft when you look deep enough.
I particularly like Wittgenstein's observation that philosophy is a ladder
that once climbed is thrown away. This does not mean the climb is worthless,
or that philosophy is valuable only unto itself, but that the ideas we hold
sacred one day become the foundation for the ideas we hold sacred the next.
Muttering the names of Wittgenstein and Rand in the same sentence is particularly
ironic, because I consider them to be complete opposites. Rand was a devout student
of aristotle and held her ideals as sacred. Wittgenstein was student to none
and held his ideals as an artifact of human behavior. In my mind, that makes
Rand the con artist. Then again, who said that truth could be marketed?
John.
Mark Taranto
> I would agree at least that Principia is unparallelled in the field
> of logic. Have you read any of it?
I've looked through parts of it. I've heard it said that Russell is
the only person to ever read all of it. An interesting claim, since
Russell had a co-author.
> Makes finnegans wake look small beer by comparison. And if you find
> joyce's spelling mistakes(?) problematic, oh boy! Just see how long
> it takes before you identify the misplaced bracket on p37. Adds a
> whole new dimension to the notion of proof-reading!
A very nice description.
I was thinking, today, of other things by Russell which I thought were
particularly good. His book on Leibniz came to mind.
Mark
KRESSJA
Certainly, but Frege's work was seminal as well, and Russell's flawed. My
own opinion is that Frege's accomplishment was greater: after all, hadn't
even Kant declared that logic, since ancient times, had been completed and
perfected?
-JK
Francis Muir
I particularly like Wittgenstein's observation that philosophy
is a ladder that once climbed is thrown away. This does not
mean the climb is worthless, or that philosophy is valuable
only unto itself, but that the ideas we hold sacred one day
become the foundation for the ideas we hold sacred the next.
I guess you are referencing LudWit's penultimate prop of the Tractatus
(6.547 or something equally prime). As I recall LW was refering quite
exclusively to his own work.
Philomath
hhend...@vax.clarku.edu
that is nominally about the great Sir Walter Scott! I beg thee,
kind sirs, remove thy badinage to a thread of its own! This one
is warped by thy woofing.
Heather, trying on the mantle of spinster
HHEND...@vax.clarku.edu
Thomas Price
>calling the post-Tractarean LW a bullshit artist, I am alluding to
Mr. Zeleny,
I would be obliged to you if you could comment on LW's _On Certainty_.
Also, I suspect that your comments about LW are as much if not more based
on contempt for people who refer to his work as they are on contempt for
his work itself. Is this the case? As for me, the three keywords which make
me run screaming from any usenet thread are 1) "Zen", 2) "Wittgenstein"
and 3) "Godel" -- as a general rule of thumb anyone who makes mention of
any of these has nothing coherent to say.
curious in pittsburgh,
Tom Price | heaven and earth regard the 10,000 | tp...@cs.cmu.edu
****************** | things as straw dogs, baby -- TTC | ******************
Thomas Price
I suspect that the above refers to the author of _Waverly_, in which
case it is completely garbled, and inaccurate in fully every particular.
Thomas Price
>[business about LW not reading other philosophers]
>
Stephen Toulmin and Allen Jamnik, in _Wittgenstein's Vienna_, claim
that he was completely familiar with the work of Boltzmann, Mach, and
Musil, and as such was thoroughly-read wrt the current state of the art
in epistemology and problems of symbolization. His claims to be uneducated
in philosophy may have been partly disingenuous carping against the academic
system that he hated so much and partly a way to emphasize what a lot of his
contemporaries were agreed on, that a new take on language was the key to
solving a whole host of problems and reading Aristotle wasn't really to the
point.
>I particularly like Wittgenstein's observation that philosophy is a ladder
>that once climbed is thrown away. This does not mean the climb is worthless,
No, you're thinking of Gautama Buddha's observation that religion is like
a raft used to cross a river and then abandoned. There's a long section
of _Waverly_ that explains all this in detail.
Mikhail Zeleny
g...@panix.com (Gordon Fitch) writes:
I am so sorry to see you take umbrage at my implicit downgrading of
your intellectual stature from its self-predicated heights, but times
are tough all over. Consider that the people lacking the wherewithal
for being affected by the deathless prose of Mistress Rand, also lack
the boundaries separating their brows from their hairlines, and thus
tend to subvert any effort at positive ranking of their intelligence
by the size of their foreheads. On the other end of the spectrum,
there clearly incurs the need to distinguish the mental endowments of
the Wittgensteinians from the capabilities demonstrated by the people
who have read and understood Frege and Husserl, to say nothing of the
two and a half millenia of antecedent philosophy. Thus I stand by my
original classification.
|--
|
| )*( Gordon Fitch )*( g...@panix.com )*(
cordially, | Why is it that all those who have become eminent
Antonio Leal
> I particularly like Wittgenstein's observation that philosophy
> is a ladder that once climbed is thrown away. This does not
> mean the climb is worthless, or that philosophy is valuable
> only unto itself, but that the ideas we hold sacred one day
> become the foundation for the ideas we hold sacred the next.
fra...@oas.Stanford.EDU (Francis Muir) writes:
> I guess you are referencing LudWit's penultimate prop of the Tractatus
> (6.547 or something equally prime). As I recall LW was refering quite
> exclusively to his own work.
"For the man who studies to gain _insight_, books and studies are
merely rungs of the ladder he climbs to the summit of knowledge.
As soon as a rung has raised him one step, he leaves it behind.
On the other hand, the many who study to fill their memories do not
use the rungs of the ladder for climbing, but take them off and load
themselves with them to take away, rejoicing at the increasing weight
of the burden. They remain below forever, since they are carrying
what ought to have carried them."
(A.Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Representation, ii.80)
"My propositions serve as ellucidations 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 it up.)
He must transcend these propositions, and then he will see the
world aright."
(L.Wittgentstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, 6.54)
Both quotes and references from (pp. 47, 295):
Byan Magee, The Philosophy of Schopenhauer, Oxford Univ. Press 1983
(reprinted, ppbk, 1987, 1989, ISBN 0-19-824484-3),
which, by the way, I rather like. The book is a compact and well
written 400 pages, 250 of which are a ten chapter book on Schopenhauer;
the remaining pages contain nine appendices, which are actually
subsidiary essays, one of them (pp. 285-315) titled 'The Influence
of Schopenhauer on Wittgenstein'.
[alt.quotations added to the distribution, but not to follow-ups]
--
Antonio B. Leal | IST / INESC
+351.1.310 0300 | R. Alves Redol 9, 1000 Lisboa
a...@inesc.pt | Portugal
Marko Amnell
his earliest philosophical ideas were some sort of crazy Schopenhauerian
Idealism and that he even wrote a book elaborating such a position (this
must have been at around the time he met Frege). Apparently the book was
such garbage he later burnt it.
--
Marko Amnell
amn...@klaava.helsinki.fi
Mikhail Zeleny
jw...@key.amdahl.com writes:
>I believe alot of what Wittgenstein has said. That he should observe
>that studying other philosophers is irrelevent in regards to being a
>philosopher is most interesting. There are some people who get inside
>philosophy and raise it to an art, and there are others who simply
>improve their forgery. Most true acts of genius come from outside the
>system, where alternate perspectives are allowed to flourish through
>infancy before being trampled underfoot. Wittgenstein, for all your
>insistance that he wasn't hardcore enough to your liking, presented a
>truly unique and original way of seeing things. All hardcore theories
>become soft when you look deep enough.
This is a recurring leitmotif in lay criticism of culture. What I
always wonder, is whether the people who feel that way would also be
willing to show some consistency by similarly dismissing the several
millennia of progress in the medical arts, when it comes down to
saving their hide. Next time you need a cancer treatment, look for a
faith healer.
>I particularly like Wittgenstein's observation that philosophy is a
>ladder that once climbed is thrown away. This does not mean the climb
>is worthless, or that philosophy is valuable only unto itself, but
>that the ideas we hold sacred one day become the foundation for the
>ideas we hold sacred the next.
Wittgenstein wanted to say the last word in philosophy by proclaiming
the impossibility of all last words. I find his preoccupation with
"expunging" certain language from the philosophical "Sprachspiel", to
be transparently indicative of a bad conscience.
>Muttering the names of Wittgenstein and Rand in the same sentence is
>particularly ironic, because I consider them to be complete opposites.
>Rand was a devout student of aristotle and held her ideals as sacred.
>Wittgenstein was student to none and held his ideals as an artifact of
>human behavior. In my mind, that makes Rand the con artist. Then
>again, who said that truth could be marketed?
Muttering the names of Wittgenstein and Rand in the same sentence
would be particularly ironic, only if they had been complete opposites.
Your claim that you consider them to be that is quite immaterial to
the issue. It is moreover quite unsurprising to see you identify a
soi-disant disciple as a student. One among many similarities between
Rand and Wittgenstein consists in their utter lack of scholarship.
> John.
cordially,
mikhail zel...@gevalt.mit.edu -- a man it transition
who had his thesis signed by a bona fide wittgensteinian
"Le cul des femmes est monotone comme l'esprit des hommes."
Todd Dailey
[....]
> As for me, the three keywords which make
>me run screaming from any usenet thread are 1) "Zen", 2) "Wittgenstein"
>and 3) "Godel" -- as a general rule of thumb anyone who makes mention of
>any of these has nothing coherent to say.
Speaking of Godel, I suppose I should point out that Thomas, in his post,
mentions all three. 8-)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Todd Dailey-...@DESIRE.WRIGHT.EDU Senior Network Analyst/
Wright State University - Dayton, Ohio LAN Specialist
"Whoso would be a man, must be a nonconformist. Nothing is at last
sacred but the integrity of your own mind." -Emerson
Thomas Price
>
>>Most true acts of genius come from outside the
>>system, where alternate perspectives are allowed to flourish through
>>infancy before being trampled underfoot.
I disbelieve! Please give us some examples.
jw...@key.amdahl.com
It is believable.
The renaissance was an underground movement that stood in direct
opposition to the reigning authority of the period, namely,
the catholic church. The enlightenment stood in direct opposition
to the monarchy.
The people in power have a vested interest in deligitimizing alternate
sources of knowledge in the pursuit of establishing themselves as
the sole sources of knowledge. The structure of power must be rational
according to the underlying knowledge in order for that structure
to be ligitimate and evoke confidence on the part of its supporters.
New knowledge can upset that structure and therefore threaten the
personalities who sit at the apex. You should know by now that
philosophy and philosophers have never been mainstream. We call
them "ahead of their time", etc.
I would be interested to hear examples of genius coming from authority.
You may begin elucidating.
John Williams
Thomas Price
>>jw...@key.amdahl.com writes:
>>>Most true acts of genius come from outside the
>>>system, where alternate perspectives are allowed to flourish through
>>>infancy before being trampled underfoot.
>tp...@cs.cmu.edu writes:
>I disbelieve! Please give us some examples.
jw...@key.amdahl.com writes:
>It is believable.
>
>The renaissance was an underground movement that stood in direct
>opposition to the reigning authority of the period, namely,
>the catholic church. The enlightenment stood in direct opposition
>to the monarchy.
> John Williams
I hardly count "the renaissance" and "the enlightenment" as acts of
genius. They weren't "acts".
It seems to me that individual acts of genius from each of these social
phenomena -- Bernini's sculpture and architecture (no instance of which
I can remember by name, alas), _The Last Supper_, _Candide_, all contradict
your thesis. Bernini and da Vinci were paid, and handsomely, by the
wealthy boozhwazee. _Candide_ (and Voltaire too) were very popular.
I was waiting for you to say something like "they killed Socrates" or
"Kierkegaard never held a faculty position in philosophy" or "Nietzsche
wrote everything in miserable solitude". But none of these examples
support your thesis either: Socrates *wanted* martyrdom, and is partially
a fictional character; Plato, in whose dialogues he appears, was a
comfortably-off schoolmaster with a respected academy. SK was independently
wealthy. Nietszche was unbalanced enough that we can't blame his isolation
on any directed persecution by the Powers that Were.
Furthermore, I think that your ideas about the "system" are post-modern
artifacts and only have meaning in the post-modern world. The "Establishment"
and the "Outsiders" didn't exist as psychological realities before Hamlet,
nor as noticeable social phenomena until the Impressionists.
jw...@key.amdahl.com
> Here is another argument which will go nowhere at all. C'est la guerre.
If you're going to argue that they were *locally* supported by a benefactor,
I couldn't agree more. If you are arguing that they represented a crowning
acheivement of the *system*, I couldn't disagree with you more. The *many*
acts of genius that came during these periods were in direct opposition
to the predominant authority. I was thinking more along the lines of
Galileo's censure, to name one of many such acts of suppression.
John Williams
egni...@acm.org
leave philosophy when he decided that he'd solved its essential
problems. This integrity was also reminiscent of Spinoza, supporting
himself by lens-grinding because he could not still his doubts and
become a rabbi. Even the far more careerist Russell left philosophy
after the Forties and protested the arms race.
Modern day philosophers like Richard Rorty would do well to follow
Wittgenstein's example. But because of the strange PostModern glorifi-
cation of careerism as a positive virtue (a glorification that has
male audiences cheering the Professor's brutalization of Carol in
David Mamet's play Oleanna) Rorty instead produces tracts like
"Contingency, Irony and Solidarity" which have no higher purpose than
maintaining a discourse terrain. Rorty instead tries in a bumbling
fashion to extend limited self-rule to feminism in the pages of
Radical Philosophy, a self-rule which is disempowering because it
promises ab initio that the territory promised shall be nihilistically
incommensurate with Rorty's, thereby securing a proper subordination.
The example being followed is the vicious example of the later Wittgen-
stein, who because of his failure as a spelling teacher elected to
return to philosophy as a sort of police agent, silencing those
with the temerity to think of essences. Who brandished a poker,
interrupting Karl Popper with the question "show me an example
of a moral act". To which Popper courageously replied, "not
threatening visting lecturers with a poker." Who fathered an
abusive antimetaphysical tradition ultimately issuing in the
unspeakable Mr Zeleny.
Meantime, the chair of the department of philosophy at the school
where I was an undergraduate, a man who challenged his administration's
drive to make that school into a trade school, recently collapsed
of a heart attack while teaching freshmen. His thoughts were
typically self-forgetting: for he was concerned about his young
charegs' ability to handle the sight of a man in his distress. This
man, while well within the analytic tradition, had a concern with
Truth that such as the later Wittgenstein would find unseemly,
or that Cora Diamond would find indicative of bad character (to
judge by a recent talk Diamond gave at Princeton.) Rorty mockingly
writes (in Contingency, Irony and Solidarity) that "one would have
to be very odd" to get excited about theories of Truth (at least,
I suppose, without being paid a munificent salary, as is Rorty);
but I find that such excitement is positively correlated with
ethical concerns of a deep order.
The flawed and defective later Wittgenstein has had too much
influence on both theory and actual behavior. His analysis, for
example, of "game" in Philosophical Investigations has never
received the proper challenge it deserves, an analysis that
simply notes that Wittgenstein did NOT discover that "game"
has no "essence", he only discovered that "game" has no exact
synonym, a trivial result in light of French theory. For he (like
Stalin in politics) made rudeness a legitimate tactic in philo-
sophical discourse, rudeness shading into physical and sexual
harassment that drives women out of the field. Rorty mockingly
quotes Shakespeare's Isabella in Philosophy and the Mirror of
Nature, not realizing that he mocks someone with the courage to
challenge the corrupt authority of a mythical Vienna, a Vienna
reminiscent of a contemporary philosophy department, or indeed
Clarence Thomas' office. His mockery flies back into his
face, like Blake's sand:
"...but man, proud man,
Drest in a little brief authority,
Most ignorant of what he's most assured,
His glassy essence, like an angry ape,
Plays such fantastic tricks before high Heaven
As make the angels weep."
"You love the power. To DEVIATE. To TRANSGRESS. To
INVENT, to TRANSGRESS whatever norms have been established
for us. And you think it's "charming" to question in your-
self this taste to mock and destroy. But you should
question it, Professor. And you pick those things which
you feel ADVANCE you: publication, tenure, and the steps
you call "harmless rituals." And you perform those
steps. Although you say it is hypocrisy. But to the
aspirations of your students. Of HARDWORKING students,
who SLAVE to come here-you have no idea what it cost me to
come to this school-you MOCK us. You call education "hazing"
and from your so-protected, so-elitist seat you hold our
confusion as a JOKE, and our hopes and efforts with it."
- David Mamet, Oleanna
Jim Kalb
>the strange PostModern glorification of careerism as a positive virtue
What's strange about it? I find it profound.
If you reject the notion that there are standards that transcend both
individual will and social attitudes and practices, then the two obvious
possibilities are to fit into society to the greatest degree possible
(thereby securing the support of society for what you do) or to defy
society to the greatest degree possible (thereby asserting the
superiority of what you do over what other people do). A rather clever
union of the two possibilities can be achieved by rising to a dominant
position in society and using that position to subvert existing social
institutions. Since pure careerism is destructive of the institutions
within which it is carried on, the careerist by practicing it can
realize that union of possibilities from the beginning.
--
Jim Kalb (j...@panix.com)
"If we only wanted to be happy it would be easy; but we want to be
happier than other people, which is almost always difficult, since we
think them happier than they are." (Montesquieu)
Mikhail Zeleny
|egni...@ACM.ORG writes:
||the strange PostModern glorification of careerism as a positive virtue
|What's strange about it? I find it profound.
|
|If you reject the notion that there are standards that transcend both
|individual will and social attitudes and practices, then the two obvious
|possibilities are to fit into society to the greatest degree possible
|(thereby securing the support of society for what you do) or to defy
|society to the greatest degree possible (thereby asserting the
|superiority of what you do over what other people do). A rather clever
|union of the two possibilities can be achieved by rising to a dominant
|position in society and using that position to subvert existing social
|institutions. Since pure careerism is destructive of the institutions
|within which it is carried on, the careerist by practicing it can
|realize that union of possibilities from the beginning.
You seem to be neglecting the inherent limitations of institutionalized
subversion. The institution is bound to prevail in the end by dint of
superior endurance, its chartered values only occasionally augmented,
but not in any way overturned, by the cunningly constrained pose of
defiant grandstanding, characteristic of the egregious adepts of
solipsistic self-affirmation through self-refutation.
|--
|Jim Kalb (j...@panix.com)
|"If we only wanted to be happy it would be easy; but we want to be
|happier than other people, which is almost always difficult, since we
|think them happier than they are." (Montesquieu)
cordially,
mikhail zel...@gevalt.mit.edu -- a man in transition
John McCarthy
NNTP-Posting-Host: panix.com
egni...@ACM.ORG writes:
>the strange PostModern glorification of careerism as a positive virtue
What's strange about it? I find it profound.
If you reject the notion that there are standards that transcend both
individual will and social attitudes and practices, then the two obvious
possibilities are to fit into society to the greatest degree possible
(thereby securing the support of society for what you do) or to defy
society to the greatest degree possible (thereby asserting the
superiority of what you do over what other people do). A rather clever
union of the two possibilities can be achieved by rising to a dominant
position in society and using that position to subvert existing social
institutions. Since pure careerism is destructive of the institutions
within which it is carried on, the careerist by practicing it can
realize that union of possibilities from the beginning.
--
Jim Kalb (j...@panix.com)
Here is Adam Smith's "glorification of careerism as a positive virtue".
It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer,
or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their
regard to their own self interest. - Adam Smith, Wealth of
Nations, book 1, ch. 2. p. 18
--
John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
*
He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
Jim Kalb
>Here is Adam Smith's "glorification of careerism as a positive virtue".
>
>
> It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer,
> or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their
> regard to their own self interest. - Adam Smith, Wealth of
> Nations, book 1, ch. 2. p. 18
to his own self interest?
Jim Kalb
>You seem to be neglecting the inherent limitations of institutionalized
>subversion. The institution is bound to prevail in the end by dint of
>superior endurance, its chartered values only occasionally augmented,
>but not in any way overturned, by the cunningly constrained pose of
>defiant grandstanding, characteristic of the egregious adepts of
>solipsistic self-affirmation through self-refutation.
with those limitations by mixing some irony into his subversion,
especially if he shares the usual implicit confidence of comfortable
people that his current way of life will last indefinitely. Admittedly
the irony devalues the subversion, but as long as he can devalue the
institution yet more he still comes out ahead. Not a perfect solution,
but heroism and a middle-class lifestyle don't mix easily.
On the other hand, institutions and ways of life don't always last
forever, especially if enough of their leaders take pride in having
rejected them. Not that the leaders aren't shocked when the crash
comes. (I believe France and Russia provide examples, although I don't
claim to be well-informed about the history of either country.)
Mikhail Zeleny
j...@panix.com (Jim Kalb) writes:
|zel...@athena.mit.edu (Mikhail Zeleny) writes:
||You seem to be neglecting the inherent limitations of institutionalized
||subversion. The institution is bound to prevail in the end by dint of
||superior endurance, its chartered values only occasionally augmented,
||but not in any way overturned, by the cunningly constrained pose of
||defiant grandstanding, characteristic of the egregious adepts of
||solipsistic self-affirmation through self-refutation.
|An institutionalized subverter with a clear head might deal adequately
|with those limitations by mixing some irony into his subversion,
|especially if he shares the usual implicit confidence of comfortable
|people that his current way of life will last indefinitely. Admittedly
|the irony devalues the subversion, but as long as he can devalue the
|institution yet more he still comes out ahead. Not a perfect solution,
|but heroism and a middle-class lifestyle don't mix easily.
The implicit calculus of probabilities ("but as long as...") confines
the outcome of such flaccid irony-mongering to perpetual tergiversation
between Voltairean mediocrity of ambition (arising from the deathless
bourgeois institution of Swiss commerce and that defunct epiphenomenon
of aristocratic boredom, the French salon) and jaded Rortean exhaustion
through self-parody (to this day eagerly supported by the evergreen
tree of the US academia). Heroism as a middle-class lifestyle had been
exemplified by Spinoza, long before its values were articulated (in his
Salon of 1846) by Charles Baudelaire.
|On the other hand, institutions and ways of life don't always last
|forever, especially if enough of their leaders take pride in having
|rejected them. Not that the leaders aren't shocked when the crash
|comes. (I believe France and Russia provide examples, although I don't
|claim to be well-informed about the history of either country.)
Chrysippus, the third leader of Stoa, wrote 705 books, all of which
had since been used for kindling and arse-wipe. By contrast, Diogenes
of Sinope, whose scandalous _Republic_ is as surely lost to us as the
prolix output of his remote descendant, remains a nonpareil example to
all oblivious onanists of this agora. Along with him, "I wish I could
satisfy my hunger as easily, by rubbing my stomach." And once empty
barrels become as plentiful as they were in the golden age of public
intoxication, I promise that you will see a lot more of that kind of
behavior.
|--
|Jim Kalb (j...@panix.com)
|"If we only wanted to be happy it would be easy; but we want to be
|happier than other people, which is almost always difficult, since we
|think them happier than they are." (Montesquieu)
cordially,
Charles L. Creegan
else LW was, he was passionately concerned with getting somewhere, with
discovering foundations, and with keeping a very personal touch with his
philosophy. If he got mad, it's only because he thought others were
being too existentially detached. The last thing he ever was is a
philosophical careerist.
The point about "game" not having a synonym is interesting, though. We
do tend to think of "essence" in terms of verbal definition. But is
there no connection between the two at all?
--
Charles Creegan NC Wesleyan College ccre...@uncecs.edu
Philip Nikolayev
egni...@ACM.ORG writes:
> The flawed and defective later Wittgenstein has had too much
> influence on both theory and actual behavior. His analysis, for
> example, of "game" in Philosophical Investigations has never
> received the proper challenge it deserves, an analysis that simply
> notes that Wittgenstein did NOT discover that "game" has no
> "essence", he only discovered that "game" has no exact synonym, a
> trivial result in light of French theory. For he (like Stalin in
^^^
> politics) made rudeness a legitimate tactic in philo- sophical
> discourse, rudeness shading into physical and sexual harassment that
> drives women out of the field.
Duh. Your thesis here may be restated as follows: the later
Wittgenstein has been too influencial, and his analysis of game has
not been adequately challenged, *because* he was rude. This doesn't
strike me as very illuminating or clever. Besides, your false analogy
between Wittgenstein and Stalin trivialises political evil, and
strikes me not only as silly, but as morally reprehensible. Finally,
your sweeping dismissal of 'rudeness' as unconditionally bad is also
useless, since it denies didactic harshness its legitimate place in
human discourse.
Philip Nikolayev
nik...@husc.harvard.edu
Andrew Dinn
an ad hominem attack on Wittgenstein in his later years which is too
lengthy to repeat (refer to the original note) but worth rebutting.
I suppose it also needs to be said (sigh) that the argument would
be better focused on his writings than his character. All together
now, follow the bouncing ball
`The world is all that is the case...'
[hum if you don't know the lyrics].
It should be noted that Wittgenstein did not return to philosophy to
bolster his flagging reputation, as claimed. On the contrary he
thought his reputation too influential and too cheaply earned. He
wished to correct the excesses of those who misunderstood his earlier
work and in doing so taught him some of its limitations. His motive
for doing so? To avoid the dangerous consequences such misunderstandings
would engender if they were allowed to poison people's intellects. He
felt very guilty that the Tractatus had caused so much error.
This was typical of Wittgenstein's motives. He worked passionately to
understand and explain philosophical difficulties because he believed
that intellectual confusions were the basis for much doctrinaire
prejudice and oppression. He was well aware of the limitations of his
chosen field and of his own achievements in that field. He was also
well aware of the limitations of some other philosophers (e.g. Popper)
who were working in the same field and was motivated by intellectual
scrupulousness and a hatred of error as well as arrogance in telling
them so.
Wittgenstein applied the same standards to his own work. He tried to
suppress the manuscripts and lecture notes circulated by his students
because he thought that their incompleteness would only fuel the
confusions his earlier work had generated. He counselled many would-be
followers to avoid studying philosophy because he thought they could
make far more valuable contributions to society. He gave up philosophy
after the 1st world war not to rest on his laurels but because he
thought that having solved the logic puzzles of the Tractatus he
should go and do something worthwhile. He gave it up during the 2nd
world war to work as a porter at Newcastle hospital, a job he rated
far higher than that of a Cambridge professor. In his non-professional
life he was a very humble man, very aware of his own failings. One
could demand that everyone be a saint but most people think that is
unrealistic. Wittgenstein thought it dishonest not to keep striving.
Wittgenstein's main fault as a philospher was professional arrogance,
not so much that he knew what was right but that he knew where other
philosophers had gone wrong (in following his earlier work). Given the
rider - and in many cases in the philosophy of his contemporaries or
in modern-day philosophy it applies - I think a good case can be made
that he was justified. Without the rider I would argue that his
concentration on his own concerns rather than those of other
philosophers was due to a proper grasp of philosophical priorities
e.g. making ontology subservient to epistemology. However, that is a
philosophical debate best left to those who have studied both his
works and those of his contemporaries/later philosophers. His personal
failings are irrelevant as are the misreadings of those who have
skimmed his work.
Andrew Dinn
-----------------------------
Our Motto - A Proper Lisp Now
Mikhail Zeleny
and...@cee.hw.ac.uk (Andrew Dinn) writes:
|In article <27h1qj$g...@hopper.acm.org>
|egni...@ACM.ORG (Edward G. Nilges) writes:
|an ad hominem attack on Wittgenstein in his later years which is too
|lengthy to repeat (refer to the original note) but worth rebutting.
|I suppose it also needs to be said (sigh) that the argument would
|be better focused on his writings than his character. All together
|now, follow the bouncing ball
| `The world is all that is the case...'
|[hum if you don't know the lyrics].
If the task of philosophy is indeed therapeutic, there is no excuse
for separating the philosopher's character from the content of his
writings. As regards the last point, the world is also all that has
been the case, all that might have been the case, and all that may
yet come to pass to be the case.
|It should be noted that Wittgenstein did not return to philosophy to
|bolster his flagging reputation, as claimed. On the contrary he
|thought his reputation too influential and too cheaply earned. He
|wished to correct the excesses of those who misunderstood his earlier
|work and in doing so taught him some of its limitations. His motive
|for doing so? To avoid the dangerous consequences such misunderstandings
|would engender if they were allowed to poison people's intellects. He
|felt very guilty that the Tractatus had caused so much error.
I see no such claim in the elided article. It seems that one of us
stands in need of basic reading instruction.
|This was typical of Wittgenstein's motives. He worked passionately to
|understand and explain philosophical difficulties because he believed
|that intellectual confusions were the basis for much doctrinaire
|prejudice and oppression. He was well aware of the limitations of his
|chosen field and of his own achievements in that field. He was also
|well aware of the limitations of some other philosophers (e.g. Popper)
|who were working in the same field and was motivated by intellectual
|scrupulousness and a hatred of error as well as arrogance in telling
|them so.
Of course, Wittgenstein was sufficiently canny to limit his telling
to oracular pronouncements dispensed within a self-selected daisy
chain of eager acolytes. In doing so, he demoted philosophy to the
status of a cult, reviving the clandestine opportunistic practices
of the first sophists.
|Wittgenstein applied the same standards to his own work. He tried to
|suppress the manuscripts and lecture notes circulated by his students
|because he thought that their incompleteness would only fuel the
|confusions his earlier work had generated. He counselled many would-be
|followers to avoid studying philosophy because he thought they could
|make far more valuable contributions to society. He gave up philosophy
|after the 1st world war not to rest on his laurels but because he
|thought that having solved the logic puzzles of the Tractatus he
|should go and do something worthwhile. He gave it up during the 2nd
|world war to work as a porter at Newcastle hospital, a job he rated
|far higher than that of a Cambridge professor. In his non-professional
|life he was a very humble man, very aware of his own failings. One
|could demand that everyone be a saint but most people think that is
|unrealistic. Wittgenstein thought it dishonest not to keep striving.
Funny, I thought that he gave up philosophy after WWI in order to
practise physical and sexual abuse of Norwegian children, and did
likewise during WWII in order to alternate between sucking cock in
the public toilets of London's East End, and doing sincere penance
for his transgressions. I guess Anscombe is right, -- the same
action admits of plural descriptions.
|Wittgenstein's main fault as a philospher was professional arrogance,
|not so much that he knew what was right but that he knew where other
|philosophers had gone wrong (in following his earlier work). Given the
|rider - and in many cases in the philosophy of his contemporaries or
|in modern-day philosophy it applies - I think a good case can be made
|that he was justified. Without the rider I would argue that his
|concentration on his own concerns rather than those of other
|philosophers was due to a proper grasp of philosophical priorities
|e.g. making ontology subservient to epistemology. However, that is a
|philosophical debate best left to those who have studied both his
|works and those of his contemporaries/later philosophers. His personal
|failings are irrelevant as are the misreadings of those who have
|skimmed his work.
If being is subservient to being known, then clandestine wrongdoing
is a contradiction in terms, -- once you succeed in concealing your
crimes, they no longer exist. On a larger scale, the priority of
epistemology had been recognized in the philosophical circles since
Descartes. Frege's great accomplishment was to posit the priority
of logic over epistemology, thereby reviving the Platonist ideal of
mathematics as the true foundation for metaphysics. Wittgenstein's
limited understanding of mathematics constitutionally prevented him
from following the path opened by his illustrious predecessor, and
reduced his own contribution to an amorphous pile of occasionally
insightful, and predominantly insipid, logophobic mutterings.
|Andrew Dinn
|-----------------------------
|Our Motto - A Proper Lisp Now
cordially,
mikhail zel...@gevalt.mit.edu -- a man in transition
who is still laboring on his critique of _on certainty_
Thomas Price
>an ad hominem attack on Wittgenstein in his later years which is too
>lengthy to repeat (refer to the original note) but worth rebutting.
>It should be noted that Wittgenstein did not return to philosophy to
>bolster his flagging reputation, as claimed. On the contrary he
>thought his reputation too influential and too cheaply earned. He
>wished to correct the excesses of those who misunderstood his earlier
>This was typical of Wittgenstein's motives. He worked passionately to
>understand and explain philosophical difficulties because he believed
>that intellectual confusions were the basis for much doctrinaire
>prejudice and oppression. He was well aware of the limitations of his
I admire Wittgenstein very much and hold his work in the highest
regard, but the impression I got from Ray Monk's biography of him
was that he returned to philosophy because he was suffering from
acute anhedonia and couldn't find a job that he wouldn't hate, nor
could he figure out what to do with himself. Since he was already
famous as a philosopher, returning to academia was the path of least
resistance.
For all that, I agree that he spent the latter part of his career
trying to sort out misunderstandings associated with his earlier
work, and that his latter work is of the greatest importance.
jw...@key.amdahl.com
> Funny, I thought that he gave up philosophy after WWI in order to
> practise physical and sexual abuse of Norwegian children, and did
> likewise during WWII in order to alternate between sucking cock in
> the public toilets of London's East End, and doing sincere penance
> for his transgressions. I guess Anscombe is right, -- the same
> action admits of plural descriptions.
What can I say except that you are obviously acting like an idiot
savant. You certainly know your vocabulary, but I have to pity you
for your inability to communicate. Maybe you take some kind of
pleasure out of being completely out of tune with others' sense of
humor, but believe me, it's a bad habit, and it costs you something.
Visualizing Wittgenstein abusing children does nothing to amuse me. It
makes me numb. It makes me want to ignore you and your feeble attempts
to make an argument. I can not sympathize, I can only pity.
John Williams
Andrew Dinn
>I admire Wittgenstein very much and hold his work in the highest
>regard, but the impression I got from Ray Monk's biography of him
>was that he returned to philosophy because he was suffering from
>acute anhedonia and couldn't find a job that he wouldn't hate, nor
>could he figure out what to do with himself. Since he was already
>famous as a philosopher, returning to academia was the path of least
>resistance.
I believe Wittgenstein enjoyed enormously his job as a school teacher
during the twenties. This period is not covered in great detail by
Ray Monk but has been documented elsewhere (by some guy with a double
barreled name and a roman numeral to boot who doesn't seem totally
reliable yet still uncovered some interesting material). He was very
resistant to making a return to philosophy and was only led to do so
by Schlick's careful courtship - this is documented either in Kenny's
book or McGuiness' (excuse the lapses of memory after 10 years).
Andrew Dinn
--------------------------
I'll teach you differences
Torkel Franzen
(Andrew Dinn) writes:
>I believe Wittgenstein enjoyed enormously his job as a school teacher
>during the twenties.
Where did you get this idea? Recall what Wittgenstein wrote to
Russell about Trattenbach.
Michael Feld
>for separating the philosopher's character from the content of his
>writings.
Now, just why should we think this? Yes, moral hypocrisy is
disgusting, and we thereby entitle ourselves to hate Heidegger that
little bit more. But does it follow that if we can imagine (against
all the evidence) that, say, the great logician Church was morally
defective, we would for that reason be justified in concluding that
Church's views on set theory are defective? For that matter, "do as I say,
not as I do" is the theme of many professional applied mathematicians:
statisticians are notorious for committing the very inductive
fallacies that they (correctly) warn us against. Even within ethics,
there remains weakness-of-will, akrasia, to explain why the hypocrisy
of moralists need not blind us to the truths they sometimes preach.
Aristotle Aristotle was a bugger for the bottle.
In short, genetic ad hominem seems needlessly weak as a
Wittgenstein-squasher.
--
Michael Feld | E-mail: <fe...@cc.umanitoba.ca>
Dept. of Philosophy | FAX: (204) 261-0021
University of Manitoba | Voice: (204) 474-9136
Winnipeg, MB, R3T 2M8, Canada
Mikhail Zeleny
In article <CDrqJ...@ccu.umanitoba.ca>
fe...@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Michael Feld) writes:
>>If the task of philosophy is indeed therapeutic, there is no excuse
>>for separating the philosopher's character from the content of his
>>writings.
>Now, just why should we think this? Yes, moral hypocrisy is
>disgusting, and we thereby entitle ourselves to hate Heidegger that
>little bit more. But does it follow that if we can imagine (against
>all the evidence) that, say, the great logician Church was
That should be either "is" or, better, "were".
> morally
>defective, we would for that reason be justified in concluding that
>Church's views on set theory are defective?
Unlike Wittgenstein, Church has no moral philosophy. This is not to
say that either his philosophical position or professional conduct
lack moral implications.
> For that matter, "do as I say,
>not as I do" is the theme of many professional applied mathematicians:
>statisticians are notorious for committing the very inductive
>fallacies that they (correctly) warn us against.
Again, this is not in itself a relevant example.
> Even within ethics,
>there remains weakness-of-will, akrasia, to explain why the hypocrisy
>of moralists need not blind us to the truths they sometimes preach.
>Aristotle Aristotle was a bugger for the bottle.
Akrasia affords no excuse for one who would tell others how to live.
It has been my habit to regard one's utterances as an extension and
expression of his will, and to appeal to its manifestations for their
interpretation. When the will is found lacking, so does the meaning.
>In short, genetic ad hominem seems needlessly weak as a
>Wittgenstein-squasher.
Surely you didn't miss my one-line moral dismissal of verificationism.
>--
>Michael Feld | E-mail: <fe...@cc.umanitoba.ca>
>Dept. of Philosophy | FAX: (204) 261-0021
>University of Manitoba | Voice: (204) 474-9136
>Winnipeg, MB, R3T 2M8, Canada
cordially,
mikhail "el desdichado" zeleny
Mark Taranto
> Even the far more careerist Russell left philosophy
> after the Forties and protested the arms race.
One would think that it would be considered acceptable to put aside
one's primary job, and spend time on one's hobbies, when one enters
his 80s.
But the fact is that Russell never completely put aside Philosophy --
although his publications did taper off considerably.
Mark