Language sets the same traps for everybody: the terrible network of well-worn wrong tracks. So we see one person after another going the same way, and we know where they will turn aside, where they will go straight ahead, without noticing a fork, etc., etc. So what I should do is to put up signs in all the places wherever wrong turnings branch off, to help people over the dangerous places (Kenny 55).If we're supposed to get the meaning of words from the way in which we use them, what are we to make of this passage? Is Wittgenstein saying that we can't trust our language to tell us what things mean?
It seems to me that what he's trying to say is that the structure of language makes it seem that things are different than they are. It's the way in which we use words similarly within language, that is, as verbs or nouns or whatever it may be, but that this leads us into false assumptions.
How is Wittgenstein to show us the way, then? The answer seems to be that Wittgenstein just wants to warn us of what kinds of mistakes we may make. But is Wittgenstein holding two contradictory positions, one that says language confuses us, and one that says we need to just look at how language is ordinarily used to free us from this confusion?
We run into problems when we make inferences from the structure of language about the nature of concepts.
But it does seems hard to be able to truly just look at the so-called 'ordinary' use of language, especially if one has studied philosophy. Where's the limit that separates 'ordinary' language from philosophical language? And how are we supposed to recognize this so we know when we're getting into meaningless confusions?
1 comment:
Presumably what may help here is to look at what traps W has in mind... Do we respond differently to them when we are engaged in philosophy than when are are engaged in other activities? etc.
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