After struggling in my undergraduate degree with the Tractatus for the last 4 weeks - these videos are finally enabled Wittegenstein's argument to click. Thank you!
Wittgenstein wrote his early work "Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus" during his participation in the first WW as a young man and completed its writing in 1918. A decade later in Cambridge Wittgenstein received his PhD with this early work. But only few years later he distanced himself from his early work ... but kept his PhD ... ;-)
Thank you so much for these vids, I was really stressing out not understanding wtf Wittgenstein was on about but you've made it a lot clearer!!! This will be so useful for my assignment, thank you.
Just came across this nice series of lectures...but wow, must be hell of a job to tackle these texts in English translation...coming from a native German speaking background I have some issues with "state of affairs" for Wittgensteins term "Sachverhalt". A Sachverhalt is more of a fact - eg. in court. There seems to be the alternative translation of Ogden/Ramsey: "atomic fact". The meaning may be clearer, but maybe even more misleading...
6:52 but properties are just 1ary predicates and relations are nary predicates. So actually Wittgenstein's ontology is more inclusive than Russell's right? And I don't know what a combination of objects should be other than a relation
Had Wittgenstein read Aristotle/Plato/Leibniz/Spinoza? I remember reading a biography about him that said Wittgenstein didnt bother to read any of the previous philosophers
In his early years he read Schopenhauer, Frege, Russell, and Whitehead, as well as physicists like Hertz and Boltzmann (great poets and novelists too.) It was only during World War I that Wittgenstein started reading Kant, Nietzsche, and Emerson(among others.) Over the years he seemed to develop an admiration for Spinoza and Leibniz (as recorded in conversations with his students.) Wittgenstein did leave some remarks about Plato in his P.I., plus his Notebooks. As for Aristotle, he never touch a single book in all his 62 years (so the legend has it!)
Good video. I've been through this work once and I have more questions than answers. Didn't Wittgenstein eventually reject it and move to a different kind of philosophy?
Pretty sure yh, in Philosohical Investigations he basically says the language cant be analysed logically because it's so subjective. Feel free to correct me if I'm mistaken on that
@@zakparsons9109 He doesn't say language is subjective, in Philosophical Investigations he even goes against such interpretations of language with his private language argument. What he says, and that denies the Tractatus' views is that language is not based on logic. He says that we always have to understand what is said in a social context (forms of life) that supposes an agreement in the term we use. Thus, when someone doesn't follow the grammatical rule that underlies a term, people sharing that form of life can tell us we're mistaken. It's quite more cultural than subjective.
@@vmb4178 Just to add off of your perspective, Ludwig also expresses the limits of language and understanding. Beyond cultural experience, language, subjective experience, and the relationship between them he goes on to essentially say such experiences are the only experiences to exist; that there is nothing beneath them. For instance, we are tempted to think of understanding, thinking, meaning, intending, and so on, as distinctly mental processes. According to this idea, if I can speak with or without thinking, the thinking must be an intangible mental act that underlies the speech. Wittgenstein sets about demolishing this notion, first with a grammatical investigation of the words "understanding" and "reading." Our criteria for determining whether someone has understood something or is reading something are not based on inner states or processes. We judge that people have understood or are reading based on their outward behavior.
@@zakparsons9109 He also explicitly says in the preface of Philosophical Investigations that a mathematician of the time, Frank Ramsey, in effect debunked the tractatus.
i am unsure on the exact history, so this comment by imaginary i may be hyperbolic, but the common feature of east asian metaphysics throughout history has been relation ontology. (as opposed to western substance ontology from Aristotle) Relationship ontology says that the “realist” things are relationships rather than substances. This understanding leads to the view that things are only real insofar as they stand in relationship with other things
The difference between analytics and continentals is one of form, not substance. Even though both post-modernists and most of the early analytic philosophers had a disdain for speculative metaphysics, analytic philosophers usually placed the natural sciences above philosophy, whereas French post-modernists would usually make some vague affirmation of the superiority of force and feeling over logic, and of the impossibility of man to know what is beyond man's own worldliness. Derrida would have never written the TLP even though he might have agreed with much of what it affirms because he didn't believe that philosophical truths could be arrived upon by the means of a sequence of logical arguments.
Is philosophy mainly the art of making the simplest things very complicated? I prefer to trust Einstein who said that if you can't explain it to a six year old, it's because you don't understand it yourself.
@@gyromaster4174 People should be able to explain it to the intended audience. This video is intended for an advanced course consisting of an audience with philosophical background. A video aimed at a layman audience without philosophical background would indeed be different. There are many such videos on UA-cam, if that is what you seek.
Einstein over-emphasized the need to make our ideas clear to laymen and bartenders. I know from personal experience that many people suffer from an unwillingness to learn or listen. For instance, when I worked for years as a server I encountered boatloads (yes, as it was in a resort town) of people who only wanted to laugh-away philosophy, or simply dismiss challenging ideas without thinking them through. Only willing and charitable people can learn difficult things.
Wittgenstein tries to say what the structure is of the, world, thought and language is. But these structures are apriory to language. So you are trying to pull yourself up by your own ears. You can use the results of the essential structure of the world and language to try and explain that structure. Thus once you understand what he is trying to do, you see that he can not do it, there goes the ladder. What is important is the fact that we can not escape our pictorial representation, which is language. I do not agree with him that the world has a logical form, which language mirrors, independent of us. Please read the works of Hiedegger and feel the mystery of our way of Being.
Understanding is simple as to understanding how we understand is incredibly complex.
This video deserves more views! Thanks for simplifying such a difficult text.
This deserves a billion views! I've had this book for years and haven't had a clue as to wtf was going on!
After struggling in my undergraduate degree with the Tractatus for the last 4 weeks - these videos are finally enabled Wittegenstein's argument to click. Thank you!
Wittgenstein wrote his early work "Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus" during his participation in the first WW as a young man and completed its writing in 1918. A decade later in Cambridge Wittgenstein received his PhD with this early work. But only few years later he distanced himself from his early work ... but kept his PhD ... ;-)
I'm a student of philosophy. This is amazing professor.
Incredible video. Difficult text, but your lecture has helped me understand it greatly.
"Although I would like to there be fewer things, I am trying to minimize my material possessions, right?" (Prof. Banick on Wittgenstein)
Thank you so much for these vids, I was really stressing out not understanding wtf Wittgenstein was on about but you've made it a lot clearer!!! This will be so useful for my assignment, thank you.
Wow! I was just blown away! Thank you, professor, I'll make sure to watch all of your videos, over and over🧐
Wow, prof... just WOW!!!
POV: you are the uber eats driver I brain wiped and am reconstructing from the ground up
This was absolutely beautiful
5 min in and I am assured that the world is mental 🤙
Just came across this nice series of lectures...but wow, must be hell of a job to tackle these texts in English translation...coming from a native German speaking background I have some issues with "state of affairs" for Wittgensteins term "Sachverhalt". A Sachverhalt is more of a fact - eg. in court.
There seems to be the alternative translation of Ogden/Ramsey: "atomic fact". The meaning may be clearer, but maybe even more misleading...
Wow, what a great video. Thank you so much, this book is so difficult, I was lost by 1.1. But your video helped.
You have just saved my work about the TLP. My Language Philosophy teacher just read the book and this explained nothing lol
6:52 but properties are just 1ary predicates and relations are nary predicates. So actually Wittgenstein's ontology is more inclusive than Russell's right? And I don't know what a combination of objects should be other than a relation
Great video!
Good one!
Had Wittgenstein read Aristotle/Plato/Leibniz/Spinoza? I remember reading a biography about him that said Wittgenstein didnt bother to read any of the previous philosophers
In his early years he read Schopenhauer, Frege, Russell, and Whitehead, as well as physicists like Hertz and Boltzmann (great poets and novelists too.) It was only during World War I that Wittgenstein started reading Kant, Nietzsche, and Emerson(among others.) Over the years he seemed to develop an admiration for Spinoza and Leibniz (as recorded in conversations with his students.) Wittgenstein did leave some remarks about Plato in his P.I., plus his Notebooks. As for Aristotle, he never touch a single book in all his 62 years (so the legend has it!)
Its a very difficult text. Im 70% through it now
Good video. I've been through this work
once and I have more questions than answers. Didn't Wittgenstein eventually
reject it and move to a different kind of
philosophy?
Pretty sure yh, in Philosohical Investigations he basically says the language cant be analysed logically because it's so subjective. Feel free to correct me if I'm mistaken on that
@@zakparsons9109 He doesn't say language is subjective, in Philosophical Investigations he even goes against such interpretations of language with his private language argument. What he says, and that denies the Tractatus' views is that language is not based on logic. He says that we always have to understand what is said in a social context (forms of life) that supposes an agreement in the term we use. Thus, when someone doesn't follow the grammatical rule that underlies a term, people sharing that form of life can tell us we're mistaken.
It's quite more cultural than subjective.
@@vmb4178 Just to add off of your perspective, Ludwig also expresses the limits of language and understanding. Beyond cultural experience, language, subjective experience, and the relationship between them he goes on to essentially say such experiences are the only experiences to exist; that there is nothing beneath them. For instance, we are tempted to think of understanding, thinking, meaning, intending, and so on, as distinctly mental processes. According to this idea, if I can speak with or without thinking, the thinking must be an intangible mental act that underlies the speech. Wittgenstein sets about demolishing this notion, first with a grammatical investigation of the words "understanding" and "reading." Our criteria for determining whether someone has understood something or is reading something are not based on inner states or processes. We judge that people have understood or are reading based on their outward behavior.
@@zakparsons9109 He also explicitly says in the preface of Philosophical Investigations that a mathematician of the time, Frank Ramsey, in effect debunked the tractatus.
@@vmb4178 yeah we need to crack the Forms of Life. do you think we make head way with private language?
At last : a reason for calling it ' Logical Atomism '
Amazing :D
professor out of topic but how could you grow such beard? WOW, is it purely genetics?
Wow Brandon Gleasons double😊
Chinese metaphysics has figured this out 2000 years ago...
Figured what out?
i am unsure on the exact history, so this comment by imaginary i may be hyperbolic, but the common feature of east asian metaphysics throughout history has been relation ontology. (as opposed to western substance ontology from Aristotle) Relationship ontology says that the “realist” things are relationships rather than substances. This understanding leads to the view that things are only real insofar as they stand in relationship with other things
If derrida had written the tractatus, he'd have been laughed at.
The difference between analytics and continentals is one of form, not substance. Even though both post-modernists and most of the early analytic philosophers had a disdain for speculative metaphysics, analytic philosophers usually placed the natural sciences above philosophy, whereas French post-modernists would usually make some vague affirmation of the superiority of force and feeling over logic, and of the impossibility of man to know what is beyond man's own worldliness.
Derrida would have never written the TLP even though he might have agreed with much of what it affirms because he didn't believe that philosophical truths could be arrived upon by the means of a sequence of logical arguments.
My shitty brain just turned into shit
so the brain turning in to something is the fact?
@@mitchellkato1436 there was some brain in there somewhere.... But I wouldn't presume
"life is black and white. the gray is our perception of the two." - jstjr
Is philosophy mainly the art of making the simplest things very complicated? I prefer to trust Einstein who said that if you can't explain it to a six year old, it's because you don't understand it yourself.
This video is not aimed at a 6 year old audience.
@@kylebanick4977 he’s saying people should be able to explain theories in layman’s terms
@@gyromaster4174 People should be able to explain it to the intended audience. This video is intended for an advanced course consisting of an audience with philosophical background. A video aimed at a layman audience without philosophical background would indeed be different. There are many such videos on UA-cam, if that is what you seek.
@@kylebanick4977 no it’s not necessarily but I am wondering why it’s necessary to make it more complex im not targeting you in general
Einstein over-emphasized the need to make our ideas clear to laymen and bartenders. I know from personal experience that many people suffer from an unwillingness to learn or listen. For instance, when I worked for years as a server I encountered boatloads (yes, as it was in a resort town) of people who only wanted to laugh-away philosophy, or simply dismiss challenging ideas without thinking them through. Only willing and charitable people can learn difficult things.
Wittgenstein tries to say what the structure is of the, world, thought and language is. But these structures are apriory to language. So you are trying to pull yourself up by your own ears. You can use the results of the essential structure of the world and language to try and explain that structure. Thus once you understand what he is trying to do, you see that he can not do it, there goes the ladder.
What is important is the fact that we can not escape our pictorial representation, which is language.
I do not agree with him that the world has a logical form, which language mirrors, independent of us. Please read the works of Hiedegger and feel the mystery of our way of Being.
He tried to explain what is the case, American’s believe they are the case.