Seminar Paper:

Ludwig Wittgenstein’s ‘Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus’

Ludwig Wittgenstein’s ‘Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus’ is a seminal text concerned primarily with the disciplines of logic and epistemology, and the role of language within these frameworks. The enigmatic text draws influence from the works of his mentor, Bertrand Russand, as well as other logicians such as Gottlob Frege.

                The book is organised over seven chapters, each consisting of a singular, cryptic sentence, elaborated upon in a series of footnotes. Russell notes in the preface that Wittgenstein’s endeavours centre around ‘the relation subsisting between thoughts, words, or sentences, and that which they refer to or mean’. Wittgenstein viewed language as much more than a simple, transparent act, but moreover the principal mechanism for establishing truth and understanding the world around us.

                Wittgenstein viewed each individual proposition as a combination of numerous atomic propositions. From these we create a picture; not necessarily a literal picture, but an amalgamation of the atomic propositions we combine. Wittgenstein found difficulty in defining his picture theory and backtracked several times. Peter Carruthers notes in his book ‘Tractarian Semantics’ that ‘it is not just a matter of constructing ever more detailed representations of the truth conditions of sentences… but constructing notations which will be logically or philosophically perspicuous’ (1989). Our unconscious works to manage all the intricate, complex rules of a language, and piece together the elements of a given proposition to establish truth or falsehood.

                This principle is consistent with work dating as far back as David Hume, a central influence, alongside Wittgenstein on Logical Positivism.  The foundations of verificationism established by Hume and elaborated upon by Alfred Jules Ayer permeate the Tractatus. Wittgenstein’s philosophy on language aims to find a verifiable truth value in any given proposition and consequently Wittgenstein acknowledges that any proposition has the capacity to be a false or a true picture. Similarly, the verification principle does not rely on a priori methodology to find truth, but only establishes truth through empirical, verifiable means.

                In Chapters 2 and 3 Wittgenstein outlines how he believes our thoughts are pictures of facts and this in turn is how we interpret the world. There is a link here with phenomenological thought. It poses the philosophical question; can we empirically verify our picture of given facts, without knowing if it is our subjective perception or a universal truth? We can however, consider these facts as provisionally true, but falsifiable (as defined in Karl Popper’s critique of the verification principle). 

                The seventh chapter of the Tractatus declares that, ‘of that which we cannot speak, we must remain silent’. This is encompassing of logical positivist ideology, in that the truth within any given statement lies within our cognitive means of verification, and of those propositions which are unverifiable ‘we must remain silent’. The unverifiable propositions are simply ‘emoting’ (as defined by Ayer), and can consequently be considered nonsensical.  

                The obscurity of the final chapter can also be perceived to reflect Wittgenstein’s overarching viewpoint of the role of philosophy. He says ‘Philosophy gives no pictures of reality and can neither confirm nor confute scientific investigation’. He asserts that without language philosophy could not exist and consequently philosophy is simply a critique of language itself. This is why Wittgenstein’s worked to uncover the way we perceive the world through language.

                Despite his work on establishing truth through language, Wittgenstein stated that ‘it is not how things are in the world that is mystical, but that it exists’. Wittgenstein acknowledged therefore that he needed to accept particular necessary truths and certitudes before he could analyse further. Before we can scrutinise our understanding of the world around us, we must recognise that language is the tool we will use for such an analysis. This certitude is undoubtedly the reason Wittgenstein attributed such prestige to the studying the philosophy of language.