Practical Logicism and Language-Game

Kant can be classified as not only a 'Theoretical' Logicist, but a 'Practical' one, as well.  For, he posits that not only are Cognitive propositions derived from Reason, so, too, is the Moral Law.  Therefore, insofar as, according to the Investigations, Logicism is a kind of Language-Game, so, too, is Kantian Morality.  However, Kant could argue that, in terms of the Investigations, Morality is, more precisely, a Meta-Language-Game, in which the formal conditions of the Language-Game in which Maxims are used are formulated.  Furthermore, he could argue that those conditions are that of any Game--that the rules of a Game be consistently observed, and that the independence of its Players be respected.  Now, corresponding to his distinction between 'Perfect' and 'Imperfect' Duty, is that between two interpretations of those Game-conditions--Regulatory, i. e. what a Player must not do, and Constitutive, i. e. what a Player must do.  But, in the latter case, the Meta-Language-Game becomes a first-order Game in its own right, i. e. 'Treating Others With Respect', arguably a universal Game.  Thus, while the Investigations exposes the subordinate status of Theoretical Logicism, it tends to reinforce the priority of Practical Logicism, by facilitating an illustration of the subtlety of Kant's concept of Pure Practical Reason.

Critique, Theoretical Language, Practical Language

Though he does not explicitly explain it as such, Wittgenstein's use of the phrase 'Critique of  Language', at #4.0031 of the Tractatus, seems a likely allusion to Kant, with the implication that his limitation of meaningful Language to empirical Experience is comparable to Kant's of Reason, to the same.  But, if so, he ignores there, at least, that in Kant's case, that limitation applies to Theoretical, not to Practical, Reason.  So, the Investigations can interpreted as a study of what can be called, correspondingly, 'Practical Language', i. e. in which Language is freed of the constraints specifically applicable to the function of describing the World.  However, he does not go so far, as Kant does with Practical Reason, to posit the possibility that Practical Language can be more than a mere means to some ulterior end.

Critique of the Critique of Language

Wittgenstein's apparent obliviousness to the previously discussed equivocation--the term "logic" in #4.0031 of the Tractatus--is perhaps ironic, given that the passage is prefaced by the assertion "All Philosophy is 'Critique of Language'".  Still, a Russellian analysis of that assertion can be instructive.  For, underlying what appears to be a preposterously false proposition, i  e. Wittgenstein offers no explanation as to how, e. g. The Republic or The Meditations is a 'Critique of Language', is a faulty inference--from 'A Critique of Language is a Philosophical procedure', to 'All Philosophy is Critique of Language'.  Now, given that Wittgenstein eventually transcends and dismisses the significance of this and other assertions, it might be taken lightly.  However, that claim is the fundamental principle of Analytic Philosophy, which has come to predominate in Anglo-American academia.  Thus, the only exposure to Philosophy that much of the general public has been getting for the past several decades is insular and internally incoherent.  In contrast, a less irresponsible curriculum might incorporate, for example, Nietzsche's examination of Truth and of the Subject-Predicate structure of Language.

Transcendental Logic and Description

Kant and Husserl each draw a distinction between the Logic of Thought and the Logic of Propositions--for the former, it is expressed in the contrast of the 'Table of Categories' and the 'Table of Judgments', respectively, to which correspond designations used by Husserl, 'Transcendental Logic' and 'Formal Logic'.  Now, while Wittgenstein never explicitly distinguishes the two, the contrast is implicit in his statement, from #4.0031 of the Tractatus: "Russell's merit is to have shown that the apparent logical form of the proposition need not be its real form."  For, he is alluding to Russell's theory of 'Descriptions', which is based on the distinction between 'S is P' and 'There is an x, such that x is S and x is P", with the latter the "real" version.  Now, as Kant characterizes it, a bare 'x' is the 'Transcendental Object".  So, in the absence of an alternative derivation of the 'there is an x' locution, e. g. from an advocacy of the Existentialist principle 'Existence precedes Essence', the Logic of the Tractatus, and of Russell's Logicism, is fundamentally that of Thought, not of Propositions.

World, Thought, Language

While the ostensible primary topic of the Tractatus is the relation between Language and World, the combination of #3, #3.1, #4.002, and #4.0031 suggests that, rather, it is that between Language and Thought.  For, to summarize those passages: 1. Thought is the Logical picture of the World; 2. A Proposition is a sensible representation of a Thought; 3. A Proposition can misrepresent the Logical structure of a Thought; and 4. The function of 'Philosophy' is to clear up such misrepresentations.  Now, given the detailed and contentious history of Epistemology, #1 is superficial and questionable.  But, the heart of the sequence is the uncritical Platonism of #2, which ignores examples of  Thought needing to be 'worked out' on paper.  Such cases tend to confirm, instead, a Derridean inversion of the traditional concept of the Thought-Language relation, i. e. according to which Logic consists in Articulation, Articulation requires Spacing, and Spacing is uniquely effected by Writing, on the basis of which a Thought is either an inchoate Proposition, or a copy of one already formulated.  So, ignored in #4 is another function of Philosophy--to debunk dogmatic assertions, i. e. prejudices presented as categorical truths.

Proposition, Narration, Description

As is familiar to most, Experience is constituted by episodes that terminate after they have started.  In other words, the fundamental elements of that World are not Facts or States-of-Affairs, as Wittgenstein asserts, but Events, each of which is constituted by an internal Temporal structure.  Accordingly, the Language with the greater fidelity to that World is that composed by Propositions that are, more accurately, narrative, not descriptive.  Thus, for example, inappropriate representations of an Event include, a Causal Proposition analyzed as an a-temporal conjunction, and Function notation, in which the Subject-Predicate relation is symbolized as static.  So, both of these features of Wittgenstein's ideal Language in the Tractatus are inadequate to a different Ontological presupposition.

Causality, Induction, Deduction

Wittgenstein's phrase "causal nexus", in #5.136 of the Tractatus, continues and amplifies a profound confusion in the Humean tradition of the concept of Causality.  For, as the text surrounding that phrase indicates, there are two nexuses in Hume's original formulation--1. Past Constant Conjunction and 2. Inference from Past to Future--the latter of which is often ignored, by others.  But, the denial that the Future necessarily repeats the Past does not entail that some Past event was a continuous process governed by Necessity, i. e. that the 'conjuncts' are the product of a previous Disjunctive analysis of an originally continuous process.  For example, from the uncertainty that swinging a hammer at some glass will break, it does not follow that a completed actual breaking of glass by swinging a hammer at it was, in fact, constituted by a contingent concatenation of two originally distinct moments.  So, as is typical in the Atomist-Empiricist tradition, Wittgenstein does not consider that while the 'Logic' governing tenseless general Causal Propositions might be Inductive, that of Past Singular ones may be Deductive, i. e. he ignores that the inference from Present to Past is as dubious as that from Past to Future.

Nature, Mathematics, Language-Games

Mathematical Physics can be interpreted either as the quantification of the cognition and/or the description of Nature, or as entailing the Ontological thesis, originated by Pythagoras--that Nature is essentially constituted by quanta.  So, for example, since Husserl ascribes the latter to Galileo, the pioneer of modern Mathematical Physics, his later de-quantization of Nature, resulting in a 'Life-World', corresponds to his earlier de-Mathematization of Science.  Likewise, the Logicism of Russell and early Wittgenstein is indistinguishable from Pythagoreanism, i. e. that classification follows from these premises: 1. Language describes the World; 2. The inner Logic of Language mirrors the structure of the World; and 3. Logic and Mathematics are identical.  Accordingly, Wittgenstein's later concept of a World constituted by Language-Games could reflect a repudiation of Pythagoreanism as much as does Husserl's Life-World.

Logicism and Mathematics

The prototype of the Proposition in modern Science is the Newtonian Law, and, hence, entails the application of Mathematics.  Accordingly, in both Kantian and Russellian Logicisms, Mathematics mediates between Logic and Empirical propositions.  In the former, that mediation is effected by the Temporalization of the Categories, which, concomitantly, facilitates the enumerability of Experience.  In the latter, Logic and Mathematics are conceived as identical, e. g. Conjunction and Disjunction are equated with Arithmetical Multiplication and Addition, respectively, and with Set Theoretical Intersection and Union, respectively.  In remarkable contrast with both, in his project of founding Science, Husserl asserts that "the mathematician is not really the pure theoretician, but only the ingenious technician" (Logical Investigations, Prolegomena, #71).  So, not only is Mathematics extrinsic to his Logicism, his Instrumentalism predates that of both Heidegger and Wittgenstein by decades, contrary to standard interpretations of those relations.  Furthermore, this affinity with the later Wittgenstein is another indication of the greater hospitability of his Logicism, than of Russell's, to a Semantics of 'ordinary language'.

Intersubjectivity, Life-World, Language-Game

Towards the end of his career, Husserl, in the Crisis of European Sciences, modifies his Logicism, by rooting his 'I' in a 'Life-World', and briefly deriving what might, correspondingly, be called 'Intersubjective Logicism'.  He therein examines what Wittgenstein bypasses in his encounter with Solipsism--that 'the' world is 'our' world, and not merely 'my' world.  Still, Husserl's goal in this later phase remains, as the title of the book suggests, to provide a foundation for scientific theory.  His development, thus, is not as radical as Wittgenstein's approximately contemporaneous metamorphosis, i. e. the Life-World does not become a general arena of the actual interaction of the multiple Subjects, and, hence, of Language-Games, and, so, does not complete a repudiation of Logicism.

Meaning, Expression, Intention

Husserl's primary ambition for his Subjective Logicism is to provide what he believes that its Objective rival cannot--a foundation for the set of Propositions that constitute any scientific theory.  But, with its concept of Intention, derived from Brentano, it also offers a more versatile ground than does it rival for a Semantics of ordinary discourse.  For, it can accommodate a formulation that conforms to the latter--'The Meaning of an utterance consists in its expressing the intention of its speaker'.  On that basis, Russell's segregation of an 'attitude', such as an intention, from a Proposition, empties the would-be symbols that comprise the latter of any Sense or Reference.

Subjective Logicism, Objective Logicism, Expression

Two varieties of Logicism can be called 'Subjective' and 'Objective'.  In both, Language is conceived as derived from Logic, but in the latter, the locus of Logic is the inner structure of the World, while in the former, it is the I.  Thus, in Objective Logicism, Language 'refers' to that locus, whereas in Subjective Logicism, it 'expresses' it.  For example, Russell implicitly subscribes to OL, Kant and Husserl to SL, and both are to be found in the Tractatus--the initial premises are that of OL, but the brief emergences of Constructivism and Solipsism can be classified as SL.  Now, as Husserl, in the Logical Investigations shows, SL, unlike OL can accommodate Expression as a type of Meaning, in the process of which he recognizes Communication as the fundamental context of Language.  Still, rather than further exploring the latter topic, his focus remains that of Russell--a concept of Language as primarily functioning to represent what is true, the necessary conditions of which are expressed, in his version, in the formal structures of Language.

Communication, Expressing, Meaning

Each of the following three are commonly accepted characterizations of someone's smile: 1. 'Happiness causes them to smile'; 2. 'The smile means that they are happy'; and 3. 'The smile expresses their happiness'.  Accordingly, 'H causes S', 'S means H', and 'S expresses H' are interchangeable in the context.  In contrast, Wittgenstein's equating of "expression" and "symbol", in #3.31 of the Tractatus, is unrelated to, and is perhaps abstracted from, the use of 'expresses' in the third formulation above, since a symbol is not an effect of its object.  Likewise, Meaning qua Expressing has no place in Fregean-Russellian Logicism, because in that respect, the 'meaning' of an utterance is some condition, e.g .volitional, of its utterer, whereas the concept of Language is abstracted from speech-acts.  In other words, Expressing is the most personal and least mediated semantical relation, i. e. is the variety of 'Meaning' that is most fundamental in Communication.

Language and Communing

The closest Wittgenstein seems to come to formally defining 'Language-Game' is in #7 of the Investigations: "I shall also call the whole, consisting of language and the actions into which it is woven, the 'language-game'.  Implied in this formulation is a distinction between Language and some associated activity.  However, there is no such distinction in cases in which people converse simply to socialize.  In these experiences, Language is not so much used as, rather, expressing the togetherness of those involved.  Therein, the essence of Language as not merely Communication, but as a mode of Communing is laid bare, and exhibited as prior to any ulterior activity into which it might be woven.

Language-Game, Work, Play

In a sequence beginning at #65 of the Investigations, Wittgenstein addresses an objection to his concept of Language-Game, that is advanced on the ground that he fails to justify the classification with a demonstration that that concept entails an essential property of the concept of Game.  His response is that since no such essence can be gleaned from the ordinary use of 'game', that Language-Games share "family resemblances" (#67) with those activities suffices to justify the subsumption.  However, he does not seem to consider that that response also implies that if some activity more closely resembles what are commonly recognized as non-games, then, the subsumption is unjustified.  For example, one ordinary indication of the distinction between Game and non-Game is the distinction between the uses of the terms 'play' and 'work', and not only the activity that he describes in #2, but also many involving tools, are commonly regarded as work-activities.  Accordingly, the use of Language in the latter cannot be easily characterized as a 'Language-Game'.  Thus, while his empirical argument against the formal objection may sufice, it is seemingly does not against a related empirical alternative.

Grammar and Morality

That the laws of Geometry are in themselves theoretical does not preclude that the geometrical properties of a tool, e. g. a hammer, do not reflect its usage.  Similarly, the grammatical structure of a sentence can reflect its Moral status.  For example, while the utterance of a Rogative sentence, i. e. 'Will you do X?', respects the independence of its addressee, that of an Imperative implicitly suppresses it, and that of a Declarative sentence is indifferent to the existence of anyone other than the utterer.  Thus, on the basis of the Rogative formation, the privileging of Imperatives, and of Declaratives, is each inherently Morally deficient, regardless of the ambitions of, say, Kant and Russell, respectively.

Language-Game and Evaluation

'Gamesmanship' can be defined as 'Respect for the integrity of some Game', and, hence, can be classified as a Game-Playing 'Virtue'.  Accordingly, in Competition-Games, cheating and deliberately losing are vices.  Now, such valuations are Game-specific.  For example, while bluffing is a virtue in Poker, it is a vice in Promising, as Kant insightfully argues, in contrast with which Wittgenstein's classification of Lying, in #249 of the Investigations, as merely one other Language-Game, is superficial and inadequate.  Likewise, while solipsistic behavior can be a virtue in Solitaire, insofar as any Language-Game involves at least two players, it is a vice in any of them.  Thus, insofar as the Logicist concept of Language is solipsistic, as the Tractatus shows, the use of it is not a Language-Game, but a vice, from the perspective of the Investigations.  So, even if Wittgenstein does not recognize it, by expanding the scope of Language in the later work, he expands that of the evaluation of it, as well,

Philosophy of Language and Morality

Wittgenstein's break with Logicism begins not sometime in between the Tractatus and the Investigations, as is widely believed, but right at the outset of the former.  For, as soon he introduces a concept of a 'World', he transgresses the usual parameters of the Logicist treatment of Language, i. e. by relating it to the easily recognizable principles of that concept--Empiricism and Atomism.  In other words, he exposes the systematic Epistemological and Metaphysical presuppositions of Logicism, thereby dissolving its presumed insularity.  Furthermore, the consequent, as Wittgenstein shows, Solipsism is more than merely a Metaphysical or Epistemological problem--it is a Moral one, as well, i. e. it seems difficult to deny the classification of a Solipsist as an 'Egoist'.  Accordingly, the transition to a World inhabited by a plurality of Language-Game-Players, i. e. which entails the recognition of the independent existence of others, is, similarly, a Morally significant development.  However, if #77 of the Investigations is any indication, Wittgenstein seems unprepared to appreciate the wider implications of his new perspective.  For, in that passage, seemingly the only one in the book that attends to the topic, he treats Morality as a type of Language-Game, which makes it difficult to recognize the inherent Moral significance of any Language-Game.  So, he misses an opportunity to encourage a study of his works that transcends the typically insular purview of Philosophy of Language.

Private Language and Logicism

Starting at #243 in the Investigations, Wittgenstein presents a sequence often characterized as his 'private language argument', a potentially misleading formulation, since he opposes, not defends that possibility.  His analyses in those passages show that while experiences, such as pains, may be private, the language associated with them is not.  such demystification seems to exemplify what he calls 'showing the fly the way out of the fly-bottle', i. e. it functions as a corrective to an extant problem.  In contrast, a preemptive approach, i. e. what might be characterized as 'preventing the fly from entering the bottle to begin with', argues, as has been proposed here, that all Language is essentially a medium of Communication, which entails that essentially no Language is private.  Now, it seems difficult to deny that the language of a Solipsist is private, and, furthermore, it seems to follow from the sequence of #5.62 to #5.6331 of the Tractatus that the Language examined in that work is that of a Solipsist, i. e. a language of one for whom "the world is my world".  Thus, even if the Private Language Argument presented in the Investigations does not explicitly cite Logicism, it seems, at minimum, applicable to it.  In contrast, the preventative alternative proposed here leaves no doubt in that regard.

Solipsism and Objectivity

The Solipsism that emerges in Wittgenstein's exposition of the World, at #5.62 of the Tractatus, has a three-fold origin.  First the equation of "the" world with "my" world echoes the result of the progressive reduction by his Empiricist predecessors--Locke, Berkeley, and Hume--of sense-objects to mental data.  Second, as has previously been discussed here, presumed 'objective' states-of-affairs are actually those of a 'third-person', from the perspective of an implicitly present 'I', the recognition of which Wittgenstein articulates at #5.632 as "the subject does not belong to the world but it is a limit of the world", like an eye to its field of vision.  Finally, the negation of  'interpersonal' is 'private', not 'impersonal', contrary to what is taken for granted in the Logicist abstraction of 'Language' from the context of Communication.  Accordingly, these passages expose a profound flaw in Logicism--a concept of Language that is Solipsistic, rather than Objective--one occasional manifestation of which is the blindness of Logicists to their own prejudices.

Solipsism and Language

In 5.62 of the Tractatus, Wittgenstein asserts that "the world is my world", in the context of considering in what respect "solipsism . . . is quite correct".  In contrast, from the outset, the environment of the Investigations is social.  Accordingly, the transcendence achieved by the end of the earlier work is not an ascent into some mystical realm, as some interpret it, but an escape from the Solipsism-bottle.  Analogously, the transition is from conceiving verbal Language as the description of one's World, to realizing that it is a means of interpersonal Communication.

Fact, Action, State-of-Affairs

The Tractatus begins with the statement, "The world is everything that is the case", and follows with the elaboration that in each instance, what 'is the case' is a Fact.  Now, the word 'fact' is rooted in the Latin for 'to do'.  Thus, at least at the outset, there is the potential in that project for a study of a 'world' constituted by Actions, from which the Language-Game of the Investigations can be derived, i. e. the initial definition of it, at #7, includes the term "actions".  However, it emerges in the course of the Tractatus that by 'fact' he means 'state-of-affairs', which is, in contrast with 'action', both impersonal and literally static.  So, the Tractatus is informed by a prejudice that is extra-linguistic, a concept of 'world', and, hence, by one that can be classified as 'Metaphysical'.

Atomic Fact and Language-Game

In the Tractatus, Wittgenstein asserts that there exist Atomic Facts in the World, without specifying which states-of-affairs they are, e. g. Cogitos, Sense-Data, etc.  Now, one candidate is the oral speech-act, for, as has been previously discussed, such an Utterance is inseparable from the process that produces it.  Furthermore, it is similarly arguable that any instance of one is inseparable from its circumstances, which includes, at minimum, an utterer, an addressee, and some purpose which it serves.  In other words, an Investigations' Language-Game can be conceived as a Tractatus' Atomic Fact.  Thus, one transition from the Tractatus to the Investigations need not involve some mystical epiphany--it is merely a road not taken within the earlier work from one of its premises.

Fact and Utterance

According to #2.141 of the Tractatus, "The picture is a fact."  So, since Wittgenstein classifies the Proposition as a Picture, a Proposition is a Fact, in this scheme.  Now, while a written sentence, like a painting, survives the process that first produces it, an oral utterance is no more separable from the uttering of it than a sneeze is from the expulsion of it.  In other words, an Utterance originates not as a Fact, but as an Element in a Fact, as the Fact-Element relation is conceived in the Tractatus.  Thus, either some Utterances are not Propositions, or else some Propositions are not Facts, a difficulty more easily avoided after the abstraction of 'Language' from the context of Communication.

Language and Constructivism

According to the Tractatus concept of it, Language isomorphically pictures the World.  However, Wittgenstein is generally no more than vague about how that principle applies to the relation between the internal structure of a Proposition and the elements of the state-of-affairs to which it corresponds, beginning with the combined yet sharply distinguished Subject and Predicate.  For example, that distinction is not immediately evident in the event that 'John is running' typically describes.  It is, therefore, in that regard that #4.0131, "In the proposition a state of affairs is . . . put together", is briefly illuminating, for it suggests that a Proposition incorporates a combination of Analysis and Synthesis that is analogous to the operation of the Understanding in Kant's theory.  Hence, the passage expresses a concept of Language that can be similarly dubbed as 'Constructivist'.  That is not to make the stronger claim that such processes likewise immediately affect the Fact to which a Proposition corresponds,  But, they can influence both how it is interpreted, and conduct towards it, e. g. 'John' can be abstracted from the event of running, and associated with an earlier robbery at a nearby jewelry store.

Atomic Facts, Propositions, Proposals

In the Tractatus, Wittgenstein defines an 'atomic fact' as a "combination" of simple objects (#2.01-02), but without specifying what those objects are, e. g. minds, sense-data, etc.  Similarly, his model of Language is based on the Propositions that correspond to Atomic Facts, without a specification of which Propositions in, say, German or English, are the simple ones.  Now, for the most part, the relation of correspondence between a Proposition and a Fact in the Tractatus seems to be that of Description, i. e. he regularly characterizes the former as a "picture" of the latter.  However, a subtle, but important, alternative is suggested by #4.031--"In the proposition, a state of affairs is, as it were, put together for the sake of an experiment"--which formulates a Constructivist concept of Language, i. e. the passage implies that even an Atomic Fact is "put together" by the Proposition which corresponds to it.  Furthermore, "for the sake of experiment" indicates that the sequence of words that 'puts together' the facts of the world is, more precisely, a Proposal, not a Proposition.  Accordingly, all the components of the Language of the Tractatus, starting with the pictures of Atomic Facts, are Proposals.  Whether or not Wittgenstein recognizes that he is advocating Constructivism in the Tractatus is unclear.

Argument, Logic, Showing a Way

The influence of Russell's principle, previously discussed here, that the essence of Language is Assertion/Denial, is evident in the more recent predominance of the 'Argument' as the mode of Logicist expression.  From that perspective, Wittgenstein's later concept of the "aim of philosophy--to show . . . the way" (Investigations, #309), as a solution to the prototypical philosophical problem, "I do not know my way about." (Investigations, #123), is commonly regarded as deviant, if not unacceptable.  However, a 'Proof', as defined by Logicists themselves, is constituted by a sequence of Propositions, beginning with 'Premises', and ending with a 'Conclusion'.  In other words, a Proof shows a way from the former to the latter.  So, if there is a deviation from the essence of Logic, it is the result-oriented Argument of contemporary Logicism, not Wittgenstein's later concept of Philosophy.

The Business of Language

Wittgenstein's lists, in the Investigations, of the variety of Language-Games suffice as not merely a divergence from, but a disproof of Russell's statement, from his introduction to the Tractatus--"The essential business of language is to assert or deny facts."  But, while Wittgenstein's evidence pertains immediately to the attribution of 'essentiality', it bypasses the more telling weakness in Russell's formulation--the term "business", which is anomalous in the context of an exposition of Language.  In the absence of any other clarification, the inclusion of that term in the statement, instead of more rigorous terms, such as 'use' or 'function, for example, can be interpreted as an attempt to fortify the implication that 'language' possesses, as an inherent property, operations  of the assertion and the denial of facts.  For, in contrast, 'use' or 'function' in that place would imply that 'language' is a grammatical object, not a grammatical in the sentence, i. e. that asserting or denying facts is a purpose that Language serves, with a speaker as the implied grammatical subject.  So, it is easy to conclude that Russell, who is among the most careful speakers in the history of Philosophy, is, in that statement, attempting to obscure the groundless of a basic principle of his concept of Language--that independent of the context of interpersonal Communication, it is more than a concatenation of empty symbols. 

The Ladder, The Fly-Bottle, Proposal

Wittgenstein's comment, in #291 of the Investigations, "What we call 'descriptions' are instruments for particular uses", suggests not that he repudiates his Tractatus concept of Language as a 'picture of the World', but that he now recognizes that function as one among a plurality of uses.  That may be why his image of his effort in the Tractatus--leading somewhat up an eventually disposable ladder, from #6.54 of that work--is similar to its correlate in the Investigations, at #309--"To show the fly the way out of the fly-bottle": common to the two is a procedure that can guide a reader to a kind of liberation.  In other words, both works are prescriptive, and, hence, are constituted by Proposals, not by Propositions, with the main difference that by the later project, he recognizes his procedures as such, with the result a re-conceiving of Language that accommodates that reflective insight.  So, ultimately, his divergence from his apparent earlier Logicism is based on a difference in what the term 'Language' denotes, not connotes--the example of his own writings vs. the contrivances of his erstwhile fellow Logicists.

Description and Indexical

Any description is necessarily subsequent to its object, as is implied in the term 're-present'.  Thus, what is commonly formulated as 'S is P' is, more accurately, "It was the case that 'S is P'", or, simply, 'S was P'.  Now, Verb Tense is classified in contemporary Logicist Philosophy of  Language as an 'Indexical', i. e. as an indication of an orientation from the perspective of a speaker.  Hence, in all presumed 'impersonal' descriptive Logicist Propositions, e. g. the 'Language' that 'pictures' the 'world' in the Tractatus, their origin in interpersonal Communication is suppressed.

Proposition, Impersonal, Third-Person

Respect for Subject-Verb agreement in the standard Propositional formulation, i. e. 'S is P', not 'S am P', implies acceptance of the classification of its Subject as a grammatical 'Third Person'.  But Thirdness implies priority of Firstness and Secondness.  Thus, likewise, any grammatical Third-Person Subject implies the priority of an 'I' and a 'You' to it.  It therefore indicates that a presumed 'impersonal' Proposition, e. g. that of Logicism, is the product of an abstraction of a Third-Person formulation from the context of First- and Second-Person interaction, i. e. from Communication.

Reliability and Truth

A 'true' friend is a 'reliable' friend.  Likewise, a 'true' utterance can easily be defined as one which reliably serves to accomplice a purpose.  In contrast, the latter meaning is difficult to derive from the Logicist meaning of 'true'.  But, the bigger problem for that orientation is the formulation of any definition of 'true'.  For, the primary aim of Logicism is to distinguish appropriate concatenations of symbols from inappropriate ones, i. e. to define 'Validity', with respect to which not only the determination of the correct application of that criterion, but the very concept of the application of it, is extrinsic.  In other words, a concept of Truth can be derived from that of Reliability, but not conversely.  That conclusion likely aggravates Logicists, but it is a consequence of the insularity of their own program.

Language-Games and Truth

The Logicist concept of Language, i. e. that of Russell and of the Tractatus, is more than a rival  to his Pluralism, which Wittgenstein suggests in #23 of the Investigations--it is one among a multiplicity of Language-Games.  That Game can be called 'Determining the Truth-Value of Utterances', by, first, representing any utterance as a bivalent Proposition, as he proposes in #36, and then submitting it to a procedure which determines whether or not it preserves the Truth of antecedent propositions, i. e. to a Proof.  So, his demonstrating that Truth is irrelevant to many Language-Games suffices to challenge the status, accorded by Logicists, of Logic with respect to Language, e. g. that Logic is the 'essence' of Language.  Still, that challenge is weaker than the one that has been advanced here, which begins with the classification of an Utterance as a Consent-seeking Proposal, on the basis of which the Logicist concept of Truth is derivative, not merely irrelevant.  Wittgenstein's characterizations of Language as a 'tool' to be 'used', suggest a similar subordination of that concept, but one that seemingly remains underdeveloped.

Utterance, Context, Meaning

In #23 of the Investigations, Wittgenstein names as one of those advocates of the concept of Language that he opposes--"the author of the Tractatus Logico-Philsophicus".  Now, the only uncertainty about the referent of that phrase is if it is a person living in 1922, or one living in 1945.  However, the Fregean Sense of it varies according to context, with the utterer of it a significant factor in its meaning.  For, while, from a publisher, it could connote simply a relation between a person and a book, in #23, it understates "I have come to repudiate a thesis which I once espoused', to which some readers might affix "thereby profoundly influencing contemporary Philosophy".  So, #23 is an example of how every utterance might constitute its own Language-Game, i. e. have a meaning that is unique to the context.

Language-Games and "Language-Game"

By Wittgenstein's own definition of it, the meaning of the term 'Language-Game' varies according to the Language-Game in which it appears.  For example, in the Language-Game 'Refuting Russell', it is defined as a relation between words and actions.  However, in the Language-Game' The Origin of Language', it can be defined as a relation between people and words.  To put it less obliquely--it is a familiar fact of experience that the meaning of words can be a function of the degree of intimacy of those conversing, with the possibility that every new interaction constitutes a unique Language-Game.  On that basis, Wittgenstein's concept of Language depersonalizes Communication as much as does Russell's, regardless of how effectively it debunks the privileged status of Logic entailed by the latter.

Language-Game, Signal, Rule

In #7 of  Philosophical Investigations, Wittgenstein defines a 'Language-Game' as a process constituted by "language and the actions into which it is woven", his primitive example of which is "one party calls out the words, the other acts on them".  Thus, the fundamental structure of a Language-Game is, as has been proposed here, that of Signal-Response.  However, thereafter, he seems to gloss that interweaving of Language and Action as the "use" of Language,  consequently apparently losing sight of that underlying structure,  e. g. as he begins, at #143, his examination of the Game that is often characterized as 'Following a Rule'.  As a result, he seems to miss the isomorphic relation between 1. fetching an object upon hearing the name of the object, and 2. writing out an infinite numerical series as an application of a mathematical formula--while he does classify the latter as a 'use' of Language, he fails to recognize that the former is as much a rule-governed activity as is the latter.  In other words, any Signal is implicitly a rule, and any Response is Rule-governed behavior, i. e. the section beginning at #143 is not an examination of a specialized Language-Game, but a making explicit what is implicit in all such contexts.

Communication and Commonality

Common in any Communication are that a phenomenon is recognized as functioning as Signal, and the meaning of the Signal.  Hence, Commonality in Communication is a function of those involved. For example, a thumbs-up or a green light may be more common than the word "Go!", or the word "Allez!", i. e. they are signals the meanings of which are more widely accepted than those of those two words.  Furthermore, in some ideologies, any Art functions as a provocation to Action, while in others, it provides passive entertainment.  Plus, apparently escaping even Nietzsche's notice is that while the opening notes of the Dithyrambic chorus might be a signal to Dionysian celebrants to begin an ecstatic dance, such a response to one of Wagner's pieces would likely get one escorted out of a concert venue.  So, in contrasr with either Nietzsche's implication, in #810 of the Will to Power collection, that Words are more "common" than Music, or its contrary, Commonality is not an inherent property of one medium as opposed to another.  Rather, it is established only by those involved in Communication. 

Music, Words, Commonality

In #810 of the Will to Power collection, Nietzsche asserts that "Compared with music all communication by words is shameless . . . words depersonalize, words make the uncommon common".  Now, it is unclear how this formulation applies to the relation between Finnegan's Wake and catchy pop jingles, but, regardless, it seems inconsistent with his earlier rhapsodizing, in section 2 of Birth of Tragedy, over the democratizing capacity of Dionysian music.  Nor can the later passage be easily interpreted as a mature supplanting of youthful naivete.  For, in the contemporaneous #809, his "The aesthetic state possesses a superabundance of means of communication . . . it constitutes the high point of communication and transmission between living creatures--it is the source of language", echoes his analysis, from that section of BT, that the Dithyrambic chorus inspires the "collective release of all the symbolic powers."  Furthermore, if it is that 'superabundant' condition that is what he, with more justification, is trying to indicate as being 'uncommon', he still misses that the function of that state is the production of Language, and, hence, of Commonality.  So, in the absence of a better elucidation, #810 is one of those passages in his oeuvre the provocativeness of which is merely superficial.

Art, Communication, Mediation

By definition, Communication entails Mediation, i. e. expression and reception do not coincide, even the voice and hearing of one and the same person.  So, when Dewey characterizes some Communication, i. e. Art, as "unhindered", he can only mean 'least mediated'.  Now, among the factors that complicate Mediation are personal, cultural, and historical.  Thus, for example, the appreciation of most of Picasso's works is conditioned by familiarity with non-representational Painting.  Likewise, the impact of Hamlet on the contemporaries of Shakespeare may be beyond the grasp of some 21st-Century scholars--a problem that is analogous to that which is the basis of Nietzsche's effort to recover the original cultural function of Tragedy.  In contrast, probably the least contingent Language is Mathematics, from which it follows that the least mediated Art is the most Mathematical--Music.  Still, as is evinced by the greater general acceptance of Dissonance in the century after Wagner's innovations, Tonality can also be a variable in the communicability of Music.  But, Rhythm, apparently, less so, i. e. Dance Music is the least hindered Art, and, thus, is the paradigm of Communicability.

Art and Communication

While Kant conceives Communication as tangentially related to Art, i. e. integral to the judgment of it, Nietzsche and Dewey each suggests a more intimate connection.  For, in "compared with music all communication by words is shameless", from #810 of the Will to Power collection, and in "works of art are the only media of complete and unhindered communication", from the end of ch. V of Art as Experience, Art is conceived as a species of Communication.  However, further development of that classification is complicated by two shortcomings.  First, though just prior to that passage, Nietzsche also observes that "one never communicates thoughts: one communicates movements" (#809), he, in that context, does not explicitly recognize such "movements" as Dancing, as he does in section 2 of birth of Tragedy.  Likewise, Dewey's denial of the assertion, in the preceding paragraph, that "communication to others is the intent of an artist", is certainly false in the case of a Dance Band.  Second, neither of the two seems to subscribe to the thesis that has been proposed here--that verbal communication is essentially a signal seeking a responsive action.  In contrast, accepting the latter concept, in combination with the overlooked example, Art, specifically Music, can be appreciated as not merely a species of Communication, but as its exemplar.

The Semantics of Fiction

With his focus on some purportedly 'paradoxical' speeches in Carroll's writings, Deleuze overlooks a more fundamental problem for Semantic theory--the Meaning of Fiction.  Now, a Meinongian theory seems well-suited to such cases--according to it, Carroll's 'Alice' means some non-existent but 'absistent' entity, as does 'Hamlet' and the 'round square'.  However, 'Hamlet' is more than an inhabitant of that realm--the name denotes a physical entity that frequently appears on a theater stage, just as 'Alice' now sometimes denotes a physical entity in cinematic and television productions.  So, as is clearer in the case of a playwright or screenwriter, words of 'Fiction' are, at bottom, instructions for performance, and, hence, are, like any other utterance, signals for possible enactment.  On that basis, the process of reading a novel is one of nascent staging.  So, while it is not impossible that 'Godot' could, in a sequel or a prequel, say, join 'Hamlet' and 'Alice' in becoming physically embodied, the 'round square' remains nothing more than an internally incoherent signal, i. e. 'draw a two-dimensional figure that is both round and square'.

Nonsense, Falsity, Parody

An increase of the distance between X and Y can be sufficiently effected in any one of three ways: 1. X moving away from a stationary Y; 2. Y moving away from a stationary X; or, 3. X and Y each moving away from an initial point of coincidence.  Now, Parmenides, as Plato represents him, constructs an apparent 'paradox of motion' by analyzing 'P is aging' as #3, with 'P' as both 'X' and 'Y'.  Deleuze likewise analyzes "Alice becomes larger" as #3, with Alice as both 'X' and 'Y', from which he concludes that the proposition is nonsensical.  But, each of those representations is simply false--for #1 is the only correct interpretation in each case.  So, granting Deleuze the ontological thesis that Meaning is an 'Event', he still fails to also show that it is therefore essentially nonsensical, i. e. that its structure is necessarily represented as #3, in which case Alice's adventures are a playful dramatization of ambiguous Language, not an ontological excursion, i. e. Parody, not Paradox.

Nonsense and Equivocation

Upon closer examination, the example that serves Deleuze, in the Logic of Sense, as his prototype of 'nonsensical' language is, in fact, merely equivocal.  That example is from the Parmenides, not from Lewis Carroll, so a serious analysis of it is not inappropriate.  There, according to Plato's 'Parmenides', and likely historically accurate, someone can simultaneously become older and younger, because, while one is aging, the one that one was is becoming less old than the one that one now is, a scenario that Deleuze believes Carroll represents analogously in the case of Alice growing simultaneously larger and smaller.  However, Parmenides' exposition is merely equivocal--the older 'self' and the younger 'self' are distinct entities, as the applicability of the underlying symmetrical principle 'A > B = B < A' entails.  So, regardless of Carroll's intentions while playing with ambiguity, Delueuze's primary ambition--to demonstrate that Nonsense is an inherent positive property of Language, i. e. is not merely an original lack--fails.  Nor does invoking Meinong here, as he occasionally does elsewhere in the book, salvage the project, for, to argue that some Lekta, e. g. that of 'X is becoming both older and younger', are contradictory, does not suffice to prove that all Lekta are so, and, hence that all Language is fundamentally nonsensical.

Lekton, Meaning, Nonsense

In Logic of Sense, Deleuze argues that the ancient Stoic 'Lekton'--rendered in the English translation of this work as 'Sense', not to be confused with the Fregean term--is the substratum of all varieties of  'meaning' presented by rival theories, including Frege's.  Furthermore, by showing how Lekta function in the writings of Lewis Carroll, he concludes that Meaning originates in Nonsense, thereby subverting the rationalistic ambitions of those rivals.  However, he does not examine the process by which a Neologism only gradually acquires Meaning through repeated usage, e. g. 'copacetic', or, more tellingly, his own idiosyncratic stipulations.  So, he does not consider that the 'nonsensicality' that he attributes as a positive property of a Lekton, derives from the inherent meaningless of a mere sequence of sounds or script.  So, perhaps a headless grin is an apt Carrollian image of the concept of 'Meaning in-itself'.

The Liar Paradox

The so-called 'Liar Paradox' neither involves Lying nor is a Paradox.  Rather, its object is a nonsensical utterance that is the product of a faulty construction.  According to the standard account of it, it is the problem that the proposition "This sentence is false",, in violation of the principle that every well-formed Proposition has a unique truth-value, is either both true and false, or neither true nor false, depending on the formulation of the problem.  However, as has been previously argued here, a 'Lie' is an utterance that is a deliberate attempt to take advantage of an addressee, whereas it is difficult to conceive how anybody could be harmed by believing that that proposition is 'true'.  Furthermore, it is difficult to conceive of a situation in which the utterance of it is not anomalous.  In other words, the uncertain status of its truth-value is not paradoxical, but a symptom that it is mere Nonsense.  Now, that diagnosis can lead to the further analysis that the construction is, contrary to what is seemingly generally taken for granted, not well-formed, on the grounds that any use of 'this' presupposes the pre-existence of its referent, an impossibility in the case of self-reference.  However, insofar as the treatment of the problem abstracts the meaning of any Proposition from Purpose, as Russell and his followers do, it lacks an adequate definition of 'Lying', and, hence, lacks the capacity to distinguish Lying from Nonsense, thereby getting trapped in a True-False problematic, as most of the recent prominent literature on the topic seems to be.

Meaning, Stipulation, Neologism

Practitioners of contemporary Philosophy of Logic Semantics tend to characterize 'Meaning', e. g. 'Sense' or 'Reference', as a  property a-temporally possessed by a linguistic unit, possibly on the model of some concept of Mathematical terms.  However, if they were to examine a procedure with which most of them are likely familiar, one which is the origin of Frege's categories themselves, they might reconsider that characterization.  That procedure is Stipulation, i. e. that by which they themselves produce many definitions, e. g. that by which Frege first fixes his uses of 'Sense' and 'Reference'.  Now, a Stipulation confers Meaning on a term by formulating conditions for its proper use.  In other words, a Stipulative Definition is a Proposal, the efficacy of which is dependent on a continued accepting response to it.  Furthermore, Naming, which some distinguish from Defining, is likewise stipulative, i. e. the 'necessity' that some attribute to a Name is contingent on the Name gaining consensual adoption following its introduction.  So, if these theorists were to examine their own operations, they might discover how contrived their resultant theories are.  In other words, an examination of a construction of a Meta-language reveals that the underlying structure of Language is neither that of Proposition Logic nor of Modal Logic, but, is, rather, Neologistic.

Signal and Truth

A green light is neither 'true' nor 'false'; rather, it is either appropriately used, or not, according to commonly-accepted practice.  Likewise, 'P is true', for proposition 'P', means 'the sequence of symbols that constitute it is used appropriately, according to commonly-accepted practice'.  Mathematical propositions are no exception: 'A + B = C' formulates the interchangeability of the symbols 'A', 'B', and 'C'.  Kant's thesis that Mathematical propositions are 'synthetic' verges on that Semiological thesis, and Principia Mathematica is, at bottom, a program for the construction of a system of symbols.  Formal Logic implicitly recognizes that Truth is not an intra-symbolic relation when it distinguishes Vocabulary and Syntax from Semantics, and Validity from Soundness.  So, Leibniz' axiom 'A = A' vs. Hegel's 'A = not-A' is a Semiological, not an Epistemological or a Metaphysical, disagreement.  Of course, these words are no exception to the analysis.

The Noble Lie and the Naked Emperor.

In Plato's discussion of the 'Noble Lie', the falsehood is known to only the Liar.  Part of Nietzsche's historical significance is theat he, perhaps uniquely, tackles the problem of the exposure of the Noble Lie.  What he wrestles with in his mature period is the profound corrosiveness of the discovery that the 'Emperor is naked', i. e. the discovery that 'God is dead' undermines the institution of any substitute Noble Lie, and, therefore, threatens to undermine any basis for future civilization.  In other words, that exposure initiates an era of what he calls 'Nihilism', which he can combat only ironically, given that his own words--the teachings of Zarathustra, the Will to Power, evaluations, the  formulation of 'Atheism', and even the thesis that civilization needs no myth--are as suspect as the expired ideology.  So, the development of that Nihilism exemplifies what has here been characterized as the process in which Lying undermines Communication, and which Kant glosses as the contradictoriness of False Promising.

The Value of Lying

Perhaps when defined as 'deliberately uttering a falsehood for the purpose of taking advantage', Lying can easily be classified as 'Evil'.  However, even with that specification, Plato and Nietzsche might still disagree with the valuation, e. g. in cases in which they justify a Lie as for some greater good, i. e. that of the state, or that of a superior being, respectively.  Still, neither of those judgments recognizes the characteristic of Lying that is the source of its potential positive value.  For, the very possibility of Lying is derived from the essential conventionality of any 'Language', i. e. any system of commonly-accepted signals, an origin that gets obscured in dogmatic rhetoric that oppresses or mystifies.  In other words, Lying is a reminder that the value of any utterance is, like that of any tool, a function of that of the purpose to which it is put.

Lying and Philosophy

The previously proposed characterization of Lying as 'sending mixed signals', presupposes, like Kant's example of False Promising, the discovery of the falsehood.  In any case, Kant's silence, in the course of that presentation, on the topic of Lying, of which False Promising is a special case, is a reminder that there has been no systematic Philosophical attention to the topic since Plato.  Now, the treatment of it in The Republic can characterized as 'sending mixed signals'.  For, on the one hand, he asserts, at 3.389b, that "the rulers of the city may . . . lie . . . for the benefit of the state", which, according to 3.414b, is a "noble lie".  However, on the other, in his later discussion of Philosophy, which he esteems as the "noblest pursuit" (6.489a), the Philosopher is one who will "hate" (6.490a) Lying.  Furthermore, in neither discussion is there attention to the variable of a lie being discovered, in sharp contrast to his Ring of Gyges example of  2.359d.  So, in the closest approximation to a systematic examination of the topic, there is no definitive moral judgment of Lying, let alone any univocal definition of it.  

Communication, Lying, Immorality

As has been previously discussed, an internally inconsistent signal can be self-defeating, since a response to it is difficult, if not impossible.  In some cases, the inconsistency is not immediate, but reflects prior irregular usage of the signal.  And, in some of those cases, the irregularity is deliberate--Lying.  So, Lying not only deceives an addressee, and  potentially backfires on the Liar, i. e. damages their credibility, but is, further, an abuse of Communication.  Now, insofar as Communication functions as the basis of social cohesion, such abuse can be classified as 'immoral'.  So, it is the immorality of self-defeating communication that Kant attempts, arguably awkwardly, to formalize as the 'contradictoriness' of False Promising.

Negation, Contradiction, Miixed Signals

As has been previously discussed, the fundamental dialogical Negation is a refusal to respond to a request, with respect to which a refusal to consent to a request is derivative.  Similarly derivative is a refusal of a proposal to subscribe to some belief, i. e. a disagreement.  Now, a disagreement is literally a 'contradiction', and, that in a disagreement, either one of the parties may be wrong, or there is a third belief that entails both beliefs, corresponds to the Analytical Logic and Dialectical Logic, respectively, representations of it.  In contrast with both representations, there is what is commonly described as 'sending mixed signals', an attempted communication that includes both a request that some action be preformed, and a request that some action be not performed.  In other words, such a signal can be classified as 'self-contradictory'.  But, more fundamental than that 'logical' problem is that the signal cannot be responded to, i. e. it is a self-defeating communication, a condition that neither formalization adequately accommodates.

Dialogue and Dialectical Logic

An utterance requests a response from an addressee.  So, even a refusal to execute what is proposed in the utterance constitutes a consent to respond, in contrast with the refusal expressed in ignoring the utterance.  Likewise, in more refined contexts, a contradiction of an assertion is a negation of it that is distinct from the negation expressed by silence.  Hence, 'Dialectical Logic', with its Thesis-Antithesis-Synthesis structure, does not adequately represent the pattern of ordinary dialogical communication.

Consent, Refusal, Freedom

The two basic responses to a Request are Consent and Refusal, each of which is independent of the Request.  Now, the negativity entailed in a Refusal is immediately with respect to corresponding Consent.  Thus, the example illustrates the flaw in Sartre's thesis that Freedom is essentially Negation.  For example, he infers from the fact that the Consciousness of X is not X, that the Consciousness of X is equivalent to the Negation of X.  But, the example suggests his inference suppresses the positive content of the Consciousness of X, i. e. a representation of X, resulting in the infinite hall of negative mirrors with which he struggles in his analysis of Reflection.  Instead, the more modest characterization of Consent and Refusal as each 'free' because 'different' from Request, avoids that futile labyrinth.

Subscriptivism

To 'subscribe' means literally to 'underwrite', and while those two terms are most commonly used in specialized contexts, i. e. when purchasing periodicals, or insurance, the essence of the former term is better illustrated in the legal standing of the signature, i. e. a piece of writing typically found on the lower part of a page.  For, a signature is accepted as an expression of free assent, and, concomitantly, as an assumption of responsibility.  Now, as has been previously discussed, if Kant's Categorical Imperative is a Prescription, then the free adoption of it, i. e. his 'willkur', is a Subscription to it.  Accordingly, it might be at least as accurate to classify his doctrine as 'Subscriptivist', than as 'Prescriptivist', as is more common.  Similarly, some of the subsequent 'Existentialist' tradition, because of decisive moments such as Nietzsche's 'affirmation', can also be characterized as 'Subscriptivist'.  In these doctrines, as is the case in Kant's, such moments are decisive because of their causal efficacy, in contrast with a mere Prescription, which, as occurs in ordinary pharmaceutical contexts, does not suffice to activate its wording, i. e. also required is a doctor's signature.  So, 'Subscriptivism' is one characterization of an influential contemporary Moral doctrine, and, perhaps, of any in which free assent is an essential element.

Description, Prescription, Subscription

Corresponding to the Signal-Sign and Proposal-Proposition distinctions is that between Prescription and Description.  Furthermore, while a description can be characterized as 'informative', a prescription can be, more accurately, 'instructive', e. g. recipes, directions, etc. as well as how frequently to take some medication.  So, perhaps a more precise classification of the Kantian 'Imperative' is 'Prescription', because the Laws and Maxims of his doctrine do not merely indicate something to be done, but, further, how it is to be executed, i. e. by following the formulation of a causal relation, in the case of a Hypothetical Imperative, or by applying a test to the latter, as in the case of the Categorical Imperative.  Thus, with justification, his doctrine has often been categorized as 'Prescriptivism'.  However, as is the case with pharmaceutical prescriptions, even a Categorical Imperative is only an inert sequence of words unless it is freely adopted.  In other words, to be efficacious, Kant's Prescription additionally requires a Subscription to it.

Reason, Morality, Internal Dialogue

By introducing verbal formulations--Laws and Maxims--into his Moral doctrine as active elements, Kant converts the Aristotelian struggle between the rational and irrational parts of the soul into an internal dialogue.  But, as has been previously analyzed here, any response to an utterance originates in an irreducible voluntary moment. So, it is that dialogical moment that Kant discovers as the 'freedom' to disobey the Rational Law, thereby undermining any thesis that Reason is a necessary condition of any Freedom.  Nietzsche, perhaps unwittingly, inherits that problem, when he interprets a relation of stronger-weaker as one of command-obey, leaving him without an adequate analysis of Obedience in such contexts, as has been previously discussed here.  So, Kant's innovation only complicates what Aristotle never adequately explains--why the irrational part of the soul submits to the rational part.

The Logic of 'Ought'

The two most prominent types of formalized Logic are Proposition and Quantification--the fundamental inference rule of the former is Modus Ponens, while that of that latter is Universal Instantiation.  Thus, Proposition Logic constitutes the inner structure of the consequentialist reasoning that fuels many attempts to persuade in concrete communication, i. e. that reasoning concatenates the propositions that link an entertained action to subsequent beneficial or harmful effects.  Now, insofar as it veils a threat, "You ought to do X", is a species of consequentialist reasoning, and, hence, is based on Modus Ponens.  However, Kant's insight is that in at least some cases, the 'ought' represents Universal Instantiation, i. e. entailing the concept of an individual agent as an instance of a Rational being.  Thus, contemporary Deontic Logic, derived from Modal Logic, often used to represent Kantian Pure Practical Reason, crucially distorts it.  For, Modal Logic is a species of Quantification Logic, ranging over 'Worlds', e. g. 'Necessarily P' = 'At all possible worlds, P'.  But, despite the semantic kinship of 'necessity' and 'ought', quantification in Kant's doctrine ranges essentially over agents, not over worlds.  So, whatever value Deontic Logic might have for its practitioners, it abstracts crucially from Kant's innovation.

The Origin of Logic

There have been two main theories of the origin of 'Language'--1. It is the medium of biological, intra-species communication, or 2. It is a supernatural visitation into otherwise isolated, perhaps inert, entitities.  Correspondingly, there have been two main theories of the origin of 'Logic'--1. It is an abstraction from some patterns of 'Language', or 2. It is the supernatural, pre-Christian, Logos itself.  Now, what is often conceived as 'Logic' in contemporary Philosophy, e. g. 'Predicate Logic', conflates the two theories.  For, while it generally functions as a useful tool, e. g. to expose and clear up misleading 'ordinary Language', it is frequently simultaneously revered as sacrosanct, e. g. when it is touted as the 'essence of Philosophy'.  The resort to a Meta-language is a common response to the former being turned on the latter, i. e. to the tool being turned on the premises of its usage.

Reasoning and Insularity

Perhaps the most influential moment in the trial of Socrates is one to which Plato can only allude--the failure of Socrates to influence the jury.  For, constituting that failure is the discrepancy between the Ideal and the Real, i. e. between the validity of an argument, and its efficacy, or lack thereof.  It is also the origin of the insularity of much of the subsequent tradition, including, for example, the extraction of 'Language' from actual communication, and the Proposition from 'propositional attitudes'.  While some advocates of that insularity go so far as to insist that the aforementioned discrepancy is outside the purview of what they call 'Philosophy', critics of the withdrawal regard it as un-Socratic tacit complicity with the status quo that has trivialized the social function of Reasoning.  Similarly trivialized is Tenure, which has degenerated from the protection of innovation from ideological repression, to a career milestone tantamount to guaranteed retirement from productivity.

Philosophy, Dialogue, Monologue

One respect in which Whitehead's observation--that Philosophy has been a "series of footnotes to Plato"--is incorrect is that with a few minor exceptions, those 'footnotes' have been monological, whereas not only is the original dialogical, but the initial one reports actual events.  Now, in much of that subsequent tradition, the monologue is at least implicitly recognized to be a part of an ongoing exchange with peers, and, hence, part of a dialogue.  However, others more stridently insist that the monological 'argument' is the essential self-suficient philosophical expression, thereby tellingly implying that Socrates' courage in the face of death is extrinsic to what they consider to be 'Philosophy'.  So, perhaps the closest contemporary approximation to the Socratic/Platonic dialogue is the sometimes only ceremonial dissertation defense.  Still, the more egregious divergence from that exemplar is Heidegger's thesis that Socrates begins a 'history of the forgetting of Being', a thesis which attempts to codify the abandonment of Philosophy as a mode of social communication, a divergence that becomes two-fold with his cowardly refusal after 1945 to publicly defend his earlier writings.

Signal, Sign, Logic

While Associationism might explain the connection of Sign and Signified, it inadequately characterizes the understanding of a Signal.  For, an occurrence of the latter entails more than an expectation that something else will follow; rather, it requires actualization, and, hence, instantiation, to 'understand' a green light is to move one's car.  Thus, the adequate response to a Signal entails Reasoning, i. e. the connection of something general with am instance.  But, so, too, does referring to the family pet as "dog", on the basis of acquaintance with the definition of 'dog'.  Hence, Frege's Sense-Reference relation is one of Universal to Particular, i. e. to refer is to subsume an object under a general concept.  Thus, Logic is more than the inner structure of Language, as some interpret it.  Rather, Language functions as a middle term in an extra-linguistic process, a role that is clearer in the case of a Signal than in that of a Sign.

Symbolic Logic and the Logic of Symbols

In Logic, 'Validity' is defined as defining a certain concatenation of symbols.  Now, each of those symbols is conceived as potentially representing some range of objects.  But, that representative relation is one of Universal to Particular.  Thus, the very existence of a 'symbol' involves Reasoning that is independent of that which is characterized as 'valid'--a distinction that is at the basis of Kant's response to Hume, i. e. that there is a Reason that is independent of that which functions as a 'slave to the passions' by constructing a concatenation of means and ends.  So, 'Symbolic Logic' presupposes a Logic of Symbols that has generally gone unnoticed by Logicians, Semiologists, and Philosophers of Language.

Universal Language and Communication

Modern Philosophy of Language begins not with Frege and Russell, but two centuries earlier, with Leibniz' efforts to develop a "Universal Characteristic", i. e. a universal language, in the course of which he also pioneers Symbolic Logic, and the cross-breeding of Logic and Mathematics.  Now, as he explains in the 1677 piece 'Towards a Universal Characteristic', by means of a "universal language", it becomes "possible for people of different nations to communicate their thoughts to one another".  Implicit in that thesis is a two-fold criticism of Russell's attempt to isolate Language from Communication, i. e. his 'Propositional Attitudes' from Propositions--1. The mistaking of 'impersonal' as 'non-personal', rather than as 'universally personal'; and 2. The lack of recognition of the possibility of universal motives, e. g. the desire to communicate.  Derived from Leibniz, that challenge to Fregean-Russellian Philosophy of Language cannot be as easily dismissed as 'misologistic' as some practitioners of that technique seem to assume.

Rogative and Declarative

Russell isolates the Proposition from what he calls 'propositional attitudes', i. e. from the 'psychological' states that motivate the utterance of a proposition.  On that basis, it seems to follow that the Proposition does not reduce to the Proposal, or the Declarative sentence to the Rogatory sentence, contrary to what has been previously discussed here.  However, the very expression of thoughts in accepted symbols and structures can only be motivated by a desire to communicate them.  Hence, the very existence of a Proposition demonstrates that it is fundamentally a Proposal, and, likewise, that a Declarative sentence is essentially a Rogatory one.  So, regardless of his motives for publicly formulating it, Russell's distinction is like that of a hand from a wrist--analytically useful in some contexts, but insufficient as the basis of the thesis that a hand has autonomous existence, or of a critique of Biology. 

Rogative and Imperative

A crucial impediment to Kant's attempt to systematize Morality emerges with his discovery that even a 'categorical' Imperative does not suffice to override the essential independence from it of an addressee, prompting him to acknowledge a 'freedom of choice' in the latter that is distinct from the Rational 'freedom' that is the source of the imperative.  However, he does not go further and recognize that even a potential neutralization of the force of a Command exposes it as a Request, and, hence, likewise, an Imperative as fundamentally a Rogative.  Thus, the introduction of the latter classification has not merely grammatical significance, but Moral import, as well.

Proposal and Rogatory Sentence

While the classification of the Proposition as a 'declarative' sentence is easy, the Proposal belongs to no obvious class.  The difficulty is well-illustrated by the status of the marriage variety, which is unarguably characterizable as a 'request'.  Now, requests are conventionally classified as 'imperative' sentences, which seems inaccurate, because a request is crucially not a command, even when the latter is tempered by the 'hypothetical' qualification, or as Searle's less forceful 'directive'.  For, what is lost in those classifications is the questioning dimension of a request.  On the other hand, 'interrogative' sentences seek information, not action.  However, there is an alternative--the obscure, but precise, 'rogatory'.  Put otherwise, communication is rogatory because, regardless of content, it fundamentally seeks a response, beginning with simply being attended to, and the Proposal is the basic sentential signal.

Having Meaning and Irony

According to the Semantic theory typically characterized as 'Platonist', words 'have meaning' because they are copies of self-subsisting Forms.  However, one shortcoming of that theory is one that Plato himself would have to acknowledge--its applicability to those situations in which Socrates communicates to Plato and others meanings that are the opposite of those possessed by the words that he utters, i. e. applicability to 'irony'.  Furthermore, such examples suggest a different genesis of the attribution of Meaning to Words: 1. The 'meaning' of words is their utterer's hoped-for response from an addressee; 2. The entire scenario is generalized as--a hypothetical generic utterer, projected as using words to elicit a hoped-for response, from a hypothetical generic addressee--resulting in the meanings of those words being conceived as 'generally accepted'; and 3. The abstraction of the those words and their acquired meanings from any interpersonal, purposive context.  That Plato himself illustrates a Semantic theory different than the one typically associated with his name is, of course, ironic. 

The Meaning of 'Is' and Meta-Language

In 'The Morning Star is the Evening Star', the meaning of 'is' is 'is the same as', as opposed to 'exists', and to 'has as a property'.  However, it is unclear if that meaning is a 'Sense' or a 'Reference', and, in either case, how it can have both types of Meaning, problems that are even more urgent in the cases of its alternative meanings, neither of which is as determinate as is 'is the same as'.  Now, the seeming difficulty in resolving these problems without implicating the millennia of extra-linguistic controversies that have fueled the history of Philosophy, e. g. from Aristotelian Metaphysics to Heideggerian Ontology, presents a challenge to Fregean Philosophy of Language, which is often depicted as an autonomous enterprise.  Accordingly, the pervasive response of Fregeans is to purge 'ordinary language' of 'is' and 'exists', and where a suitable alternative is not available, e. g. 'lives', to resort to meta-linguistic re-formulation.  However, one indication that such a manoeuvre is inadequate is its susceptibility to the Heideggerian interpretation of it as an extra-linguistic 'forgetting of Being', an interpretation towards which Fregeans tend to be dismissive.  But, less easy for them to shrug off is the charge that the response is tendentious, on the grounds that it is disguised Platonism.  For, as is suggested by the survival of 'is' or 'exists' in the meta-language, e. g. 'there is an x such that . . .' the meaning of 'is' is now the eternal 'exists' of a privileged realm.  Now, a Platonic Form is both a Sense and a Reference, i. e. the Form of the Good is both the Sense and the Reference of the ordinary use of 'good'.  Likewise, it is not the case that meta-linguistic 'is' has no Meaning, but, rather, that it has one, and it is both a Sense and a Reference.  So, Fregean Philosophy of Language is not as presupposition-less as its advocates tend to portray it as.

Identity and Interchangeability

According to Kant, from the proposition 'A = B', it does not follow that 'A' and 'B' are interchangeable in that, or in any other, proposition.  So, perhaps Frege's point is that from the sentence 'The Morning Star is the Evening Star', it does not follow that 'the Morning Star' and 'the Evening Star' are interchangeable in the utterance of that, or any other, sentence.  Accordingly, what that example primarily illustrates is that 'meaning' can be equivocal, i. e. can be sometimes synonymous with 'Reference', sometimes with 'Sense', regardless of whether or not the problem further serves as the foundation of a theory of Semantics.  However, a Fregean might reject this diagnosis of the example, because it relies on the term 'interchangeable', which has a practical connotation, which is not easily accommodated in the Fregean Philosophy of Language.

Name and Reference

It is not too much of a stretch of credibility to imagine Frege sitting in a chair, gazing at a fire in front of him.  Now, if he were to hear the sound "Gottlieb" coming from behind, he might turn around, or he might ignore it.  In either case, the utterance of his name functions as a signal calling for a response.  But, because at the moment of utterance, that response is non-existent and indeterminate, "Gottlieb" has no referent.  Thus, the scenario undermines the foundation of Fregean Semantics--that names 'refer'.

Synthetic Identity Propositions

As has been previously suggested, the attribution of 'informativeness' to a Fregean 'Proposition' runs the unwanted risk of exposing it as a Proposal, the personalized, purposive context of which has been suppressed. To avoid that complication, the prototypical Fregean puzzle can be rephrased as 'How can an Identity Proposition be synthetic?', the solution to which is that its referent is one and the same, but its terms are distinct, or, equivalently, e. g. in 'A = B', 'A' and 'B' have the same 'Reference' but not the same 'Sense'.  However, the attempt to generalize the favorite examples of that theory exposes a different weakness in the model.  For, 'The red object is a spherical object', has the much less puzzling explanation that one and the same object can have two different properties attributed to it, just as 'The Morning Star is the Evening Star' reduces to 'One and the same object sometimes appears in the morning, and sometimes in the evening'.  So, to further purify Fregean Philosophy of Language, i. e. by better depersonalizing its Propositions, seems to only trivialize it.

The Morning Star and the Evening Star

Fregean Philosophy of Language offers a theory of Semantics, i. e. the thesis that a Proposition has both a 'Reference' and a 'Sense', as a solution to the problem, 'How is the proposition "The Morning Star is the Evening Star" informative'?  Now, since it is difficult to imagine a scenario in which the utterance of that proposition is not stilted, at best, it is equally difficult to not classify that question as what some of the school's practitioners call a 'pseudo-problem', based on an analytical contrivance, not on an exemplary case.  Regardless, that the proposition is conceived as 'informative', is a tip-off as to its implicit purposive character, and, hence, that it is an abbreviation of "Consider that the Morning Star and the Evening Star are one and the same', which might be uttered as a means to stimulating further interest in Astronomy.  Hence, the school's concept of 'Proposition' is derived from that of 'Proposal'.  Likewise, the central thesis of the doctrine, the proposition 'A Proposition has both a Reference and a Sense', abbreviates the proposal 'Consider that a Proposition has both a Reference and a Sense', which exposes the inapplicability of the thesis to discourse about it.  So, Fregean Philosophy of Language is self-falsifying, a difficulty which, as has been previously discussed, the introduction of a 'Meta-linguistic' device either confirms, or compounds, perhaps infinitely, as has been previously discussed.

Proposal, Proposition, Meaning

The meaning of a green light is for a car to go.  Similarly, the cry of a hungry baby is a signal to its mother to feed it.  More generally, an utterance is a signal, to an addressee, for a response specified by its content--to act, to speak in return, to absorb the content for future use, etc.  Furthermore, a well-articulated Signal is a Proposal.  So, a Proposition is a Proposal that has been abstracted from its interpersonal purposive context.  Similarly, the 'meaning' of a Proposition, e. g. its 'Reference' or its 'Sense', is abstracted from the Response that is meant in a Proposal, more so in the case of a Sense than in a Reference, which retains some of the components of a concrete purposeful context.  For example, if "It is raining" is a proposal to an addressee to bring an umbrella, as a proposition, its 'referent' is weather conditions concurrent with its utterance, and its 'sense' is presumably general to all such utterances.  So, as a Proposal is de-personalized into a Proposition, the concept of 'Meaning' is abstracted from it original concrete practical character in Communication as the execution of what is proposed, an abstraction that is codified in Platonistic Philosophy of Language, pioneered by Frege.  Dewey, notably, in works such as Logic:Theory of Inquiry, typically ignored by many practitioners of the Fregean tradition, re-grounds Language in Communication, but without doing likewise to Sign in Signal, or to Proposition in Proposal.

Communication and Meaning

Perhaps the most primitive occurrence of Communication is a baby crying to its mother out of hunger.  So, the context is fundamentally causal, i. e. the baby cries in an attempt to effect its getting fed.  Now, since a 'sign' is typically correlated with some co-existent that it represents, the rubric mis-characterizes the crying, which seeks something not yet existing.  Instead, 'signal' is the more accurate characterization of the crying, with respect to which the mother feeding the baby is a subsequent 'response'.  Thus, in this example, 1) Communication occurs in a causal context; 2) 'Meaning' in Communication is primarily a relation between a Signal and a Response; and 3) that relation is diachronic.  So, it is only upon further abstraction that a Signal is converted into a Sign, the meaning of which is a contemporaneous object, e. g. the proposition 'The baby is hungry'.

Communication, Language, Meta-Language

Insofar as Philosophy is a mode of Communication, and a study requires distance from its object, a Philosophy of Communication is problematic.  Unhelpful to such a project is a device employed in seemingly similar enterprises--the 'Meta-Language'.  For, while the 'meta-' might suffice to connote distance, 'Language' is an inert abstraction from 'Communication', e. g. typically a representation of the Vocabulary and the Grammatical patterns of the latter, which distance alone does not reanimate.  Indeed, that shortcoming afflicts those contexts in which the device is most frequently used--many varieties of 'Philosophy of Language', as evidenced by the susceptibility of the involved 'meta-language' to infinite further objectification, i. e. to a 'meta-meta-language', etc.  So, the Philosophy of Language, as typically conceived, is an inadequate exemplar for a Philosophy of Communication, and, may be less sound an enterprise than its practitioners seem to appreciate.

Communication, Privatization, Language

Modern Philosophy goes astray from the outset.  What Descartes is doing at the beginning of his Meditations is not sitting in a chair, gazing at a fire, as he describes it, but, quite plainly, sitting at a desk, and writing.  So, if he had conducted his search for Certainty more rigorously, he might have arrived at the discovery that "I am writing this" must be true whenever it occurs.  Accordingly, his foundation would be "I write, therefore I am".  Analogously, Locke's original tabula rasa is not the locus of Secondary Qualities, as he proposes, but the surface on which he inscribes the words "tabula rasa".  Now, from that axiom, Descartes could have proceded to classify Writing as a species of Communication, and then argue that his self-evident ability to write proves the existence of others, which demonstrates that his concept of Meditation is an inherently social procedure.  On that basis, the sundering of the 'I' from that procedure is exposed as privatizing Philosophy, and as concomitantly abstracting 'language' from Communication, and reifying it.  So, his Meditations begin as a portrayal of Descartes as Humpty Dumpty jumping, with respect to which the more recent 'private language argument' is one more problem for king's horses and king's men.

Will to Power, Writing, Communication, Analytic Philosophy

The Will to Power appears in Nietzsche's oeuvre variously as a theory, a principle, and a doctrine, but, it functions primarily for him as a method of interpretation.  Its implementation consists in a harbinger of what later comes to be called 'psychoanalysis', in which any event is conceived as a product of the motives that generate it.  Consequently, the fundamental locus of the evaluation of an event is its generating motives, so that, two apparently identical events, e. g. two uses of the term 'good', can be distinguished  on the basis of their contrasting motivations, e. g. strength vs. weakness.  Now, unexplored by Nietzsche is one of the more general implications of the method--that encountered, seemingly fixed, entities, are the products of a process of generation, a significant example of which are books.  The Will to Power is thus a reminder, perhaps discomforting to some, that most of what is categorized as 'Philosophy' is written, so, is generated by a process of writing, and, hence, is, fundamentally, a mode of Communication.  In other words, Writing as an artifact encourages the abstraction, from the communicative context, the reification of analytical procedures such as 'theory', 'language', and 'logic', not to mention, 'philosophy' itself, thereby facilitating the reduction of Communication to 'Language', and the study of it to a 'Philosophical Theory', the criterion of which is 'Logic'.  So, one unexamined premise in much of what these days appears under the Analytic Philosophy rubric of 'Philosophy of Language' is not its content, but, the pretension of some of its practitioners that it is a privileged self-subsistent entity, rather than a useful tool.  Likewise, it may be to avoid self-examination that some Analytic Philosophers are dismissive of Nietzsche.

Will to Power and Communication

Given that Nietzsche is a prolific writer who is rarely shy about challenging entrenched dogma, it is surprising to read his assertion that "We 'free spirits' are not exactly the most communicative spirits", in Beyond good and Evil #44.  Perhaps he is here alluding to his advocacy of Miscegenation, a far-sighted, provocative, concrete proposal that he withholds from his official publications.  In any case, also unclear from the passage is his concept of 'Communication'.  Now, on the basis of his Will to Power principle, Communication can be classified as either a medium of Empowerment, e. g. as benefiting others, or as one of Overpowering, e. g. as manipulating others.  In contrast, not easily reducible to either of these varieties is the concept of it expressed in 'The Convalescent' section of Thus Spoke Zarathustra--"Are words . . . not rainbows and seeming bridges between things eternally separated".  Implicit there is a concept of Communication that evokes some of the early passages of Birth of Tragedy--a means to fellowship, a process which seems to have no clear translation into a Will to Power doctrine.  That it is a concept cherished by a 'convalescent' raises the question of how much of that doctrine is an expression of illness.

Eugenics, Experimentation, Affirmation

A revaluation of all values, on the basis of the Will to Power, might recast Eugenics, from as 'tampering with Nature', or as 'defying God', to the noble enterprise of the generating of superior beings.  However, it is unclear if that transvaluation adequately anticipates the challenge presented by what Mengele and his associates epitomize.  Now, the history of admired self-sacrifice, in the name of a higher good, evinces that what in such experiments horrifies is not necessarily their content, but the fact that participation in them is involuntary.  Correspondingly, Nietzsche seems to implicitly endorse such practices in many of his uses of the term 'slave'.  However, that implication is not necessarily inherent in the doctrine of the Will to Power, itself, which, as the promotion of maximal Power, entails maximal voluntarism, but seems to derive only from Nietzsche's articulation of it as a 'Will to Overpowering' doctrine.  So, the better defense of Eugenics, and of Experimentalism, requires the further condition of the universal affirmation of participation, a modification that is not clearly one that Nietzsche would embrace.

Eugenics, Miscegenation, Evaluation

Possibly unbeknownst to Nietzsche is the contemporaneous emergence in England, inspired by the insights of Mendel and Darwin, of the 'Eugenics' movement. Now, since the latter promotes selective breeding, Nietzsche's advocacy of Miscegenation can be classified as 'Eugenicist'.  Conversely, that association can benefit the latter--its goal, which is vulnerable to the charge of 'tampering', either with the 'will of God', or with 'Nature', is revalued in Nietzsche's doctrine as 'good'.  Accordingly, his 'philosophy of the future' may be more present than he realizes.

Miscegenation and Master Race

In #13 of Beyond Good and Evil, Nietzsche warns against "superfluous teleological principles".  However, in #960 of the Will to Power collection, he does not heed his own warning.  For, there, he advocates Miscegenation as a means to the production of a "master race", which entails both 1. superior beings, and 2. beings, who, by virtue of their superiority, would be "masters of the earth", i. e. would "work as artists" upon inferior beings.  So, #2 is a superfluous teleological principle, not only in the specific context, but with respect to the dynamic of Self-Overcoming that constitutes the Will to Power, in general.  Furthermore, beyond mere logical superfluity, the seeking, by a being, of a being that would not only be superior to it, but its 'master', as well, seems difficult to not classify as the yearning of a 'slave', a classification that is equally difficult to reconcile with most of the rest Nietzsche's doctrine.  Instead, more consistent with the concept of Self-Overcoming is the thesis that the fundamental concern of those superior products of Miscegenation would be to, in turn, continue the ascent, via procedures that are likely unforeseeable two stages in advance.

Will to Power, Reflection, Miscegenation, Pragmatism

In #36 of Beyond Good and Evil, Nietzsche derives the Will to Power as a general principle from its original formulation as a Psychological hypothesis.  However, the passage leaves unexamined how the principle applies to his discovery of it, a moment which some characterize as 'Reflection'.  Instead, such a concept of Reflection can be derived from his later advocacy of Miscegenation.  For, deliberate interbreeding, as a means to the generation of superior beings, harnesses the Will to Power qua the procreative drive.  Thus, the advocacy of Miscegenation is a manifestation of the overcoming of Self-Overcoming, and, hence, of the Will to Power as applied to itself.  But, that harnessing is constituted by the implementation of a theory.  Thus, the Will to Power concept of Reflection can be classified as 'Pragmatist'.

Procreation, Dionysus, Bacchus

It is unclear from the brief allusions to Bacchus in Birth of Tragedy if Nietzsche would agree with the equivalence of it and Dionysus that some seem to accept.  One reason that he would not is that his Dionysian principle, like Schopenhauer's Will to Live from which it is derived, represents fundamentally the procreative drive, which is why the focus in BT is on its rhythm of the dissolution of, and the re-formation of, individuals.  In contrast, 'Bacchanalian' typically connotes mere drunkenness.  So, while the concept 'drunken orgy' can be classified as both 'Dionysian' and 'Bacchanalian', 'orgy' is essential to the former, while 'drunken' is essential to the latter.  Thus, the conflation of the two tends to abstract gratuitous individual fun from what for Nietzsche in BT is a metaphysically significant overwhelming of an individual by the species drive that first produced it.

Dionysian, Will to Power, Miscegenation

Like Schopenhauer's Will to Live principle, Nietzsche' Dionysian principle is a representation of the Procreative drive.  So, too, is his Will to Power, with the significant variation that the drive is conceived as ascending, not as merely preserving.  Accordingly, while Schopenhauer interprets the self-consciousness of Procreation as a moment of self-neutralization, Nietzsche conceives it as one of further ascent, the result of which is Miscegenation, which initiates the next stage.  So, Miscegenation completes the arc of his philosophical development--from the Dionysian, to the Will to Power, to the deliberate harnessing of Procreation, as a means to the generation of yet more superior humans.

Miscegenation and Inbreeding

Miscegenation can be conceived as a potential means to Peace, i. e. via the dissolution of entrenched enmity.  In contrast, Nietzsche's advocacy of it, in #960 of the Will to Power collection, is based on its Eugenic value.  Common to both construals is the diagnosis that Inbreeding is a weakness, an ill that can be generalized from that obtaining in the more widely recognized, often tabooed, blood variety, to that of any division, e. g. ethnic, religious, geographic, etc.  So, proponents of 'racial purity' would be mistaken in claiming themselves to be 'Nietzscheans' in that regard. 

Democracy and Genetic Engineering

Even though American Democracy has been characterized by some as an 'experiment', Nietzsche, in Beyond Good and Evil #44, is not impressed with it.  In contrast, a better indication of the kind of political experiment that does appeal to him is alluded to in #960 of the Will to Power collection: "the production of international racial unions whose task will be to rear a master race . . . a kind of higher man, who, thanks, to their superiority . . . employ democratic Europe . . . to work as artists upon 'man' himself' . . . politics will have a different meaning."  The interbreeding that he proposes, which anticipates what has come to be known as 'genetic engineering', combines some of the cardinal features of his doctrine--it is an experimental procedure that is rooted in the Will to Power, is guided by Master Morality, and, as unprecedented, is 'of the future'.  It also clarifies his dissatisfaction with Democracy, while, notably, it unequivocally debunks the racist pretensions of the Fascist version of the 'master race'.

Democracy and Family Values

The phrase 'Family Values' these days typically refers to a Moral arrangement constituted by a strong father, a compliant wife, and obedient children.  While a staple of Conservative rhetoric, a Liberal variation of it has been urged by Lakoff, which he classifies as encoding 'maternal' values, consisting in a 'nurturing' relation between Government and Citizenry.  However, that alternative is as inappropriate to a Democracy as is what it opposes--they each connote a Parent-Child representation of what is presumably a system of self-rule.  Furthermore, since, as Hegel, via Kant, argues, Political and Moral relations are autonomously constructed, they are falsified by the representation of their terms as 'brothers' and/or 'sisters', each of which is a connection that is involuntarily given.  So, the concept of Family Values, in any of its permutations, is antithetical to that of Democracy.

Power, Parent, Child

Indirectly implied in the concept of Genealogy is a hierarchical relation that is more concretely fundamental than that of Master-Slave--Parent-Child, which plainly contrasts strength and weakness, independence and dependence.  Indications of the pervasive cultural influence of this relation include phrases such as 'God the father' and 'Mother Earth', as well as concepts such as Patriarchy and Matriarchy.  Now, by not recognizing this most basic of natural power relations, Nietzsche fails to decisively distinguish the hierarchies that he does endorse from those of the philosophies of the past.  More specifically crucial, that inattention undercuts his image of the "child", from the 'Of the Three Metamorphoses', in Thus Spoke Zarathustra, a metaphor that sentimentally abstracts 'innocent creativity' from the actuality of powerless dependence.

Genealogy of the Moralist

Nietzsche's use of the term 'genealogy' to characterize the development of Morality is anticipated by his assertion, in #45 of Human, All Too Human, that in the earliest Master 'castes', it is considered that "goodness is inherited".  Now, it is possible that he regards himself as the heir to the philosopher-king line, i. e. with Schopenhauer as his 'father', and, similarly, that his future values-creators are his descendant 'progenitors'.  But such imagery only borrows from concrete inter-generational transmission, and, perhaps, overextends it.  For, instead, by his own analysis, in Beyond Good and Evil #212, for example, the emergence of a new philosopher is as a product of the "bad conscience" of the time.  So, the 'genealogy of the Moralist' is not only not to be confused with the 'genealogy of Morals, but 'genealogy' is an inappropriate characterization of the former process.

Will, Volition, The Future

The English language includes the peculiarity that 'will' both connotes Volition, and functions as verb tense auxiliary.  So, in the former case, i. e. in which one initiates an attempt to effect X,  the 'future' is conceived as the provisional product of one's own efforts, while, in the latter, i. e. in 'It will be the case that X', it is conceived as inevitably befalling one.  Now, this distinction--active/uncertainty vs. passive/certainty--suggests a 'Master' vs. 'Slave' contrast that seems implicit in many of the passages of Beyond Good and Evil.  Thus, embedded in one of the most common linguistic formations is a Moral prejudice.

Value-Creation and Social Engineering

A society is shaped by its values.  Thus, Nietzsche's value-creators are creators of societies.  Now, such creativity is, according to Beyond Good and Evil #212, informed by the concept of a "new greatness in man", with 'greatness' constituted by "wholeness in manifoldness".  Thus, the creativity aims at the construction of a "more comprehensive" (#257) society.  However, these value-creators are also experimenters, so the success of their projects is never guaranteed in advance.  Thus, Nietzsche's concept of History, at least as expressed in these passages, contrasts, on the one hand, with various Determinisms--Mechanical, Teleological, Dialectical--and, on the other, with randomly successive Oligarchisms.  Instead, it anticipates the Progressivism of Dewey, a doctrine more recently often characterized by some opponents as 'social engineering'.

Philosophy and The Future

In some passages of Beyond Good and Evil, the phrase 'philosophy of the future' seems to mean 'philosophy at some later date'.  In contrast, in #212, Nietzsche's characterization of the philosopher as "being, of necessity, a man of tomorrow", is instead suggesting that the 'future' is an essential dimension of philosophical activity, and, hence, is 'of' the latter, rather than the converse.  More precisely, as creators, these "furtherers of men", who "know of a new greatness of men", are not merely inhabitants of some future, they are its makers.

Future Values

Nietzsche's characterizations of 'philosophers of the future' as 'value-creators' and as 'experimenters' seems indeterminate in two respects.  First, he does not specify what those values might be, presumably because they would be the choices of individual creators.  Second, he does not address whether or not those creators would instantiate their choices.  Thus, he does not seem to consider that, simply by virtue of their efforts, regardless of the formulations that they produce, they might exemplify a departure from traditional values.  For, among the highest values of that tradition is Certainty, while, as has been previously discussed, Creativity and Experimentation involve Uncertainty equally.  So, whether or not he intends it, his projections of the 'philosophy of the future' are potentially more determinate than they seem, and, perhaps, are sufficiently so. 

Will to Power, Certainty, and Uncertainty

Experimentation combines controls and unknowns.  Music improvisation combines structure and novelty.  Games combine rules and choices.  So, each example involves both a Will to Certainty and a Will to Uncertainty.  They, thus, illustrate that the Will to Power, in general, can be conceived as incorporating both drives, in varying proportions, ranging from an emphasis on Certainty, e. g. tyranny, to one on Uncertainty, e. g. escape.

Power and Uncertainty

In #10 of Beyond Good and Evil, Nietzsche diagnoses that underlying an apparent Will to Uncertainty, e. g. Skepticism, may be a deeper Will to Certainty, e. g. Dogmatism.  Still, he expresses admiration for the initial instinct of its advocates "to get away.  A little more strength, flight, courage, and artistic power, and they would rise--not return", imagery that corresponds to other passages in which he illustrates the Will to Power as 'defying Gravity'.  Likewise, it anticipates the Value-creators and Experimenters who he later in the book introduces as 'philosophers of the future'.  So, plainly, he here conceives the Will to Power as a Will to Uncertainty, involving an adventurousness that seems difficult to reconcile with the earthbound domination, self- or other-directed, that he elsewhere derives from it.

Power and Certainty

Nietzsche's characterization, in Beyond Good and Evil #10, of "nihilism" as consisting in a preference of "a certain nothing to an uncertain something", seems to anticipate his formulation, at the end of Genealogy of Morals, of Asceticism as that "man would rather will nothingness than not will". Perhaps he would explain the implied correspondence between Certainty and Power as expressing that the Will to Certainty is a special case of the Will to Power.  But, if so, then he would also need to explain his apparent advocacy, suggested in BGE #1, of the Will to Uncertainty, which he assimilates there to the Will to Falsehood.  Now, one possible explanation of that latter that is inadequate in that regard is the proposition that Uncertainty is a means to Certainty, since the theme of #1 is the elevation of Uncertainty and Falsehood over Certainty and Truth.  Furthermore, the value of Uncertainty is plain in the event of boredom or stagnation, examples that suggest that the relative value of Certainty and Uncertainty is not constant.  So, if the value of Power is constant, there is no correspondence between Power and Certainty, which poses to Nietzsche the challenge of deriving both a Will to Certainty and a Will to Uncertainty from the Will to Power.