Saturday, December 28, 2013

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.

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