Monday, December 30, 2013

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.

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