purpose of philosophy to clarify language wittgenstein

The philosophical significance of this debate on the Tractatus is due to the fact that the interpretation of Wittgenstein's early philosophy affects directly also the interpretation of his later philosophy and, therefore, the evaluation of his work as a whole. Others, most notably Peter Hacker, have argued against the resolute reading and defended the traditional interpretation. Since then this line of interpretation - often called a 'resolute reading' - has been taken up and developed by many others, including James Conant, occasionally Diamond's co-author. By contrast, Diamond argued, to take seriously Wittgenstein's statement about the nonsensicality of his book is to abandon the view that it contains a theory or gives expression to any truths, the notion of a nonsensical theory or truth being ultimately incomprehensible.

In her work Diamond contested the prevailing interpretation that the Tractatus ' purpose is to put forward a metaphysical theory of the essence of language and reality and to determine in this way the bounds of language, including the Tractatus ' own language use which, allegedly, is to be recognized as nonsensical on the basis of the very theory articulated in the book. This book is a contribution to the ongoing debate on Wittgenstein's Tractatus that was initiated by Cora Diamond's articles in the 1980s (reprinted in her Realistic Spirit ), and has been a dominant theme in the discussion of Wittgenstein's philosophy since the 1990s.

Purpose of philosophy to clarify language wittgenstein