Tuesday 9/18

Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, 4.003-4.0412

Discussion Questions

First Question: Deep Problems

At the end of 4.003 Wittgenstein boldly asserts that "[a]nd so it is not to be wondered at that the deepest problems are really no problems" (Ogden) or "[a]nd it is not surprising that the deepest problems are in fact not problems at all" (Pears/McGuinness) (emphasis Wittgenstein's). If we read this as the conclusion of an argument as the Ogden translation suggests, what is the argument?

Second Question: Picturing and Modeling

At 4.01 Wittgenstein elucidates his notion of proposition in two ways: "[a] proposition is a picture of reality" and "[a] proposition is a model of reality as we imagine it" (emphasis mine). What must be the case, of a picture, that it picture? What must be the case, of a model, that it model? Does picturing differ in any salient way from modeling, or are they interchangeable concepts as Wittgenstein seems to suggest?

Third Question: Depicting

What does Wittgenstein mean when he says at 4.014, "[a] gramophone record, the musical idea, the written notes, and the soundwaves, all stand to one another in the same internal relation of depicting that holds between language and the world." Specifically, what is this "internal relation" to which he points?

Fourth Question: Hieroglyphs

At 4.016, Wittgenstein pinpoints what he deems essential to propositions:

4.016 In order to understand the essential nature of a proposition, we should consider hieroglyphic script, which depicts the facts that it describes.

And alphabetic script developed out of it without losing what was essential to depiction.

4.02 We can see this from the fact that we understand the sense of a propositional sign without its having been explained to us.

4.021 A proposition is a picture of reality: for if I understand a proposition, I know the situation that it represents. And I understand the proposition without having had its sense explained to me.

What is a concrete example of a hieroglyphic script of the sort Wittgenstein envisages? How does examination of it bear out his point in 4.021, if it does? What do we learn about depiction from this example?

Fifth Question: Showing and Saying

At 4.022 Wittgenstein draws an intriguing distinction:

4.022 A proposition shows its sense.

A proposition shows how things stand if it is true. And it says that they do so stand.

What are at least three concrete examples you think help illustrate Wittgenstein's distinction between showing and saying? In pictures? In models? In propositions? What is the distinction, precisely?