Abstract
In his middle and later periods one of Wittgenstein’s concerns was perception. This is, of course, precisely what one would expect given his obvious interest then in the notion of experience and in the language we employ to describe and express our experiences. However, the passage which has attracted most attention is the discussion in sec. XI of part II of Philosophical Investigations which is concerned with “seeing as”, or “aspect seeing”. In this paper the examples that Wittgenstein uses are examined, and some puzzles about them raised. It is suggested that Wittgenstein’s aim is to discredit some supposedly mistaken accounts of what ‘seeing as’ is. These mistaken accounts are supposed to made by Gestalt psychologists such as Kohler, and traditional sense-datum theorists. It is further argued that Wittgenstein’s criticisms are not uniformly cogent. It is, though, conceded that this rich and original passage contains far more than the elements investigated here, so much more needs to be scrutinised.
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Notes
- 1.
I have discussed some of Wittgenstein’s ideas from that period in Snowdon (2011).
- 2.
Wittgenstein (2001, p. 182). Since the paragraphs in Section II are not numbered I cite Wittgenstein’s text by the page where the passage is located.
- 3.
My own method here, as elsewhere, is to look closely (and critically) at certain passages, but many passages cannot be given such attention, and so have to remain in the background.
- 4.
Wittgenstein (2001, p. 165).
- 5.
See Footnote 4.
- 6.
One feature of Wittgenstein’s discussion that is for him unusual is that in the first three pages he introduces a sequence of technical terms—namely, ‘noticing an aspect’, ‘continuous seeing’, ‘the dawning of an aspect’, and ‘picture object’.
- 7.
Wittgenstein (2001, p. 169).
- 8.
See Footnote 4.
- 9.
See Footnote 4.
- 10.
Wittgenstein (2001, p. 166).
- 11.
- 12.
See Footnote 10.
- 13.
Wittgenstein (2001, p. 168).
- 14.
Wittgenstein (2001 pp. 165, 174).
- 15.
This is probably a reference to the significance for Wittgenstein's problem, as he saw it, of the kind of physiological speculation which Kohler engages in. See for example, Kohler (Kohler 1992, pp. 217–219). However, it would not be correct to identify causal hypotheses with physiological hypotheses, since evidently the cause need not be identified physiologically.
- 16.
See I. Rock, op. cit. p. 265.
- 17.
See M. Budd, op. cit. p. 78.
- 18.
I have tried in Snowdon (2018) to argue that Wittgenstein is not totally a-theoretical (or quietist).
- 19.
Wittgenstein (2001, p. 171).
- 20.
Wittgenstein (2001, p. 175).
- 21.
See Footnote 20.
- 22.
Wittgenstein (2001, p. 174).
- 23.
Wittgenstein (2001, p. 165).
- 24.
Wittgenstein (2001, p. 181).
- 25.
Wittgenstein (2001, p. 212).
- 26.
Wittgenstein (2001, p. 168).
- 27.
Kohler (1992, p. 151).
- 28.
Kohler (1992, p. 169).
- 29.
In Ray Monk's discussion of aspect perception he obviously implies that Wittgenstein did see Kohler's theory in these terms. Thus he says; "Kohler's treatment of them (ie. these problems) falls foul of the very conceptual confusions that Wittgenstein had been trying to dispel in his ‘Private Language Argument’. These confusions begin with Kohler's description of a Gestalt as ‘a concrete individual and characteristic entity, existing as something detached and having a shape or form as one of its attributes’. This already makes it sound as if what was being described was an object, a private object”. See Monk (1990, p. 512). One reason that his is unhelpful is that it is not actually clear what confusion Wittgenstein is dispelling in his argument against a private language.
- 30.
Wittgenstein (2001, p. 178).
- 31.
See Footnote 8.
- 32.
Wittgenstein (2001, p. 182).
- 33.
Wittgenstein (2001, p. 181).
- 34.
See Footnote 33.
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Snowdon, P.F. (2020). Wittgenstein on Seeing as; Some Issues. In: Wuppuluri, S., da Costa, N. (eds) WITTGENSTEINIAN (adj.). The Frontiers Collection. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-27569-3_24
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