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Wittgenstein and Pragmatism pp 221–261Cite as

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Chapter 6: Between Method and Weltanschauung

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Part of the book series: History of Analytic Philosophy ((History of Analytic Philosophy))

Abstract

During a lecture on philosophical psychology, Wittgenstein affirmed that ‘the good’ in pragmatism had to do with asking what a description is for when investigating its meaning. The last chapter, starting from this remark, examines Wittgenstein’s and the pragmatists’ attitudes towards philosophy as a method and the relationship between method and Weltanschauung. One aspect on which Wittgenstein’s approach differs significantly from the pragmatists is that while the former insists on the separation between philosophy and science, the latter maintained that they should work side by side as allies in the search for knowledge. This difference, in turn, is linked to the distinction between the logical and the empirical levels, which Wittgenstein holds fast while blaming James for not being able to see it.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    See also RPP I, §§625, 635–636.

  2. 2.

    Also in CP 5.404.

  3. 3.

    Also in CP 5.401.

  4. 4.

    On Peircean pragmatism as a method see Tiercelin (2016, p. 184).

  5. 5.

    The same theme was highlighted in Chap. 4, Section ‘Meaning and Understanding’, and I will come back to it also in Section ‘Science and Philosophy’.

  6. 6.

    See also PPF, sec. xii and RPP I, §46.

  7. 7.

    From ‘Fallibilism Continuity and Evolution’, prob. 1897.

  8. 8.

    From ‘A Detailed Classification of the Sciences’, 1902.

  9. 9.

    From ‘The Three Kinds of Goodness’, fifth of the Harvard Lectures on Pragmatism, 1903.

  10. 10.

    Here I adopt an expression of Lars Hertzberg spoken during the conference ‘In Wittgenstein’s Footsteps’, Reykjavik, September 2012.

  11. 11.

    From MS 133, p. 82 (1946); see also CV, p. 78, from MS 137, p. 141a (1949).

  12. 12.

    Peirce’s MS 598, pp. 1–2, cited in Colapietro (2011, p. 7).

  13. 13.

    From a letter to James, 1897.

  14. 14.

    On these themes see Goodman (2002, pp. 163–164, 174).

  15. 15.

    See RPP I, §723.

  16. 16.

    From ‘Pragmatism’, 1907.

  17. 17.

    From MS 173, pp. 28v–29r, 1950. See also RC III, §125, from MS 176, p. 17v, 1950.

  18. 18.

    See MS 165, pp. 150–151 (1941–1944), quoted and translated in Hilmy (1987, pp. 196–197).

  19. 19.

    In WB, pp. 57–89. Putnam (1992a) interpreted this text as an anticipation of Wittgenstein’s private language argument.

  20. 20.

    See Putnam, A.R. and Putnam, H. (1992).

  21. 21.

    See ‘On a Certain Blindness in Human Beings’, in TT, pp. 229 ff.

  22. 22.

    Dated 1931. Quoted in Christensen (2011a, p. 810).

  23. 23.

    See Perissinotto (2016a, p. 166) for a parallel between Wittgenstein and James on conversion.

  24. 24.

    See also LFM, p. 103 and Citron (2015a, pp. 39, 62). On ‘aspect-seeing’ as a method see Floyd (2010) and Agam-Segal (2015).

  25. 25.

    In RLT, pp. 105–122; EP II, pp. 27–41; and CP 1.616–648.

  26. 26.

    The early Wittgenstein seemed to share this view: ‘We feel that even if all possible scientific questions be answered, the problems of life have still not been touched at all.…’ TLP 6.52.

  27. 27.

    But see Bergman (2010) for a broader contextualization of Peirce’s attitude.

  28. 28.

    And for Dewey as well; see his The Quest for Certainty (Dewey 1929).

  29. 29.

    On the difference of attitude between Peirce and James see Hookway (2012, Chap. 10).

  30. 30.

    See Cavell (1979, p. 463), (1992, p. 92) and (2005, pp. 199–201).

  31. 31.

    It is a coded note, not in NB.

  32. 32.

    From MS 183, p. 113.

  33. 33.

    Emerson (1862). See MTD, p. 121 footnote d.

  34. 34.

    See in particular Cavell (1989), but also West (1989) for other aspects.

  35. 35.

    Modified translation. In his lectures in English, Wittgenstein uses the adjective ‘synoptic’, and not ‘perspicuous’ or ‘surveyable’; cf. LCM, pp. 50, 107, 114. See also Dias Fortes (2015).

  36. 36.

    Originally in MS 103, p. 7r, 1916 (NB, p. 72).

  37. 37.

    Another concept prefigured by Spengler (see for instance Spengler 1933, p. 202), as well as by James, as mentioned earlier (see Section ‘Outlines for a Comparison’ in Chapter 3).

  38. 38.

    Dias Fortes (2015) also proposes a reconstruction of the development of this remark.

  39. 39.

    Modified translation.

  40. 40.

    MS 142, p. 17 (1936), also in TS 220, p. 81 (1937–1938).

  41. 41.

    ‘Ähnlich einer “Weltanschauung”’ in TS 238, p. 8 and TS 239, p. 82, both 1942–1943 revisions of some parts of TS 220.

  42. 42.

    Again in TS 239, p. 82 (1942–1943), ‘Daher die Wichtigkeit des Findens und des Erfindens von Zwischengliedern’.

  43. 43.

    TS 227, p. 88, corresponding to PI final version (ca. 1945).

  44. 44.

    What strikes me in OC, §421, moreover, is another aspect: Wittgenstein speaks of letting thoughts go around, which permits us to imagine that he might have been thinking about James’ stream of thought, and that through James he might have arrived at pragmatism. Indeed, the expression he uses, ‘Gedanken schweifen lassen’, is quite similar to ‘meinen Blick schweifen lassen’, that he uses in a 1944 remark which closes with these words: ‘(Stream of thought). James’ (MS 129, p. 114; cf. Z, §203).

  45. 45.

    See Perissinotto (1991, p. 222) and Conant (2011).

  46. 46.

    See for instance CP 5.464 for Peirce and P, p. 31 for James.

  47. 47.

    From ‘On Phenomenology’, 1903.

  48. 48.

    See CP 5.464 (1907).

  49. 49.

    It is not my intention to suggest that Wittgenstein (or James) found inspiration in Boutroux, but simply to underline how this metaphor—as often happens—was part of a Zeitgeist before belonging to individual thinkers.

  50. 50.

    Menand (2001, p. 279). Another pragmatist that used a similar image is John Dewey: ‘Experience is no stream, even though the stream of feelings and ideas that flows upon its surface is the part which philosophers love to traverse. Experience includes the enduring banks of natural constitution and acquired habit as well as the stream’ (Dewey 1925, p. 7). I owe this quote to Larry Hickman (private conversation).

  51. 51.

    See also Boutroux (1911), written shortly after James’ death, and Russell’s critical review of it (Russell 1912).

  52. 52.

    See also MS 129, p. 107. For a fuller analysis see Boncompagni (2012b).

  53. 53.

    PE also contains interesting notes on this topic. See for instance PE, p. 276.

  54. 54.

    Peirce too uses the image of the flux in connection to habits: ‘The stream of water that wears a bed for itself is forming a habit’, from ‘A Survey of Pragmaticism’, CP 5.492.

  55. 55.

    On the Jamesian conception of meaning see Myers (1986, p. 285).

  56. 56.

    See Crosby and Viney (1992, p. 111).

  57. 57.

    But see the different interpretation offered by Flanagan (1997).

  58. 58.

    See the first chapter of WB.

  59. 59.

    According to the already cited passage from MS 165, pp. 150–151.

  60. 60.

    From a letter to the positivist psychologist Ribot, quoted in Edie (1987, p. ix) and Perry (1938, p. 58).

  61. 61.

    See RPP I, §949, also in Z, §458 (from MS 134, p. 153).

  62. 62.

    Interestingly, Wittgenstein associated Ramsey with a materialist Weltanschauung, as shown in letters exchanged between G.E. Moore and Sydney Waterlow: ‘I quite agree with what you say about Ramsey,’ writes Moore to his friend. ‘I think [Ramsey’s] Weltanschauung, without objective values, is very depressive. Wittgenstein finds this too: he calls Ramsey a “materialist”; and what he means by this is something very antipathetic to him.’ The letter, dated 1931, is quoted in Paul (2012, p. 117). As mentioned, Wittgenstein also described Ramsey as a ‘bourgeois thinker’, see CV, p. 17 (from MS 112, p. 70v, 1931).

  63. 63.

    The last sentence reappears in PI, §109.

  64. 64.

    See Ramsey (1990, p. 7).

  65. 65.

    From MS 164, p. 67 (ca. 1943–1944); see also MS 129, p. 128.

  66. 66.

    See Sections ‘Meaning and Understanding’ (Chap. 4) and ‘The good in pragmatism’ (this chapter).

  67. 67.

    Russell (1936). The editorial note is now in CE, 370. See Perissinotto (2016b).

  68. 68.

    From MS 125, p. 41v (1941).

  69. 69.

    From MS 130, p. 72 (1946). See also PPF, sec. xii and RF III, §9.

  70. 70.

    See RPP II, §§678, 706–708.

  71. 71.

    More peculiar, I think, than is envisioned in Strawson (1985). On Wittgenstein and naturalism see Tripodi (2009) and Hamilton (2014, pp. 286–291).

  72. 72.

    See the first part of Moyal-Sharrock (2013b).

  73. 73.

    Starting from Wittgenstein’s remark on ‘not empiricism yet realism’, Diamond’s seminal work (Diamond 1991) criticizes Ramsey for not being realistic. An interesting response is provided by Methven (2015), who claims that Ramsey was indeed committed to a realistic spirit throughout his whole (brief) work.

  74. 74.

    From ‘Habit’, 1898 (also in RLT, pp. 218–241). Here Peirce is criticizing Mach, but his reasoning applies, I think, equally well to scientists in general.

  75. 75.

    On this topic see Sanfélix Vidarte (2001) and (2011), Hensley (2012).

  76. 76.

    Rhees used these notes for the Foreword of PR. The quoted passages come from MS 109, p. 204, November 1930.

  77. 77.

    On pragmatism and the Vienna Circle see also Chauviré (2003, pp. 94–96), Ferrari (2015), Uebel (2015), and Klein (2016).

  78. 78.

    From MS 133, p. 90 (1947). See also Citron (2015a, p. 36).

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    Anna Boncompagni

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Boncompagni, A. (2016). Chapter 6: Between Method and Weltanschauung . In: Wittgenstein and Pragmatism. History of Analytic Philosophy. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-58847-0_7

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