purpose of philosophy to clarify language wittgenstein

#PURPOSE OF PHILOSOPHY TO CLARIFY LANGUAGE WITTGENSTEIN SERIES#

The video is part of The School of Life‘s series on philosophy, which Alain de Botton is founder of. Words are in some way, therefore, “public tools for the understanding of private life.” Working out which kind of game the other is involved in is key to good communication, says De Botton. Our understanding of ourselves depends on the words of others, on languages that have developed publically and communally over many centuries, before we were born. a “stating the facts game” – but is a “confort and reassurance seeking game”. A statement such as “you never help me around the house” is not a request for concrete examples of help provided – i.e. In later years Wittgenstein moved away from the picture language theory and, in his Philosophical Investigations (published posthumously), he argued that words are tools that we use to play different “games”, not intended, of course, in a literal sense, but more as “patterns of intention”. His Tractatus Logico Philosphicus is a plea to speak more carefully and less impusively, says de Botton.

Problems arise when we are not clear of what things mean in our own heads, which is why self-understanding is essential, or when we read more meaning in words than was originally intended. Words enable us to make these pictures and people are constanty “swapping” pictures with each other when they communicate. The narrator says Wittgenstein’s view of how we manage to communicate ideas to each other – which was revolutionary for his times – is that language works by triggering pictures in our minds of how things are in the world. Much has been said and written about Ludwig Wittgenstein and his theory of language, but the video narrated by British philosopher and author Alain de Botton provides a fresh and playful take on his complex background, life, philosophy, and vision of language. By Pisana Ferrari – cApStAn Ambassador to the Global Village

Purpose of philosophy to clarify language wittgenstein