For my MA course on Wittgenstein earlier this year, students had to write a short essay, blog post-style, on the Tractatus. One of them, Joseph Wilcox, took up the challenge of asking what exactly it means to say that Wittgenstein's project in the Tractatus is essentially a Kantian project -- something I kept hammering on them relentlessly. (To me at least this seems like the best and perhaps the only way I can make sense of the Tractatus!) The result is the insightful post below. (Proud teacher here!)
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By Joseph Wilcox
Wittgenstein [in the Tractatus] is a Kantian philosopher. Or so I'm told.
What exactly does it mean to say that someone is a Kantian philosopher? I always find it hard to grasp what is meant by such comparisons. Is it some fundamental belief that they share? Is it a field of thought that they both enter into? Is it a common goal that guides their thinking?
As often seems to be the case when it comes to philosophy, I am inclined to say that all the options must have some truth to them. In the case of Wittgenstein, however, I've been led to believe that it is the goal he sets out to achieve that forms the main connection between him and the lifework of his Prussian predecessor. What is it then, that both of these thinkers desire above everything else? The answer is to limit. To designate a point or level beyond which something does not or may not extend or pass. To place a restriction on the size or amount of something permissible or possible. On first looking, this doesn't seem like a very encouraging, confident or even useful objective. Why in the world would we bother to spend our precious time thinking about that which we can't reach? Isn't it far more interesting to seek to pass over such borders? Isn't it more inspiring to think that the impossible can serve as a beacon to aspire to? Isn't the thought of placing limits a token of the kind of pessimism that might cause one to give up hope?
Perhaps, in order to find out whether this initial impression holds firm, we need to delve into Wittgenstein's subject matter. What does he wish to find the limits of? The answer is: language, thought and the world. These three, to him, are very much bound together. Language can be seen as a tool that represents the way our thinking is built up. An analysis of language, of the way propositions are structured and related when it comes to their truth or falsity, therefore, should automatically tell us something about the nature of thought. If this is so, what then is the correspondence between these two and 'the world'? Are we to believe that any potential limits to our thought and language are a reflection of the limits of the world as a whole? What is at least clear is that their connection can be understood in terms of facts. Wittgenstein describes the world, at the starting point of his Tractatus, as the totality of facts, or everything that is the case. Facts, it seems, is the currency that our thought and language do their dealings in. Therefore, thought and language at the very least are two vehicles that make it possible for us to gain some understanding of what this world is that we speak of.
What does placing a limit on these things amount to? Does Wittgenstein intend to determine what we can say or think, or what we should say or think? Is it about what is possible, or what is permissible? What we can conceivably fathom or what makes logical sense? It seems that at base for Wittgenstein, these are two sides of the same coin. They are clearly very much intertwined. Whatever it may be that this limit comprises in the end, Wittgenstein points out from the start that there is a fundamental stumbling block in the way of this very enterprise. How, he wonders, are we to ascertain the limits of anything, when we cannot step outside those limits in order to see the borders with our own eyes? In other words, doesn't the very fact that something is limited determine the impossibility of ever capturing that same limit? More specifically, how can we determine what we cannot think, if we cannot think what we cannot think? Analogously, how can we determine what we cannot say, if by definition we don't have the words to do so?
The limit of the world is described by Wittgenstein as 'logical space'. Though change and temporality are not actually dealt with in Tractatus, it seems as though the world he describes must be nothing more than the present situation at a given moment. Facts come and go, after all, as quickly as a person can make a decision or the weather can take a turn. The world, therefore, must be in a constant state of change or movement - a movement that can be seen as occurring within logical space. Logical space is the collection of all possible facts, including those that do not obtain (i.e. that are not the case) - although they could at some point. Those facts within this collection that do obtain are what forms the world. An image seems to be formed of the world as a bubble or balloon that is constantly floating around inside a small room or box, changing shape and size as it goes. The bubble is limited by the borders of the space it's in. What's more, it could never fill the entire space, not at the same time. That is because some possible facts contradict one another and therefore cannot both obtain at the same time.
When it comes to the limits of language and thought, we might make use of a similar image. In this case, however, our goal should be to slowly inflate the bubble until it fills all corners of the space it's in. It would not pop, but would come to a gentle and sturdy rest. This would be the closest we could come to seeing the limits of thought and language - brushing up against its inner boundaries. The question is, how to do so? How to inflate the bubble? One would think that the way to do so would be by employing thought and language in such a way that one is constantly seeking to explore its outer reaches - using our powers of thought and speech to the fullest. Does that mean thinking everything there is to think, including thoughts we'd rather not face? Does that mean saying everything there is to say, including words that would hurt those around us?
I suppose it could be seen to come down to the imperative to simply live our lives, albeit living our lives with an open mind - open both towards itself and towards the minds of others. In this light, the searching out of limits suddenly sounds a lot less pessimistic than it did at the top of this text (my own little Wittgensteinian bubble). The process of inflating sounds remarkably similar to the aspiration towards the beacon of what at one moment seems impossible but in the next becomes possible. And insofar as searching out the limits does still have a negative connotation, perhaps it is simply a necessary evil. Knowing and showing limits might be what it takes to be able to finally let go of their grasp; perhaps what we cannot think or say is something that, at a deeper level, can be known or shown.
It is easy here, in this line of thought, to make the step from thought and language in general to the experience and existence of a single human being and our own personal limits. Perhaps this touches on what is described as the therapeutic nature of Wittgenstein's philosophy. One could imagine that, analogously to the above, it is through stretching ourselves to the limit and thereby confronting ourselves with our own limits, that we can learn to accept them and live with them - or despite them.
I think I've reached my limit - for today at least.
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