display all the ideas for this combination of philosophers
11 ideas
| 18731 | There is no theory of truth, because it isn't a concept [Wittgenstein] |
| Full Idea: It is wrong to say that there is any one theory of truth, for truth is not a concept. | |
| From: Ludwig Wittgenstein (Lectures 1930-32 (student notes) [1931], C V B) | |
| A reaction: This makes you wonder how he understood the word 'concept'. In most modern discussions truth seems to be a concept, and in Frege it can be an unsaturated predicate which is satisfied by sentences or thoughts. |
| 10910 | The best account of truth-making is isomorphism [Wittgenstein, by Mulligan/Simons/Smith] |
| Full Idea: The most sophisticated account of truth-making to have appeared to date is the 'isomorphism' theory of the Tractatus. | |
| From: report of Ludwig Wittgenstein (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus [1921]) by Mulligan/Simons/Smith - Truth-makers §5 | |
| A reaction: Wittgenstein's theory is clearly closely related to Russell's 'congruence' theory of correspondence of around 1912. |
| 23462 | He says the world is the facts because it is the facts which fix all the truths [Wittgenstein, by Morris,M] |
| Full Idea: Wittgenstein is thinking of the world as what makes truths true. …To get all the truths fixed we need more than the things: we need, as it were, the way things are - that is to say, the facts. | |
| From: report of Ludwig Wittgenstein (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus [1921], 1.12) by Michael Morris - Guidebook to Wittgenstein's Tractatus 1 | |
| A reaction: Morris says this is 'sometimes suggested'. It strikes me as plausible, and makes LW a key source for the modern truthmaker idea. Perhaps in David Lewis's version of it. The facts include the relations and processes of the things. |
| 18349 | All truths have truth-makers, but only atomic truths correspond to them [Wittgenstein, by Rami] |
| Full Idea: In 1922 Wittgenstein said that every truth has a truth-maker, but only atomic truths correspond to their truth-makers. | |
| From: report of Ludwig Wittgenstein (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus [1921]) by Adolph Rami - Introduction: Truth and Truth-Making note 04 | |
| A reaction: Presumably this is what logical atomism is meant to be (cf Russell). The atomic sentences plug into the world, and the rest are constructions from them, making the latter more remote from the truth-makers. |
| 10967 | Wittgenstein's picture theory is the best version of the correspondence theory of truth [Read on Wittgenstein] |
| Full Idea: Wittgenstein's picture theory is without doubt the best thought-out and developed of all the versions of the correspondence theory of truth. | |
| From: comment on Ludwig Wittgenstein (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus [1921]) by Stephen Read - Thinking About Logic Ch.1 |
| 7087 | Language is [propositions-elementary propositions-names]; reality is [facts-states of affairs-objects] [Wittgenstein, by Grayling] |
| Full Idea: Language consists in propositions, which are made of 'elementary' propositions, which are based ultimately on names. This matches the world of facts, compounded out of 'states of affairs', which are compounded of objects. | |
| From: report of Ludwig Wittgenstein (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus [1921]) by A.C. Grayling - Wittgenstein Ch.2 | |
| A reaction: This is Grayling's summary of the basic idea of the 'Tractatus'. The whole thing seems to be an elaborate version of Russell's 'congruence' account of the correspondence theory of truth. Later Wittgenstein is loss of faith in this theory. |
| 4702 | The account of truth in the 'Tractatus' seems a perfect example of the correspondence theory [Wittgenstein, by O'Grady] |
| Full Idea: Wittgenstein's account in the 'Tractatus' is often taken as a paradigm instance of a sophisticated correspondence theory of truth. | |
| From: report of Ludwig Wittgenstein (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus [1921]) by Paul O'Grady - Relativism Ch.2 | |
| A reaction: This might explain why I am so much more drawn to the 'Tractatus' than to the later relativistic anti-philosophical mind-eliminitavist, meaning-eliminativist Wittgenstein. |
| 7056 | Pictures reach out to or feel reality, touching at the edges, correlating in its parts [Wittgenstein] |
| Full Idea: A picture attaches to reality by reaching out to it; it is laid against reality like a measure; only the end-points actually touch the object; the pictorial relationship consists of correlations of picture's elements with things, the picture's feelers. | |
| From: Ludwig Wittgenstein (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus [1921], 2.1511-5) | |
| A reaction: (somewhat compressed). This is Wittgenstein's so-called 'picture theory' of meaning (replaced later by 'meaning is use'). It is perhaps better seen as an account of the correspondence theory of truth. Compare Russell's 'congruence' view (Idea 5427). |
| 18707 | All thought has the logical form of reality [Wittgenstein] |
| Full Idea: Thought must have the logical form of reality if it is to be thought at all. | |
| From: Ludwig Wittgenstein (Lectures 1930-32 (student notes) [1931], A V.1) | |
| A reaction: This links nicely the idea that true thoughts somehow share the structure of what they refer to, with the idea of logical form in logic. But maybe logical form is a fiction we offer in order to obtain a spurious map of reality. |
| 23483 | Proposition elements correlate with objects, but the whole picture does not correspond to a fact [Wittgenstein, by Morris,M] |
| Full Idea: Correlation need only be between elements of the picture and things in reality; it is not also required that there be a correspondence between the picture as a whole and a fact in reality - so things can be depicted falsely. | |
| From: report of Ludwig Wittgenstein (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus [1921], 2.15121) by Michael Morris - Guidebook to Wittgenstein's Tractatus 3C | |
| A reaction: To turn his picture theory into a correspondence theory of truth would need a further step, of saying the proposition is true when the two structures coincide. I don't think LW says that. |
| 11074 | 'It is true that this follows' means simply: this follows [Wittgenstein] |
| Full Idea: The proposition: "It is true that this follows from that" means simply: this follows from that. | |
| From: Ludwig Wittgenstein (Remarks on the Foundations of Mathematics [1938], p.38), quoted by Robert Hanna - Rationality and Logic 6 | |
| A reaction: Presumably this remark is simply expressing Wittgenstein's later agreement with the well-known view of Ramsey. Early Wittgenstein had endorsed a correspondence view of truth. |