Philosophical Remarks

When the Council of Trinity College, Cambridge, had to decide in May 1930 whether to renew Wittgenstein's research grant, they turned to Bertrand Russell for an assessment of the work Wittgenstein had been doing over the past year. Russell's verdict was that "The theories contained in this new work . . . are novel, very original and indubitably important. Whether they are true, I do not know. As a logician who likes simplicity, I should like to think that they are not, but from what I have read of them I am quite sure that he ought to have an opportunity to work them out, since, when completed, they may easily prove to constitute a whole new philosophy."

Wittgenstein's "Philosophical Remarks" contains the seeds of his later philosophy of mind and of mathematics. In this work, he discusses the role of the indispensable in language, criticizing Russell's "The Analysis of Mind." He modifies the Tractatus's picture theory of meaning by emphasizing that the connection between the proposition and reality is not found in the picture itself. Wittgenstein also analyzes generality in and out of mathematics, as well as the notions of proof and experiment. Furthermore, he formulates a pain/private-language argument and discusses both behaviorism and the verifiability principle. The work is difficult but important, and it belongs in every philosophy collection, as stated by Robert Hoffman in "Philosophy."

According to Leonard Linsky of the American Philosophical Association, "Any serious student of Wittgenstein's work will want to study his Philosophical Remarks as a transitional book between his two great masterpieces. The Remarks is thus indispensible for anyone who seeks a complete understanding of Wittgenstein's philosophy."

product information: