tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post3010349064248533756..comments2024-02-11T12:24:26.294-08:00Comments on The Compass Rose: Wittgenstein's Tractatus - Model of Creative ThinkingCurtis Favillehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06213075853354387634noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-37896126691048295232011-05-24T07:28:42.755-07:002011-05-24T07:28:42.755-07:00This comment has been removed by the author.Jhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11567400697675996283noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-90303737082229447072011-05-24T06:20:56.578-07:002011-05-24T06:20:56.578-07:00Well, Curtis, the Tractatus is a technical work, a...Well, Curtis, the Tractatus is a technical work, and thus some discussion of its content is in order. The early Wittgenstein is fairly dry. His ideas on meaning were quite limited--the "meaning of a word is the object it refers to"--wouldn't seem to promise much for literatteurs. (and a view mostly rejected now)<br /><br /> Russell and Whitehead claimed all mathematics could be put on a logical basis. But they did not claim completeness-- the Principia was not finished. First Order logic--ie, formal,predicate logic holds, actually--as a system. Goedel proved that. So, the logical basis of the Principia (Russell's intuition, if you will--tho Russell provided much of the logical work as well) was established. Witt. had little to do with that..<br /><br />Goedel's incompleteness theorem does suggest that arithmetic may have unprovable assumptions (though some logic mavens have not accepted Goedelian "numbering'..a bit too much for the CR combox discussion). Decidable-ness is an issue (that was due to Church). But either way, one can construct a set of valid deductions (a very large set) and then have completeness, in brief. One reason your operating system works (and an OS first order logic, more or less). The impossibility of logic was sort of 60s hype. If undecidability and incompleteness, indeterminacy was a serious issue, computers wouldn't work. <br /><br /><br />Curtis: Re the literary usages of Wittgenstein, as I said that probably comes from later Witt--. Tho I recall a sentence in Pynchon's V from the Tractatus. Used in a song or something. Test. writers. ).Jhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11567400697675996283noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-40628727440898649172011-05-24T06:08:10.928-07:002011-05-24T06:08:10.928-07:00Richard:
Yes, I follow all your points and agree ...Richard:<br /><br />Yes, I follow all your points and agree insofar as I understand what you're saying.<br /><br />And, yes, Perloff has made these same connections. They're obvious, and Silliman and Watten and Bernstein have all acknowledged their debt to linguistic (or semantic) philosophy--specifically Wittgenstein.<br /><br />In that sense, this piece is not original, though not many people have made the point outright. I noticed Watten's approach in Factors and the two Tuumba books when they first appeared. Since it was something we "shared" at the time, it didn't seem very prescient even to raise the issue then. But, historically speaking, it's useful to emphasize it now. <br /><br />Language is a sequential process. It occurs in time. So do logical systems--like the Tractatus. But using a logical form to make "non"-logical assertions, deliberately, was a fairly new thing. Self-consciously. It throws the process of "poetic" composition into a different light.<br /><br />Using quasi-philosophical texts as a form was also employed by Ashbery in Three Poems. Those are almost "straight" philosophical/metaphysical meditations.Curtis Favillehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06213075853354387634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-81474859099491627042011-05-24T01:45:19.692-07:002011-05-24T01:45:19.692-07:00This is good post (on an interesting Blog). This l...This is good post (on an interesting Blog). This link was made by Marjorie Perloff in her book 'Wittgenstein's Ladder' and also I think "Radical Artifice"<br /><br />Wittgenstein was working with Russell and Whitehead* and after he wrote his Tractatus and Russell and Whitehead realised that this, together with Russell's Paradox and Godel's Theorem meant that linking mathematics (hence perhaps all knowledge) by some logical foundation was impossible (at least to define how it could be so <br />linked)<br /><br />Perloff links him to Silliman and others (even works by Beckett such as Watt and codes etc). I read all of his "Alphabet" books. Tjanting is a favourite. Wittgenstein's method or approach gave them (Langpos etc) a way into a systematic method as you say here.<br /><br />But another who followed Euclid;s process for representing ideas was Spinoza in his 'Ethics'. I read that fairly easily as a teenager but I find it hard nowadays, and I didn't get far with the Tractatus. But the ideas structures and methods are stimulating. <br /><br />The, or a, point is, I think, that the decimal "increments" imply an infinite set of "left-outs" [like the Dewey decimal system to define knowledge or book classification] linking ideas that W. and Russell etc were well aware of (these I think are due to (limits? contradictions? ambiguities) of language, and that is the key.<br /><br />Hence the interest in W. by the language poets. Wittgenstein as you say was aware of this problematic aspect (did his "left-outs" preempt Derrida's deferance and difference etc?) (W. seems to want however to keep to knowledge in so far as it can be discussed, that is speculation of metaphysical sort doesn't, on the surface, seem to interest him,although it maybe a bit glaringly left out...)<br /><br />None of this implies (to me) there can be "no meaning" or anything such as that. I am sure W. was quite sane if eccentric.<br /><br />In any case the method of proceeding is in itself "poetic" as kind of almost austere poetic undercuts certain (old ways of writing or presenting) poetry. <br /><br />In a similar way Silliman uses the Fibonacci series in some of his works as a formal device. (One word. One word. Two wds. Three wds. Fie wds. etc). This encourage concentration on the word or the phrase as it is built up. Then the whole work is built up. <br /><br />Perhaps it is a bit artificial but I really liked Tjanting and Paradise for example. I think that Tjanting is possibly a great PM work. (But one needs to concentrate on the words adn phrases etc closely and this applies to such as Stein also and others...Armantrout I found more problematic. A little too riddling for me... but she is very astute.) <br /><br />*(What I know of Witt. et al is second hand so I could well be completely wrong or quite wrong).<br /><br />An interesting essay in any case.<br /><br />Regards, RTRichardhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10272507198753290435noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-18262432756954334362011-05-23T19:55:13.764-07:002011-05-23T19:55:13.764-07:00J:
What did my post actually say?
The point--if ...J:<br /><br />What did my post actually say?<br /><br />The point--if you read it carefully--was the application of a prose form (from LW's Tractatus) to a literary movement which adopted many of his positions and insights--appropriating his methodology to aesthetic purposes. <br /><br />Obviously Wittgenstein is a complex philosopher and a complex person. I made that point in my footnote--it wasn't an attempt to make a comprehensive assertion about his whole career from the point of view of a consideration of his best-known work. <br /><br />Okay? A full-blown discussion of the Tractatus will have to await another opportunity.Curtis Favillehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06213075853354387634noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1660090614793277371.post-52480147870485132722011-05-23T18:31:43.411-07:002011-05-23T18:31:43.411-07:00Most humanoids who have been to collegetown go thr...Most humanoids who have been to collegetown go through a St. Witt. phase, but they grow out of it, hopefully. <br /><br />As a logic text the Tractatus is somewhat interesting but outdated. His views on tautology are not accepted by most of the logic mavens (ie, Quine for one).<br /><br />Isn't the later St Witt. the language guy? The Tractatus has a few lang. related proverbs IIRC but he was still a logic chopper at that point wasn't he. His somewhat metaphysical reflections on...logical form, the "great mirror" are interesting--he sounds rather platonic at times. But I think he moved away from that as well. And there are some puzzling sections (ie, a complete denial of inductive reasoning of any sort, and really probability). <br /><br />And what do you make of the end section of the Tractatus-- ? Whack, IMHE. Read Witt's Poker as well (ie, St Witt. brandished an iron poker at some Oxford greats, including Popper). Whack. Even Lord Russell said as much about the aged Witt.Jhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11567400697675996283noreply@blogger.com