Description
Book SynopsisRush Rhees, a close friend of Wittgenstein and a major interpreter of his work, shows how Wittgenstein''s
On Certainty concerns logic, language, and reality topics that occupied Wittgenstein since early in his career.
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- Authoritative interpretation of Wittgenstein''s last great work, On Certainty, by one of his closest friends.
- Debunks misconceptions about Wittgenstein''s On Certainty and shows that it is an essay on logic.
- Exposes the continuity in Wittgenstein''s thought, and the radical character of his conclusions.
- Contains a substantial and illuminating afterword discussing current scholarship surrounding On Certainty, and its relationship to Rhees''s work on this subject.
Trade Review"This book contains illuminating remarks and a novel perspective on an important and widely discussed classic. And it has a special authority, being the work of one of the author’s best students and closest friends."
William Brenner, Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia "This book contains two remarkable and original contributions by Rush Rhees and D. Z. Phillips to the burgeoning scholarship on Wittgenstein’s On Certainty. I recommend it strongly." Avrum Stroll, University of California, San Diego
Table of ContentsPreface vii
PART I THE PHILOSOPHICAL BACKGROUND TO ON CERTAINTY 1
1 On Certainty: A New Topic? 3
2 Saying and Describing 6
3 Concept-Formation 11
4 ‘Seeing’ and ‘Thinking’ 16
5 Thought and Language 27
6 Picturing Reality 34
7 What Makes Language Language? 40
8 The Logical and the Empirical 44
9 On Certainty: A Work in Logic 48
PART II DISCUSSIONS OF ON CERTAINTY 53
10 Two Conversations with Wittgenstein on Moore 55
11 Preface to On Certainty 61
12 On Certainty’s Main Theme 67
13 Induction 73
14 Wittgenstein’s Propositions and Foundations 78
15 Language as Emerging from Instinctive Behaviour 93
16 Words and Things 106
17 Not Worth Mentioning? 111
18 Certainty and Madness 118
PREFACE
Appendix 1: Comparisons Between On Certainty and Wittgenstein’s Earlier Work 125
Appendix 2: Some Passages Relating to Doubt and Certainty in On Certainty 131
Afterword: Rhees on Reading On Certainty 133
D. Z. Phillips
Notes 183
Index 192
