Swansea Studies in Philosophy General Editor: D. Z. Phillips, Rush Rhees Research Professor, University College of Wales, Swansea and Danforth Professor of Philosophy of Religion, Claremont Graduate University Philosophy is the struggle for clarity about the contexts of human discourse we engage in. What we need is not theoretical explanation, but clarification and elucidation of what lies before us. Recent returns to theory in many fields of philosophy, involving more and more convoluted attempts to meet inevitable counter-examples to such theories, make this need all the more urgent. This series affords an opportunity for writers who share this conviction, one as relevant to logic, epistemology and the philosophy of mind, as it is to ethics, politics, aesthetics and the philosophy of religion. Authors will be expected to engage with the thought of influential philosophers and contemporary movements, thus making the series a focal point for lively discussion. Title include: Lilli Alanen, Sara Heinamaa and Thomas Wallgren COMMONALITYAND PARTICULARITY IN ETHICS Christopher Cordner ETHICALENCOUNTERS Knowledge and Moral Meaning David Cockburn OTHER HUMAN BEINGS Ilham Dilman WITTGENSTEIN'S COPERNICAN REVOLUTION The Question of Linguistic Idealism John Edelman AN AUDIENCE FOR MORAL PHILOSOPHY? Raimond Gaita GOOD AND EVIL An Absolute Conception D. Z. Phillips WITTGENSTEINAND RELIGION RECOVERING RELIGIOUS CONCEPTS Closing Epistemic Divides Rush Rhees (edited by D. Z. Phillips) MORAL QUESTIONS
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Wittgenstein's Copernican Revolution The Question of Linguistic Idealism Ilham Dilman
* ilham Oilman 2002 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London W1T 4LP. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The author has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. First published 2002 by PALGRAVE Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS and 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N. Y. 10010 Companies and representatives throughout the world PALGRAVE is the new global academic imprint of St. Martin's Press LLC Scholarly and Reference Division and Palgrave Publishers Ltd (formerly Macmillan Press Ltd). ISBN13: 978-0-333-97354-7 hardback This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of CongressCataloging-in-Publication Data Oilman, ilham. Wittgenstein's Copernican revolution: the question of linguistic idealism / llharn Oilman. p. cm.-(swansea studies in philosophy) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-333-97354-2 (cloth) 1. Wittgenstein, Ludwig, 1889-1951. 2. Idealism. 3. Language and languages-philosophy. I. Title. II. Swansea studies in philosophy (Palgrave (Firm)) B3376.W564 0552001 192-dc21 2001045179 Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Antony Rowe, Chippenham and Eastbourne
Table of Contents Detailed Table ofcontents Acknowledgements vii x Introduction 1 1. Realism and its Rejection: Wittgenstein's Copernican Revolution 18 2. The Dangers in Rejecting Realism: Linguistic Idealism 38 3. Wittgenstein and Linguistic Idealism S7 4. Bernard Williams: Wittgenstein and Idealism 83 S. Bernard Williams: A Sophisticated Realism 96 6. G. E. M. Anscombe: Was Wittgenstein a Linguistic Idealist? 110 7. Cora Diamond: Wittgenstein and the Realistic Spirit in Philosophy 131 8. Hilary Putnam: Metaphysical and Internal Realism 146 9. Hilary Putnam: Ethics and Reality 172 10. Conclusion: Reality and Human Life 206 No res 220 Bibliography 221 Index 224 v
Detailed Table of Contents Introduction 1 1. Realism and its Rejection: Wittgenstein's Copernican Revolution 18 1. What is Philosophical Realism? 18 2. What is the Problem about the Relation between Language and Reality? 24 3. Wittgenstein's Anti-realism: Are Grammatical Features of our Language, then, not Responsible to Anything? 28 4. If the Relation between Language and Reality is Internal does this Mean that before there was Language there was no Reality? 32 5. Conclusion: Wittgenstein's Anti-Realism is not a Form of Idealism 35 2. The Dangers in Rejecting Realism: Linguistic Idealism 38 1. What is Linguistic Idealism? 38 2. Rejection of Realism: Appreciating its Implications 40 3. Language and the Human World 47 4. Conclusion: Logical Categories and Concepts in Use 52 3. Wittgenstein and Linguistic Idealism 57 1. Was Wittgenstein a Linguistic Idealist? 57 2. Wittgenstein and Hume on the Problem of Induction 59 3. Wittgenstein and Bambrough on the Problem of Universals 67 4. Wittgenstein and Kant on the Limits of Empiricism 73 5. Taking Stock 77 4. Bernard Williams: Wittgenstein and Idealism 83 1. The Tractatus and Transcendental Solipsism 83 2. The Investigations and Transcendental Idealism 85 3. On Certainty and Relativism 87 4. What does Wittgenstein Really Think? 90 5. Conclusion 95 vii
viii DetailedTable ofcontents 5. Bernard Williams: A Sophisticated Realism 96 1. Realism: Language, Knowledge and Reality - A Sketch of Williams' View 96 2. Williams' Absolute Conception of Reality 103 3. Criticism of Williams' Absolute Conception 107 6. G. E. M. Anscombe: Was Wittgenstein a Linguistic Idealist? 110 1. The Investigations and the Question of Linguistic Idealism 110 a. 'Essence is expressed by Grammar' (P.!., 371) 110 b. Wittgenstein's alter-ego: 'But there really are four primary colours' (Z., 331) 112 c. Does having different concepts mean not realizing something that we realize? (P.!., II, xii) 115 d. Anscombe's Test for Linguistic Idealism 116 e. Mathematics is a 'phraseology' and as such 'a suburb of our language' (Wittgenstein) 118 2. On Certainty and the Question of Cultural Relativism 120 a. Criticism of Alien Beliefs and Practices: in the end our reasons run out, we resort to persuasion (D.C., 612) 120 b. Is Wittgenstein a Cultural Relativist? 123 3. Conclusion 128 7. Cora Diamond: Wittgenstein and the Realistic Spirit in Philosophy 131 1. 'Realism Without Empiricism' 131 2. Truth and Falsity in Philosophy 140 3. Conclusion 144 8. Hilary Putnam: Metaphysical and Internal Realism 146 1. Two Kinds of Realism? 146 2. Putnam Not Committed to Linguistic Idealism 153 3. Kant and Putnam's Realism without Dichotomies 156 4. The later Putnam: Cleaning up his 'Internal Realism' in Rorty's Mirror 162 5. Conclusion 169 9. Hilary Putnam: Ethics and Reality 172 1. Putnam's Ethical Realism 172 2. Wittgenstein's 'Lecture on Ethics' 176 3. Fact and Value 186
Detailed Table ofcontents ix 4. The Reality of Moral Values 188 5. Objectivity and Moral Knowledge 193 6. Moral Learning: Coming to Moral Knowledge 196 7. Putnam's Realism without Dichotomies in Ethics 199 8. Conclusion 203 10. Conclusion: Reality and Human Life 206 1. Looking Back 206 2. Simone Weil on the World as Something We Read 210 3. Conclusion 217
Acknowledgements I would like to thank the editor of this series, Professor D. Z. Phillips, for his many helpful comments on earlier drafts of this book. I would also like to thank Helen Baldwin, who has done all the secretarial work in preparing the typescript of this book, for her invaluable assistance in getting the manuscript ready for publication. x