The Mystical in Wittgenstein's Early Writings

James R. Atkinson

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2009
• Print ISBN: 9780415963442
• eBook ISBN: 9781135893705
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Mind & Body in Philosophy

The aim of this book is to consider what reasonably follows from the hypothesis that the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus can be interpreted from a mystical point of view. Atkinson intends to elucidate Wittgenstein's thoughts on the mystical in his early writings as they pertain to a number of topics such as, God, the meaning of life, reality, the eternal and the solipsistic self.

1 Self-subsistence and Method

The aim of this chapter is to show the relationship between Russell’s belief in the independent nature of complexes and their constituents and his notion of the scientific method of philosophy. This relationship is important to this project in that it shows that a philosophical method based on analysis is an inadequate means of understanding the mystical we find in Wittgenstein’s Tractatus.

In Russell’s 1918 lectures, “The Philosophy of Logical Atomism” (in Logic and Knowledge, LK), we find the essence of his notion of philosophy, whether it is metaphysics or epistemology, embodied in the maxim ‘Occam’s razor’. That ‘entities are not to be multiplied beyond necessity’ becomes a method for Russell that proceeds by asking the following question:

What is the smallest number of simple undefined things at the start, and the smallest number of undemonstrated premises, out of which you can define the things that need to be defined and prove the things that need to be proved? (LK, 271)

In Russell’s application of Occam’s razor we find two assumptions. First, Russell assumes that the process of analysis reveals self-subsistent simples. Second, he assumes that the complexes that his method analyzes and the simples it reveals are actual entities. The fact that undefined things and undemonstrated premises are actual reveals his assumption that they are not possible. In other words, in order to constitute the smallest number they must be actual, possible things and entities would increase the number of things and entities to unwieldy numbers.

Russell turns to physics to demonstrate how he applies Occam’s razor and how his notion of analysis reveals simples. In Russell’s illustration of a desk he shows that what we refer to as ordinary objects are actually logical fictions. Russell asks what makes one think that a series of successive appearances of a desk is the same desk (LK, 273). He states that while it is easier to conceive an object as a continuous entity, this is not what is given in the empirical world. Although a desk is perceived from different angles and at different times, we believe that it is the same desk. However, Russell denies that what makes a thing “really real” is that it lasts for a very long time or forever. Rather, he claims that the things that are really real are those things that “last a very short time” (LK, 274). He thinks that the successive images of an object perceived over a period of time define the object as a single persisting entity. The things that we think are real (tables, chairs and so on) are “systems, series of classes of particulars and the particulars are real things, the particulars being sense data when they happen to be given to you” (ibid.). He continues to state that objects such as tables and chairs are a “series of classes of particulars, and therefore a logical fiction” (ibid.). In fact, he believes that objects of this kind are on the same level of reality as hallucinations and phantoms. When Occam’s razor is applied to the world we learn that the starting point is not the world of objects such as tables and chairs, or the objects of the constituents of matter as in physics, but simple moments of perceived sense data, or particulars.

We begin with Occam’s razor because it offers the key to Russell’s method, namely to reduce philosophical problems to the smallest number of the simplest parts. Moreover, the influence of Occam’s razor is found in three points that are keys to understanding Russell’s method of scientific philosophy. The first key is found in Russell’s critique of monism in 1907. The main point in this critique is Russell’s belief in the self-subsistent nature of complexes and their constituents. Next, we find the influence of this belief on his theory of judgment. The key point we find in this discussion is a shift from an absolute notion of truth to our knowledge of truth. The third key is Russell’s distinction between two kinds of knowledge: acquaintance and description. The significant point of this distinction is that Russell attempts to bring us to a point of unanalysable atoms of meaning as the ultimate constituents of knowledge. This chapter begins with Russell’s belief in the self-subsistent nature of things in his critique of monism.

CRITIQUE OF MONISM

Russell’s rejection of the idealists’ view of the internal relationship of a subject to its predicate shows that he promotes a worldview of self-subsistent things whose relations are not defined by their natures.

In The Philosophy of Mathematics (1900), Russell believes that independence is a quintessential quality of a term. The independent thesis quality of a term reappears throughout those writings of Russell that this will consider. For example, in Russell’s 1906–1907 essay “The Monistic Theory of Truth” (Philosophical Essays, PE, 131–146), he holds and applies this belief to a critique of a form of monism in which it was assumed all things are not connected through the identity of a term, but with its nature. It is worthwhile examining Russell’s rejection of monism because the arguments he uses for this rejection promote a worldview of self-subsistent things whose relations are not defined by their natures.

In “The Monistic Theory of Truth”, Russell offers a critique of H.H. Joachim’s book The Nature of Truth, criticizing the following quotation in particular: “That the truth itself is one, and whole, and complete, and that all thinking and all experience move within its recognition and are subject to its manifest authority; this I have never doubted” (Joachim, 178 in PE, 131–132). In his critique of Joachim, Russell examines what is meant by the nature of a term. He begins with the question, “Is the nature of a term different from the term” (PE, 144)? If it is different, this raises the question of relationship: a term reduces to the relationship it shares with its nature. If a term reduces to such a relationship, Russell claims that the “term is not other than its nature” (PE, 145). On the other hand, if there is no relationship and the subject, as a term, is its own nature, (because the subject includes the predicate) “every true proposition attributing a predicate to a subject is purely analytic” (PE, 145). The thrust of Russell’s argument is as follows: if we say that subject x has the predicate y, it is no longer clear what we mean by subject x if y is specified in explaining the nature of x.

For Russell, the nature of a subject includes its predicates as features of the subject; however, where predicates are seen as separate attributes of the subject, it raises the problem of how to explain the bond that unites a particular collection of predicates into the predicates of a particular subject. Russell states that any collection of predicates presupposes a subject; however, if this tack is taken, it raises the following issue: if the nature of a term or subject is defined in terms of predicates, there is no difference between a subject and its predicates, thereby rendering the terms “subject” and “predicate” meaningless. In either case, whether a subject is identical to or different from its nature, we find two problems. First, these arguments show that the relationship between a term and its nature cannot be established, and second, that the relationship between the subject and predicate cannot be shown. Russell shows that these two points demonstrate that the axiom of internal relations is “incompatible with complexity” (PE, 146).

In contrast to Russell’s view of relations, for the idealists, the relationships of the constituents of a fact are related to each other in a determinate way. For example if we say “A loves B” there exists a relationship of “A” to the feeling of love it has for “B”. In other words, there is an internal relationship between “A” “love” and “B” in “A loves B”. Russell’s point of contention with this view is that it leads to monism. That is, “A” is not only related to “love” and “B”, but also to “C”, “D” and so on. Each of these relations is related to countless others through countless relations, to the point where each thing is related to everything else. In the idealists’ view, individual things cannot be considered self-subsistent because if relations are seen as internal, each thing is seen in a dependent relationship with all other things. Russell’s aim with this line of reasoning is to refute monism, and in particular the notion that there is “identity in difference”. In other words, where difference is perceived in the constituents of aRb, Russell shows that the relationship of a to b to R is not internal. Rather, he claims that “there is identity and there is difference” (PE, 146, emphasis mine).

Russell shows through the identity of a term with its nature (or a subject to its predicate) that in the appearance of difference one should not confuse that difference with identity. For Russell, complexes have some elements that are identical and some that are different. The basis of Russell’s view is his belief that complexes are composed of independent simple things, which he states as follows:

We thus get a world of many things, with relations which are not to be deduced from a supposed ‘nature’ or scholastic essence of related things. In this world, whatever is complex is composed of related simple things, and analysis is no longer confronted at every step by an endless regress. (PE, 146)

With this line of thinking, Russell counters the monistic view of truth as one, whole and complete. Moreover, as we shall examine in latter sections, it provides us with a key to Russell’s method. That is, if he assumes that complexes and their constituents are self-subsistent, the method he employs will seek to separate complexes into simpler and simpler constituents. As we shall later examine, the application of this method to the problems of philosophy means that a method of analysis will attempt to divide complex philosophical questions into separate less puzzling questions.

RUSSELL’S THEORY OF JUDGEMENT (1910)

The focus in the following two sections will be upon Russell’s shift from a belief in absolute objective truths to the knowledge we can have of truth.

At the time of the publication of the Philosophical Essays (1910), Peter Hylton in his essay “The Nature of the Proposition” (in Philosophy in History, PH) suggests that a shift in Russell’s thought begins to occur. At the time of this shift Hylton argues that Russell “professes doubt about his view of propositions” (PH, 385). Hylton remarks that Russell “gives up the idea that there are propositions which are independent of our acts of judgement” (PH, 386). From Russell’s first draft of “The Monist Theory of Truth” in 1906–1907, until 1910, he held the view that an “act of judgement was the apprehension of a single entity entirely distinct from the act” (PH, 386). An alteration to this theory of judgement takes place in 1910 when he thinks that a judgement is now a “relation between a person and various non-propositional entities which the person judging somehow unites so that a judgement is formed” (ibid.). Because judgements are no longer thought of as two-place relations, but as multiple relations among the person judging and the multiple entities judged, this view came to be known as the multiple-relation view of judgement. Hylton suggests that the striking feature of this shift in Russell’s thought is that by 1910 he seems to have accepted this aspect of the idealists’ views that he once attacked. That is, his view at this point seems to have altered to accept that propositions are dependent on mental acts for their existence (ibid.). The difficulty that presents itself to Russell with this view is that the act of judgement imposes no restrictions on what can be judged or what can be true. The mental act on which the theory depends lacks the power to impose constraints on what can be judged. The problem here is that there is no way to explain why it is impossible to judge nonsense. That is, it is possible to form a judgement from a random selection of things that I am acquainted with that appear as nonsense, such as “the table penholders the book” (PH, 386–387). The problems in his theory of judgement led him to revise the theory in 1913. The significant feature of this new theory is the introduction of logical form, meaning “the way in which constituents are put together” (Russell in PH, 387). Russell does not abandon the relationship of the mental act of judgement, but includes logical form to explain how a judgement is made. The function of logical form in the 1913 theory of judgement is to offer constraints on what can be judged (PH, 387). From his first doubts about the nature of the proposition to his 1913 theory of judgement, Russell shifts his emphasis from ontology to epistemology. Despite these shifts in thought, one consistent point remains: the existence of complexes that are comprised of independent simples.

EPISTEMOLOGY—FACTS (1914)

Epistemology continues to be Russell’s concern in 1914. In his essay “Logic as the Essence of Philosophy”, (in Our Knowledge of the External World, OKEW, 42–69), Russell introduces the notion of facts.

When I speak of a “fact”, I do not mean one of the simple things in the world; I mean that a certain thing has a certain quality, or that certain things have a certain relation. (OEWK, 60)

Russell gives the example of Napoleon, who is not a fact. However, it is a fact that he married Josephine. In this example, the relationship of Napoleon to Josephine is a fact, where Napoleon alone is not. In this sense, facts are not simple, but consist of two or more constituents. These constituents are not other facts, but are “things and qualities or relations” (OKEW, 61). A fact is a single relation of one or more things. One relation of two or more terms may hold between A and B, and A and C; however this constitutes two distinct facts, as in the case where A is the son of his father and the son of his mother (ibid.). Russell’s notion of a fact consists of a single relation and does not permit any case that is constituted by other facts. However, this example does not include the case where A is related to B on the account of C, as in the case where A is jealous of B because of C. In this case there is only one fact consisting of three people (ibid.). In this way Russell maintains that a fact is a single relation and stresses the point that each fact is self-subsistent and independent of other facts.

Although facts look similar to propositions, they differ on the account that facts are “objective, and independent of our thought or opinion about it” (OKEW, 61). On the other hand, propositions involve thought. They are true or false, positive or negative (OKEW, 62). We should note that the discussion on propositions has shifted from the subject-predicate notion Russell has criticized to an assertion of his own definition. Russell offers the examples of “Charles I was executed” or “he did not die in his bed” to illustrate that a proposition is “a form of words that may be either true or false …” (ibid.).

A form of words which must be either true or false I shall call a proposition. Thus a proposition is the same as what may be significantly asserted or denied. A proposition which expresses what we have called a fact, i.e. which, when asserted, asserts that a certain thing has a certain quality, or that a certain thing has a certain relation, will be called an atomic proposition. (ibid.)

We see a shift that has occurred in Russell’s thought at this time. In 1903 he held that a proposition is a true or false complex entity. However, its constituents and their arrangement do not give meaning by its truth-value; rather, its meaning is given by the criteria of its identity as we see in the following example (REAP, 297–298). To say “Grass is green” expresses a different proposition than “Desdemona loves Cassio” (REAP, 298). Moreover, the latter statement also expresses a different proposition than “Cassio loves Desdemona” (ibid.). The shift that occurs following the multiple-relation view of judgement is the introduction of logical form to express how things are united in a proposition. A group of objects requires logical form in order that they can be united in a proposition. Only when this order has been established can the act of judgement occur. The second shift that occurs following Russell’s critique of monism is a move from the independent, objective and absolute notion of truth to a theory of judgement that places the emphasis on our knowledge of truth. Despite these changes, Russell holds to his belief in the notion of the independent nature of complexes and their constituents.

EPISTEMOLOGY—KNOWLEDGE BY ACQUAINTANCE

In Russell’s book on Leibniz we saw that his belief in the independent nature of complexes and their constituents had an influence upon the early statement of his method. He takes as a self-evident truth that the method of philosophy should begin with an analysis of propositions (PL, 8). Moving now to The Problems of Philosophy (PP) in 1912, we find the method of analysis he mentions in The Philosophy of Leibniz becomes sharper. In The Problems of Philosophy Russell draws a distinction between two kinds of knowledge: knowledge by acquaintance and knowledge by description. The significance of this shift is that Russell wants to take us down to unanalysable atoms of meaning as the ultimate constituents of knowledge. The distinction between knowledge by acquaintance and knowledge by description is that the former is immediate knowledge of things. Russell describes knowledge of acquaintance as follows: “We shall say that we have acquaintance with anything of which we are directly aware, without the intermediary of any process of inference or any knowledge of truths” (PP, 46). In simple terms, acquaintance is concerned with knowledge of things that exist. It is knowledge of the sensation of the “data of the outer senses” (PP, 51). Knowledge of acquaintance is composed of objects of two kinds, particulars and universals. Particulars refer to particular things that exist. Universals refer to objects of immediate knowledge of general ideas such as “whiteness, diversity, brotherhood and so on” (PP, 52).

By “knowledge by description” Russell means “any phrase of the form ‘a so-and-so’ or ‘the so-and-so’” (PP, 52). Russell calls the former (‘a so-and-so’) an ambiguous description, while the later (‘the so-and-so’) he refers to as a definite description. “A man” is ambiguous because it does not refer to any one man, while “The man” refers to a specific man. Common words and proper nouns are descriptions. This is the kind of knowledge one finds in statements such as “The French Suites were composed by J.S. Bach in 1722” or “The French Suites were recorded by Glenn Gould in 1978”. The point is that the various descriptions all apply to the same entity, the French Suites. Russell’s point is that one can move between these descriptions “in spite of not being acquainted with the entity in question” (PP, 55). The primary importance of knowledge by description is that it allows us to move beyond the limits of our immediate private experience. For example, if we make a statement about J.S. Bach, although he is not present before our eyes, we share a common description of an eighteenth century German musician who composed the Brandenburg Concertos, Saint Matthew’s Passion and so on. However, the fundamental principle in the analysis of statements of description is as follows: “Every proposition which we can understand must be composed wholly of constituents with which we are acquainted” (PP, 58). In other words, by this understanding, all knowledge by description fundamentally reduces to knowledge by acquaintance, whose basic constituents are self-subsistent moments of experience. From this point Russell’s mature form of the scientific method in philosophy begins to emerge.

FORMULATION OF A METHOD

As we saw, knowledge by acquaintance includes both particular things and universal properties. Russell states those universals are sensible qualities (such as “whiteness”), or relations in space and time (such as “north of”). Universals, according to Russell, are not merely thoughts, but objects of thoughts (PP, 99). That is, universals are real and subsist independent of our thoughts. Although unlike particulars, which can be said to exist, universals subsist or have being (ibid.). The difference between existence and subsistence in this context is that the former refers to a world that is

fleeting, vague, without sharp boundaries, without any clear plan or arrangement, but it contains all thoughts and feelings, all the data of sense, and all physical objects, everything that can do either good or harm, everything that makes any difference to the value of life and the world (PP, 100).

In other words, the qualities of existence and universals correspond to Russell’s notion of knowledge of acquaintance. On the other hand, Russell refers to the world of being as “unchangeable, rigid, exact, ...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1 Self-subsistence and Method
• 2 What cannot be put into Words, Method and Mysticism
• 3 Language, Method and Mysticism
• 4 Showing and Wittgenstein’s Two Objections to Russell’s Theory of Types
• 5 Two Senses of Showing
• 6 The Mystical and Showing
• 7 Time and The Mystical
• 8 Mysticism and the Problems of Philosophy
• 9 Nonsense and Two Interpretations of the Tractatus
• 10 Metaphysics and the Mystical
• 11 The Mystical and the Meaning of Life
• Conclusion: Silence
• Bibliography