Published since October 8, 2008

Conceptus

Zeitschrift für Philosophie

ISSN: 2196-9523

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Volume 42 Issue 101-102

January 2013

Frontmatter

Publicly Available January 3, 2017

Frontmatter

Page range: i-iv

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Articles

January 3, 2017

‘Reddish Green’ – Wittgenstein on Concepts and the Limits of the Empirical

Bernhard Ritter

Page range: 1-19

Abstract

A “concept” in the sense favoured by Wittgenstein is a paradigm for a transition between parts of a notational system. A concept-determining sentence such as “There is no reddish green” registers the absence of such a transition. This suggests a plausible account of what is perceived in an experiment that was first designed by Crane and Piantanida, who claim to have induced perceptions of reddish green. I shall propose a redescription of the relevant phenomena, invoking only ordinary colour concepts. This redescription is not ruled out by anything the experimenters say. It accounts for certain peculiarities in both their descriptions and their subjects’, and suggests that instead of discovering forbidden colours the experimenters introduced a new use of “-ish”. Still, there is a point in speaking of “reddish green” in their context, which can be motivated by invoking what Wittgenstein calls a “physiognomy”.

January 3, 2017

Wittgenstein’s Thought-Experiments

Nenad Miščević

Page range: 20-40

Abstract

Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations feature three big thought-experiments: the Builders, the Rule-following argument, and the Private language argument. The experiments in question are macro-thought-experiments, which are rare in theoretical philosophy. The paper distinguishes eight such stages in/of these experiments, characterizes them briefly, and offers an explicit understanding of the stages, their mutual relations and commonalities with other thought-experiments in philosophy. This is proposed as a step towards systematically placing Wittgenstein’s work in the wider context of actual philosophical methodology and of present-day sharp debates about armchair thinking in the field. One immediate result of comparing Wittgenstein’s thought-experiments with their counterparts in the analytic mainstream reveals an interesting trait: they are merely suggestive, in the sense that the theses they point to are rarely put forward explicitly, and even more rarely argued for in the manner that is nowadays fashionable in the mainstream. The paper briefly points to the difference by using the examples of Saul Kripke’s (1982) presentation of Rule-following and the unorthodox reading of the Builders by Charles Travis (1989), to illustrate the potential of the merely suggestive material for re-interpretation by a creative thinker.

January 3, 2017

Stroud on Logical Necessity and General Facts of Nature

Frederik Gierlinger

Page range: 41-50

Abstract

What makes the denial of a necessary truth impossible or unintelligible? Barry Stroud argues that there is an answer to this question which avoids Platonism, yet does not force us to adopt Conventionalism about logical necessity. In Part 1, I give a brief characterization of Platonism and Conventionalism and sketch some of the difficulties that arise when trying to explain logical necessity along either of those lines. In Part 2, I will summarize the main points of what Stroud has to say on the matter and raise what I believe to be serious difficulties for his account.

January 3, 2017

Wittgenstein as a Common-Sense Realist

Kristóf Nyíri

Page range: 51-65

Abstract

The later Wittgenstein is widely held to be a relativist, indeed a constructivist. By contrast, this paper argues that all appearances to the contrary Wittgenstein was a realist, and that this fact becomes almost conspicuous in his late-1940s manuscripts. His realism was a common-sense one, the only kind of realism worthy of the name. Wittgenstein’s common-sense realism has unique traits: first, an uncompromising stress on deviations from ordinary language as a source of (bad) philosophy. Secondly, his awareness of the significance of the pictorial & the motor. Thirdly, his emphasis on established use, that is, on traditions. In the later Wittgenstein, philosophical realism and social conservatism converge.

January 3, 2017

Philosophy from an ‘Anthropological’ Point of View

Wittgenstein and Sraffa

Volker A. Munz

Page range: 66-82

Abstract

In this paper I shall try to introduce a few aspects on the possible influence Piero Sraffa had on Wittgenstein’s later philosophy. Although we do not have many explicit sources, we find a few remarks in Wittgenstein’s manuscripts that contain Sraffa’s name in brackets. And interestingly enough they almost all deal with the fundamental relation between rules and empirical propositions. Wittgenstein raises questions such as: Do grammatical rules only say that words are actually used in a particular way? Do mathematical propositions describe how human beings usually calculate? Are the rules of chess descriptions of how the game has always been played? Wittgenstein’s discussions of these questions also had an impact on his philosophical turn towards an ‘anthropological’ point of view.

January 3, 2017

Objectivity and Idealism

Andrew MacDonald

Page range: 83-92

Abstract

This paper takes up a more so-called ‘austere’ argument for objectivity derived, for the most part, from P. F. Strawson’s Bounds of Sense . It is austere in the sense that its conclusion is reached by transcendental means but without transcendental idealism. Readers familiar with Henry Allison’s Kant’s Transcendental Idealism will know that in his view arguments of this general kind cannot be separated from Kant’s idealism. The motivation for this position and for Allison’s interpretation and defense of transcendental idealism more generally is, I argue, the threat of a particular kind of scepticism. I go on to explore how we might retrospectively understand the more austere argument as one meant to uncover the indispensability of objectivity for the very possibility of thought or experience. Such a status would not guarantee the truth of objectivity, but it would provide a kind of invulnerability against the scepticism Allison is worried about.

January 3, 2017

Wittgenstein, Wissen und die Gnade der Natur

Stefan Tolksdorf

Page range: 93-107

Abstract

This paper is an attempt to explain Wittgenstein’s remark that „It is always by favor of Nature that one knows something.“ In this regard, two positions are distinguished. The first one is the standard interpretation within analytic epistemology. Alternatively, I will suggest another possibility to interpret Wittgenstein’s remark, which is inspired by John McDowell’s epistemological disjunctivism. As I am going to show, the alternative is the better choice.

January 3, 2017

Interpretation und das Prinzip der Nachsicht

Simon Dierig

Page range: 108-119

Abstract

Davidson's principle of charity says that we should interpret someone's beliefs and utterances in such a way that these beliefs and utterances are, according to our own standards, mostly true. Davidson has advanced three major arguments for this principle. In the first part of this essay, I reconstruct these arguments and explain Davidson's project of a theory of interpretation as far as it is necessary for this reconstruction. In the second part of my article, it is shown that none of the three arguments for the principle of charity put forward by Davidson is convincing. I also examine the two most important arguments against Davidson's principle. It is demonstrated that these arguments are not compelling, too. The upshot of my discussion is that the debate between proponents and opponents of the principle of charity has reached stalemate.

Volume 42 (2013)

Issue 101-102

Volume 41 (2012)

Issue 99-100

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(Deutsch)

Online ISSN: 2196-9523
Type: Journal
Languages: English, German
Publisher: De Gruyter
First published: October 8, 2008
Publication Frequency: 2 Issues per Year