A filibuster from a mountebank follows?
Consider the following passages from the
Tractatus:
Philosophy aims at the logical clarification of thoughts.
Philosophy is not a body of doctrine but an activity.
A philosophical work consists essentially of elucidations.
Philosophy does not result in philosophical propositions, but rather in the clarification of propositions.
Without philosophy thoughts are, as it were, cloudy and indistinct: its task is to make them clear and give them sharp boundaries. . . .
It must set limits to what can be thought; and in doing so, to what cannot be thought.
It must set limits to what cannot be thought by working outwards through what can be thought.
It will signify what cannot be said, by presenting clearly what can be said.
Thus at the very beginning, Wittgenstein's definition changes the idea of "
philosophy." A boundary wall is erected in the traditional subject matter of philosophy. Important things occur on both sides of the wall; but direct statements or "
sayings" can reach only one side. What is on the other side can only be "
signified" or "
shown."
Kierkegaard saw a similar wall. The attempt to reach the other side of this wall is a constant temptation, as he notes:
The ultimate potentiation of every passion is always to will its own downfall, and so it is also the ultimate passion of the understanding to will the collision, although in one way or another the collision must become its downfall. This, then, is the ultimate paradox of thought: to want to discover something that thought itself cannot think. This passion of thought is fundamentally present everywhere in thought, also in the single individual's thought.
For both Kierkegaard and Wittgenstein, philosophy is inevitable. But another essential feature of their thinking is that the place of philosophy is limited. It can do some preliminary brush-clearing and straightening out; but when it comes to the truly essential features, another kind of thinking is just as inevitably needed. They are both dedicated to demonstrating the presence of the "wall," or the limits of perception and "
rational" thought; they are also dedicated to working toward getting beyond it.
For both Kierkegaard and Wittgenstein, philosophy is inevitable. But another essential feature of their thinking is that the place of philosophy is limited.
Kierkegaard's understanding of the place of philosophy in his task may be better understood when seen in comparison with his description of the power and way of working of the ironist, from
The Concept of Irony: "As the ironist does not have the new within his power, it might be asked how he destroys the old, and to this it must be answered: he destroys the given actuality by the given actuality itself." The biographical root of the method of indirect communication can be found in Kierkegaard's relation with Regina. But its philosophical antecedent is his work on Socrates. Like Socrates, he is able to demonstrate the inadequacies of philosophy by an ironic use of its own categories.
This also recalls Wittgenstein's way of working: "the work of the philosopher consists in assembling reminders ["
given" in the world] for a particular purpose." Wittgenstein's projects are also under a limitation similar to Kierkegaard's. The purpose of philosophy, according to him, is to eliminate itself! Wittgenstein's usual method is to get clear about particular philosophical problems, and in so doing to show some features of philosophy in general. So his reminders may be various in their form. There may be polemical-corrective features in them; that is, if an idea is deeply entrenched, the reminders may have to be sharp beyond ordinary usage. And the reminders may also be incomplete. Wittgenstein's purpose in describing a situation or coining a term is not to give a systematically complete explanation or definition. Often he only notes the features germane to the point at hand. This arises from his task-orientation, and does not constitute a "
mistake" or oversight!
For both Wittgenstein and Kierkegaard, one particular problem demanding this unusual mode of thinking and communication is the ethical dimension of life. Wittgenstein's works also include explicit consideration of another essential feature requiring this other kind of thinking: the way in which language, thinking, and understanding work.
The key to this unusual kind of thinking and representation is contained in a brief statement by Wittgenstein: "What can be shown, cannot be said." The logical and ethical dimensions are features which "show themselves" in the world; but they are not directly expressible. Kierkegaard used the term "
paradox" to refer to human apprehension of such phenomena.
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