

The do-it-yourself life of Ludwig Wittgenstein (1988) - helwr
http://www.nytimes.com/1988/11/13/books/the-do-it-yourself-life-of-ludwig-wittgenstein.html

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philwelch
For those curious about the life and times of Ludwig Wittgenstein, the
formative years of analytic philosophy, and an intriguing incident which took
place at Cambridge in 1946, I would highly recommend the book _Wittgenstein's
Poker_ by David Edmonds and John Eidinow. It begins:

 _On the evening of Friday, 25 October 1946 the Cambridge Moral Science Club--
a weekly discussion group for the university's philosophers and philosophy
students--held one of its regular meetings....That evening the guest speaker
was Dr. Karl Popper, down from London to deliver an innocuous-sounding paper,
"Are There Philosophical Problems?" Among his audience was the chairman of the
club, Professor Ludwig Wittgenstein, considered by many to be the most
brilliant philosopher of his time. Also present was Bertrand Russell, who for
decades had been a household name as a philosopher and radical campaigner._

...

 _This was the only time these three great philosophers--Russell,
Wittgenstein, and Popper--were together. Yet, to this day, no one can agree
precisely about what took place. What is clear is that there were vehement
exchanges between Popper and Wittgenstein over the fundamental nature of
philosophy--whether there were indeed philosophical problems (Popper) or
merely puzzles (Wittgenstein). These exchanges instantly became the stuff of
legend. An early version of events had Popper and Wittgenstein battling for
supremacy with red-hot pokers. As Popper himself later recollected, "In a
surprisingly short time I received a letter from New Zealand asking if it was
true that Wittgenstein and I had come to blows, both armed with pokers."_

From there it discusses the lives of Popper and Wittgenstein, from their early
years in Vienna to their time in England and the ideas of those places and
times, up to and including the famous clash between the two in Cambridge.

~~~
joshuacc
I second this suggestion. It's not only informative, but highly entertaining.

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jashkenas
PDF link to the Tractatus:

[http://filepedia.org/files/Ludwig%20Wittgenstein%20-%20Tract...](http://filepedia.org/files/Ludwig%20Wittgenstein%20-%20Tractatus%20Logico-
Philosophicus.pdf)

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siglesias
In a nutshell, one can divide Wittgenstein into two phases. In his first phase
(Tractatus Logico Philosophicus), Wittgenstein contends that since language
seems to capture every facet of reality (try thinking a thought that can't be
expressed in language) that language and reality must share the same logical
structure. Thus what cannot be expressed in logic cannot be said to describe
reality in a sensible way.

The second phase (Philosophical Investigations) does away with logic as a
necessary underpinning to reality and establishes ordinary language as the
main constructor of reality. Thus expressions only make sense insofar as they
are useful and conform to publicly agreed upon norms. Thus, for example, since
we roughly agree upon usage cases for the word blue, there can be no separate
meaning of blue that refers to a "private" perception of blue, which does away
with a question such as "do we share the same blue?"

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Towle_
_Wovon man nicht sprechen kann..._

~~~
mahmud
Is this becoming a meme?

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1504712>

2 hours apart.

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dzuc
[http://wyattgwyon.files.wordpress.com/2007/10/wittrealschule...](http://wyattgwyon.files.wordpress.com/2007/10/wittrealschulecrop.jpg)

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akadruid
It seems the https equivilent of this page is missing, so if you're running
EFF's HTTPS-Everywhere add-on, you'll need to disable it via the Options
button in Add-ons.

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asymmetric
we need moar of this food for thought on hn..

