Additional readings will be made available through the
Marriott Library reserve desk.
(See Marriott's
for an intro to using the library
reserves.)
For best results with JSTOR, either click on a JSTOR
link while you're on-campus
or click through to the journal from
the Marriott catalog, log in, and search JSTOR for the item.
- Aug. 25: Introduction: Why Think
about Wittgenstein?
Optional prereading: Rudolph Carnap,
"Intellectual Autobiography" (excerpts, online reserve);
F. R. Leavis, "Memories of Wittgenstein" (online reserve).
- Aug. 27: Truth Functions and the Emptiness of the
Logical Must.
Reading: TLP (Abbreviations) 4.2-5.132,
5.14-5.143, 6.1-6.1202, 6.121. (If you haven't managed to
buy or print off a paper copy yet, here's a hypertext
version.) Optional reading: Fogelin,
Wittgenstein, ch. 4. And if you'd like
to look at a contemporary and standard textbook
presentation of truth tables, there's an excerpt from Copi,
Symbolic Logic, on online reserve. And
followon reading, for your amusement: Dreben and Floyd,
"Tautology: How Not to Use a Word" (online reserve);
PG II-I-2 (pp. 247-249).
- Aug. 29: Pictures: The Possibility of Correlation is the
Correlation of Possibility.
Reading: TLP 2.1-3.144, 3.4-3.42,
4.01-4.024.
Optional reading: Fogelin, Wittgenstein,
ch. 2. Followon reading: Eli Friedlander, "We Make to
Ourselves Pictures of Facts" (online reserve);
PG I-VII-85 (p. 132).
Happy Labor Day! Labor Day weekend would be a good time
to do a first cover-to-cover readthrough of the
Tractatus, starting with the Preface
(but you can probably leave Russell's Introduction for
another time).
- Sept. 3: It's All Simple, Really.
Reading: TLP
1.13-2.063, 3.2-3.261, 4.2-4.23. Anthony Kenny, "The
Metaphysics of Logical Atomism" (excerpt
from his Wittgenstein, online reserve).
Optional reading: Bertrand Russell,
"On
Denoting";
Fogelin, ch. 1; David Stern, "Logical Atomism" (online reserve).
Followon reading: PG I-II-20, final para. (on p. 58, the
para. starting "A connected point...").
Brian McGuinness, "The Supposed Realism of the
Tractatus" (online reserve).
- Sept. 5: There's No Business Like Show Business.
Reading: TLP 4.1-4.1212, 4.123-4.124, 4.1271-4.1272,
5.5562-5.641.
Cora Diamond, "Throwing Away the Ladder: How to Read
the Tractatus" (online reserve).
Optional reading:
Ricketts, "Frege, the Tractatus, and the Logocentric Predicament" (online reserve).
Further background reading: Peter Hylton, Russell,
Idealism and the Emergence of Analytic Philosophy.
How to paraphrase the
Tractatus to yourself, as you read it: a model.
- Sept. 8: Why Care about Deconstruction?
Reading: TLP Preface, 1-1.12, 3.262-3.311, 6.53-7;
Roger White, "Throwing the Baby out with the Ladder" (online
reserve).
Optional reading: Jaako Hintikka, "What Does the Wittgensteinian
Inexpressible Express?" (online reserve)
- Sept. 10: The General Form of the Proposition.
Reading: TLP 5.451-5.452, 5.4541-5.5352, 6-6.002.
Optional reading: Fogelin, pp. 54-57, 78-85;
PG II-II-8 = p. 268 (first page of "Criticism of my former view
of generality"). Followon:
Appendix to Juliet Floyd, "Number and Ascriptions of Number in
Wittgenstein's Tractatus" (online reserve); PG
(pp. 268-269).
- Sept. 12: Wittgenstoned.
Reading: TLP 6.121-6.13, 6.3-7.
Eddy Zemach, "Wittgenstein's Philosophy of the
Mystical" (online reserve).
Optional reading:
Conant, "Putting Two and Two Together" (online reserve).
Followon reading (to the extra credit assignment):
Ian Proops,
"The Tractatus on Inference and Entailment".
- Sept. 15:
How to Write a Paper about the Tractatus (I).
Reading: White, "Can Whether One
Proposition Makes Sense Depend on the Truth of Another?"
(online reserve; this reading doesn't have the citation
information you need, so: Royal Institute of Philosophy
Lectures 7 (1973): 14-29). Plus:
Now would be a good time to reread the
Tractatus, end to end.
Optional reading:
Peter Sullivan, "Simplicity and Analysis in Early
Wittgenstein"
(online reserve);
Norman Malcolm,
"The Elements of Reality" (online
reserve);
Ian Proops, "Wittgenstein on the Substance of the World"
(online reserve);
PG I-VI-69 (pp. 112f), Appendix
to Part I (through sec. 5, = pp. 199-214).
- Sept. 17:
How to Write a Paper about the Tractatus (II).
Reading: Review Zemach,
"Wittgenstein's Philosophy of the
Mystical".
Optional reading: G.E.M. Anscombe, "'Mysticism' and
Solipsism" (online reserve).
- Sept. 19: The Road to Solipsism: What "'p' says p" Says.
Reading: 5.54-5.5423, 5.6-5.641, 6.374-6.375, 6.4-6.4311.
Start reading Conant and Diamond, "On Reading the
Tractatus Resolutely" (online reserve) for Monday.
Optional reading:
PG I-VII-86f (pp. 132-135);
Fogelin, Wittgenstein, ch. 8. Followon reading:
John Koethe, "The End of the Line"; "The Reality of the Past".
- Sept. 22: The Austerity Program.
Reading: TLP Preface (2nd-4th paras.), 3.03-3.032, 3.328,
4.003, 4.112, 4.113-4.116, 5.473-5.4733, 6.54;
Conant and Diamond, "On Reading the
Tractatus Resolutely" (online reserve).
Optional reading:
PG I-VI-81 (pp. 125-127);
Ian Proops, "The New Wittgenstein: A Critique" (online reserve);
Conant, "Mild Mono-Wittgensteinianism"
(online reserve -- it may make more sense to hold off on
this one until we're fairly far into the Investigations,
but a first look at it might also be useful now, if you're
wanting to write about "resoluteness"; warning: it's
long).
Followon reading:
Diamond, "'We Are Perpetually Moralists': Iris Murdoch,
Fact, and Value" (online reserve); Thompson Clarke,
"The Legacy of Skepticism".
- Sept. 24: The Logocentric Predicament.
Reading: TLP 2.012-2.0121,
4.12-4.121, 5.4541, 5.473, 5.551-5.5521, 5.555,
6.124-6.1251, 6.13.
Optional reading: Ian Proops,
"Logical Syntax in the Tractatus".
Background reading:
Warren Goldfarb,
"Logic in the Twenties: The Nature of the Quantifier".
- Sept. 26: But What about Math?
Papers due today.
Reading: TLP 4.241-4.243, 6.02-6.031, 6.2-6.241;
Suppes, excerpt from Axiomatic Set Theory (online reserve).
Optional reading: PG p. 376;
Juliet Floyd, "Number and Ascriptions of Number in
Wittgenstein's Tractatus" (online reserve);
Bertrand Russell, "Mathematical Logic as Based on the Theory
of Types" (online reserve).
- Sept. 29: A Slabdash Response to the Tractatus?
Reading: PI 1-24.
Warren Goldfarb,
"I Want You to Bring Me a Slab: Remarks on the Opening
Sections of the Philosophical Investigations"
(also available via online reserve).
Optional reading: Fogelin, Wittgenstein,
ch. 9;
PG I-II-19-20 (pp. 56-58).
- Oct. 1: Making the World Absolutely Safe for Ethics.
Reading: Wittgenstein, "Lecture on Ethics" (online reserve);
Cora Diamond,
"Riddles and Anselm's Riddle";
(For best results, either access JSTOR on-campus,
or click through to the journal -- in this case,
Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society -- from
the Marriott catalog, log in, and search JSTOR for the
item.)
[Goldfarb, "Fixity," has been bumped to Friday.]
Optional reading: Wittgenstein, Notebooks
(excerpt; online reserve).
- Oct. 3: Can We Really Analyze Concepts? Can We Really
Replace Names with Definite Descriptions?
Reading: PI 25-80, 87, 89. Bernard Suits, The
Grasshopper, pp. 54-55
(online reserve -- look for the marked paragraph).
Warren Goldfarb, "Wittgenstein on Fixity of Meaning" (online reserve).
Optional reading: Hacker, "Metaphysics as the Shadow of
Grammar" (online reserve). PG I-II-32 (pp. 68f).
- Oct. 6: Surveyability and Psychoanalysis.
Reading: PI through 136;
Charles Travis, "Hardness"
(online reserve).
Wittgenstein,
"Some Remarks on Logical Form".
(For best results, either access JSTOR on-campus,
or click through to the journal -- in this case,
Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society -- from
the Marriott catalog, log in, and search JSTOR for the item.)
Optional reading:
Fogelin, Wittgenstein, ch. 9.
Thinking about your next paper? Check out two new model
papers (online reserve).
- Oct. 8: How to Be a Reading Machine.
Reading: PI 137-184.
Optional reading:
Strawson, "Review of Wittgenstein's Philosophical
Investigations
(online reserve).
- Oct. 10: Following a Rule.
Reading: PI 185-242, 323-325; Preface.
Optional reading:
Fogelin, Wittgenstein, ch. 10.
Paper topics have been handed out.
Have a great
Fall Break; take the Investigations and
Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language
to Cancun!
- Oct. 20: The Private Language Argument.
Reading: PI 243-279; Kripke,
Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language
(You can skip the Postscript, starting on
p. 114, but make sure to get the "Note Added in Proof,"
on p. 146.)
Optional reading: Fogelin, Wittgenstein,
chs. 11-12.
Paul Boghossian, "Blind Rule-Following" (online reserve).
- Oct. 22: The Skeptical Solution. Why Does the Private
Language Argument Matter?
PI 280-298;
Diamond, "Rules: Looking in the Right Place" (online reserve)
Optional reading: Minar, "Wittgenstein and the
'Contingency' of Community" (online reserve).
- Oct. 24: Private Language and Private Sensation.
Reading: PI 299-322, 350-361, 390-402; review 258.
Optional reading:
Paul Horwich, "A Critique of Theoretical Philosophy" (online reserve).
- Oct. 27: New Wittgensteinians vs. Kripkenstein!
We will return to Kripkenstein's argument against the appeal
to idealized dispositions, and then take up arguments from
Diamond and Minar against Kripke's reading.
Prereading for Wednesday: Over the
weekend, I recommend starting in on (i.e., read about half of)
Austin, How to Do Things with Words.
Optional reading: Baker, "Surveyability of Grammar" (online reserve).
- Oct. 29: Compare and Contrast: Was Wittgenstein an
Ordinary Language Philosopher?
Reading: Austin, How to Do Things with Words.
Optional reading: Austin, Sense and Sensibilia
(extract, online reserve).
Rogers Albritton,
"On Wittgenstein's Use of the Term 'Criterion'".
(For best results, either access JSTOR on-campus,
or click through to the journal -- in this case,
Journal of Philosophy -- from
the Marriott catalog, log in, and search JSTOR for the
item.)
Followup reading: Alice Crary, "The Happy Truth" (online reserve).
Did Nietzsche worry about the Private Language Argument?
I'll be giving a talk at the SLCC
conference on Nietzsche's nihilism (Th, Oct 30, 11:00-11:45) that
says he did.
- Oct. 31: Skepticism, Round One.
Reading: OC thru sec. 99.
G. E. Moore, "Proof of an External World" (online reserve).
- Nov. 3: Kripkenstein Wrapup; Skepticism, Round Two.
Reading: Review Minar arguments; come with objections.
OC thru sec. 350.
Optional reading: Diamond, "The Realistic Spirit" (online
reserve; the online copy doesn't have the citation info, so
here it is: Cora Diamond, "Realism and the Realistic
Spirit," in Stuart Shanker, Ludwig Wittgenstein:
Critical Assessments, vol. 4 (London: Routledge, 2004)).
- Nov. 5: Skepticism, Round Three: Other Minds.
Reading: Finish OC. PI 416-427, 578-580; PI II:iv (in
the 4th ed., secs. 19-26)
Optional reading: Cavell, The Claim of Reason
(excerpt, available online);
Conant,
"Wittgenstein on Meaning and Use".
- Nov. 7: The Rose Has Teeth in the Mouth of the Beast.
Reading: PI 412-436, 467-486, 571, 573, 578, 580,
584, 593, 610; PI II:i (paras. 2-4);
II:ix (1st para; in 4th ed., 67).
Optional reading: Martin Kusch, "Kripke's Wittgenstein,
On Certainty, and Epistemic Relativism" (online reserve);
Nigel Pleasants, "Wittgenstein, Ethics and Basic Moral
Certainty" (online reserve).
Followon reading: Daniele Moyal-Sharrock, "Unravelling
Certainty" (online reserve).
- Nov. 10: Uncertainty about On Certainty; Seeing-As.
Reading: PI 323, 464;
330-349, 363, 366, 370, 374, 420, 525-527, 530-539, 635;
PI II:xi (in the 4th ed., secs. 111-278; in the third
edition,
till you get to the vowel "e" being yellow).
Optional reading:
Virgil Aldrich, "An Aspect Theory of Mind" (local color:
this is by a former Utah faculty member).
Stephen Affeldt, "On the Difficulty of Seeing Aspects"
(online reserve).
- Nov. 12: Wittgensteinian Ethics.
Reading: Vicki Hearne, "How to Say 'Fetch!'" (online
reserve);
John
McDowell, "Virtue and Reason".
(For best results, either access JSTOR on-campus,
or click through to the journal -- in this case,
The Monist -- from
the Marriott catalog, log in, and search JSTOR for the
item.)
Optional reading:
Diamond, "Eating Meat and Eating People" (online reserve).
- Nov. 14: Wittgenstein at the Salad Bar.
Reading: PI II:xi, para. 327 (in the 3rd ed., this is
the penultimate para. on p. 223);
495-500; 520-521; 554-557.
RFM, I:148-149, 150-152;
III:77 (pp. 202ff), paras. 1, 4-6;
I App I, 8-9 (p. 105);
I App I, 11 (p. 106);
III:80, para. 6 (p. 209, "Can we say...");
I App III, 8 (p. 118, "I imagine someone asking...);
III:87, para. 5 (p. 220, "We shall see...").
Optional reading: review Michael Forster, "The Sense in
Which Grammar Is Arbitrary" (online reserve).
FINAL PAPER TOPICS HAVE BEEN HANDED OUT -- MAKE SURE YOU
HAVE A COPY.
- Nov. 17: More Wittgensteinian Ethics.
Reading:
John McDowell, "Non-Cognitivism and Rule-Following" (online
reserve); review Hearne.
Optional reading:
Crary,
"Ethics, Inheriting from Wittgenstein" (online reserve);
Diamond, "Anything But Argument" (online reserve); Diamond,
"Experimenting on Animals" (online reserve).
- Nov. 19: Wittgensteinian Wills.
Reading:
PI 454-461, 611-632;
Rogers Albritton,
"Freedom of Will and Freedom of Action"
(JSTOR -- click through on-campus);
Optional reading:
Peter Winch, "Wittgenstein's Treatment of the Will"
(online reserve).
- Nov. 21: What Do Proofs Do?
Reading:
RFM I:1-146, 154-169; III:1-77; I App II.
Optional reading:
Gasking, "Mathematics and the World" (online reserve);
Juliet Floyd,
"On Saying What You Really Want to Say" (online reserve);
(and, for folks who are familiar with
Goedel's
Incompleteness Theorems) RFM I App III.
Guidelines for the Sneak Previews have been distributed
-- make sure you have a copy!
- Nov. 24: Logical Aliens and New Wittgensteinians.
Reading: RFM I-147-153; VI-49; I, Appendix I.
Bernard Williams, "Wittgenstein and Idealism" (online reserve).
Optional reading:
Jonathan Lear, "The Disappearing 'We'" (online reserve); if
you don't already know your way around Kant, you'll want to
start in on p. 286 -- focus on pp. 294-298.
- Nov. 26: The Diagonal Argument.
Reading:
Kamke, Axiomatic Set Theory (excerpt, online
reserve);
RFM II.
Optional reading:
Hilary Putnam, "Wittgenstein and the Real Numbers" (online reserve).
Happy Thanksgiving!
Starting to think about your final paper? Here's a
model paper, written by Joe Ulatowski. And here's
another
short model paper: "Truth and Falsehood in Wittgenstein's
Conception of Grammar" (online reserve).
- Dec. 1: Surveyability -- and the Refutation of the
Russell's Principia.
Reading:
RFM IV, V:1-5.
Fogelin, "The Status of Mathematical Expressions" (online
reserve).
Review RFM III:1, I:154; III:18; III:3; III:39, para. 7
(this is the first para. on p. 171); III:42, para. 4;
III:43, paras. 2, 3; III:45, III:55; III:58, para. 3;
III:59; III:60, paras. 1, 2; III:62.
Optional reading:
Arnold Levison, "Wittgenstein and Logical Laws" (online reserve).
- Dec. 3: Dummett, Proof, and Surveyability.
Reading:
RFM V:6-end;
Michael Dummett,
"Wittgenstein's Philosophy of
Mathematics" (JSTOR -- click through on-campus).
Optional reading:
Hacking, "A Cartesian Introduction" (online reserve),
esp. secs 20-26, 32-33.
- Dec. 5: Hardenings.
SNEAK PREVIEWS DUE TODAY AT 4:00!
Reading:
RFM V:25, 42, 45, 49, 50; VI.
Optional reading:
Alice Ambrose, "Wittgenstein on Some Questions in
Foundations of Mathematics" (online reserve).
- Dec. 8: Surveyability Redux, Excluded Middle, Contradiction.
Reading:
RFM III 78-90; IV: 56-60; V:28, 50; VII:15-16.
Optional reading:
Crispin Wright, "Consistency" (available online, and in the reserve bin
behind the reception desk in the Philosophy Department).
- Dec. 10: Why Did He Write Like That?
Reading:
Stephen Mulhall, Wittgenstein's Private Language
(excerpts; online reserve).
Optional followon reading, for the very ambitious:
Erich Auerbach, Mimesis.
- Dec. 12: Putting Wittgenstein to Work.
No new reading.