Routledge Philosophy Guidebook To Wittgenstein And The Tractatus

This text presents an introduction to the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, the only book Wittgenstein published during his lifetime. Morris introduces & analyses the brief & sometimes cryptic text, including Wittgestein's life, the background to the Tractatus, & the importance of Wittgenstein's work in philosophy today.

Written by a leading expert, this is the ideal guide to the only book Wittgenstein published during his lifetime, the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. Michael Morris makes sense of Wittgenstein’s brief but often cryptic text, highlighting its key themes. He introduces and analyzes: Wittgenstein’s life and the background to the Tractatus the ideas and text of the Tractatus the continuing importance of Wittgenstein's work to philosophy today, Wittgenstein is the most important twentieth-century philosopher in the English speaking world. This book will be essential reading for all students of philosophy of language and metaphysics.

This text presents an introduction to the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, the only book Wittgenstein published during his lifetime. Morris introduces & analyses the brief & sometimes cryptic text, including Wittgestein's life, the background to the Tractatus, & the importance of Wittgenstein's work in philosophy today.

This accessible and lucidly written guidebook introduces the student of Wittgenstein to his most important work, the Philosophical Investigations and looks at the overall importance of Wittgenstein to current philosophy.

Ludwig Wittgenstein is arguably the most important philosopher of the twentieth century. In On Certainty he discusses central issues in epistemology, including the nature of knowledge and scepticism. The Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Wittgenstein and On Certainty introduces and assesses: Wittgenstein's career and the background to his later philosophy the central ideas and text of On Certainty, including its responses to G.E. Moore and discussion of fundamental issues in the theory of knowledge Wittgenstein's continuing importance in contemporary philosophy. This GuideBook is essential reading for all students of Wittgenstein, and for those studying epistemology and philosophy of language. On Certainty, Wittgenstein's final work, addresses a category of "world-picture" propositions discovered by G.E. Moore. These challenge Wittgenstein's enduring commitment to a well-defined category of empirical propositions, and help to generate a critique of scepticism. Developing Wittgenstein's view that scepticism is self-undermining, the Guidebook offers a combative yet therapeutic interpretation that locates On Certainty between the standpoints of Kant and Hume.

Gottlob Frege is considered the father of modern logic and one of the founding figures of analytic philosophy. His writings are difficult and deal with technical, asbtract concepts. The Routledge Philosophy Guidebook to Frege On Sense and Reference helps the student to get to grips with Frege's thought.

Merleau-Ponty and Phenomenology of Perception is an ideal starting point for anyone coming to Merleau-Ponty for the first time and reading his magnum opus. It is essential reading for students of Merleau-Ponty, phenomenology and related subjects such as art and cultural studies.

Discussion of Wittgenstein's Tractatus is currently dominated by two opposing interpretations of the work: a metaphysical or realist reading and the 'resolute' reading of Diamond and Conant. Marie McGinn's principal aim in this book is to develop an alternative interpretative line, which rejects the idea, central to the metaphysical reading, that Wittgenstein sets out to ground the logic of our language in features of an independently constituted reality, but which allows that he aims to provide positive philosophical insights into how language functions. McGinn takes as a guiding principle the idea that we should see Wittgenstein's early work as an attempt to eschew philosophical theory and to allow language itself to reveal how it functions. By this account, the aim of the work is to elucidate what language itself makes clear, namely, what is essential to its capacity to express thoughts that are true or false. However, the early Wittgenstein undertakes this descriptive project in the grip of a set of preconceptions concerning the essence of language that determine both how he conceives the problem and the approach he takes to the task of clarification. Nevertheless, the Tractatus contains philosophical insights, achieved despite his early preconceptions, that form the foundation of his later philosophy. The anti-metaphysical interpretation that is presented includes a novel reading of the problematic opening sections of the Tractatus, in which the apparently metaphysical status of Wittgenstein's remarks is shown to be an illusion. The book includes a discussion of the philosophical background to the Tractatus, a comprehensive interpretation of Wittgenstein's early views of logic and language, and an interpretation of the remarks on solipsism. The final chapter is a discussion of the relation between the early and the later philosophy that articulates the fundamental shift in Wittgenstein's approach to the task of understanding how language functions and reveal the still more fundamental continuity in his conception of his philosophical task.

Rev. ed. of: Routledge philosophy guidebook to Wittgenstein and the Philosophical investigations.

Wittgenstein's Tractatus - the only book he actually published within his lifetime - was an immensely important work which changed the direction of philosophy in the first half of the twentieth century. Highlighting the importance of the nature of language in philosophy and the problematic nature of metaphysics, it strongly influenced the work of Russell, the Vienna Circle and A. J. Ayer. An understanding of the ideas in the Tractatus is essential to fully grasp Wittgenstein's remarkable thought. In Wittgenstein's 'Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus': A Reader's Guide, Roger White provides a thorough account of the philosophical and historical context of Wittgenstein's work. The book provides a detailed outline of the themes and structure of the text, guiding the reader towards a thorough understanding of this remarkable text. White goes on to explore the reception and influence of the work and offers a detailed guide to further reading. This is the ideal companion to study of this hugely important philosophical work.