{"id":359,"date":"2011-04-05T13:25:14","date_gmt":"2011-04-05T20:25:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kooleady.ca\/thoughts\/?p=359"},"modified":"2011-05-06T15:09:24","modified_gmt":"2011-05-06T22:09:24","slug":"a-quick-look-at-the-work-of-wittgenstein-and-derrida-notes-quotes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kooleady.ca\/thoughts\/?p=359","title":{"rendered":"A Quick Look at Wittgenstein and Derrida (Notes & Quotes)"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m in a bit of a hurry today to catch a flight, so this is simply a compilation of quotes to think about with regard to language and the nature of reality.<\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889- 1951)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Realist: \u201cA statement can only have meaning if that statement refers in an obvious way to things actually in the world\u201d (p. 156).\u00a0 (Related to Frege\u2019s reference<\/em>.)<\/p>\n

\u201cWittgenstein saw the world as a totality of facts, not of things. Facts are logical entities; they can only be asserted or denied. They are not hard, red, round, etc. Things exist in space and time: they have shape, colour, consistency, etc.\u201d (p. 158).<\/p>\n

\u201cWe cannot demonstrate the limits of language or of the world\u201d (p. 159).<\/p>\n

\u201cHe decided that what a sentence meant (what language means) is not what the words refer to in the world outside, but the way in which words relate to each other. The way language works is not because it acts like an ideal logic, but because it follows its own working, which is the way people agree language works. This is not something that happens formally, but something the people in a language community grasp automatically\u201d (p. 159).<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can never get outside language to the reality \u2018outside\u2019 language. We can only use language in order to talk about language. All language is shared by at least two people. There is no such thing as a \u2018private\u2019 language\u201d (p. 160).<\/p>\n

\u201cWe cannot think unless we possess language\u201d (p. 161).<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Jacques Derrida (1930-2004)<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cHis greatest insights include the notion that whenever language expresses an idea it changes it\u201d (p. 184).<\/p>\n

Structuralism: \u201cIts main teaching is that reality is composed of relationships rather than things\u201d (p. 187).<\/p>\n

\u201cStructuralism tends to divide our perceptions of the world into binary categories, minimal pairs: good\/bad . . . etc. It analyses the structures that lie behind or beneath things. It tends to distrust history and concentrates instead on the web of patterns holding at any given time. Derrida reacted against this outlook\u201d (p. 188).<\/p>\n

\u201cSpeaking is a sign of presence. When we speak to somebody they are with us. Writing is a sign of absence. We write to somebody because they are at a remove. The more words are shut away in writing, logocentrism maintains maintains, the more they are copies than the real thing\u201d (p. 189). –><\/p>\n