Talk:Ludwig Wittgenstein

Legacy

I'd like to start work on a legacy section, and specifically a subsection that deals with his manuscripts. But I find I can't understand what's going on.

I know that he left his manuscripts to Rhees, Anscombe, and von Wright. And I've read this very interesting article in the Atlantic Monthly. But I'm struggling to understand the current relationship between Michael Nedo and the Cambridge Wittgenstein Archives; the Norwegian Wittgenstein Project, abandoned in 1987 (they produced the CD collection of his works published by Oxford University Press in 1988, though it seems it's no longer available); and the Wittgenstein Archives at Bergen.

Is anyone able to shed light on it? And who are the trustees, now that the three original ones are deceased? SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 19:38, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

G. E. Moore context and links?

Hi, I'm new to the page (and Wittgenstein himself) so I was not aware who G. E. Moore is. However once you get to the "Work on Logik" section he's an important figure, only mentioned in passing previously as a member of the Cambridge Apostles, and then at the beginning in reference to his wife.

I can't seem to edit, so could someone at a minimum link his name to his page? Better would be to provide some context with how he came to be important to LW enough to be invited to be his "secretary"... Spopejoy (talk) 22:27, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

Hi, I've linked it on first reference; the reason it wasn't linked is that the part of the sentence it was previously in was removed. You're right that we need something about who Russell and Moore were, and why they were so influential. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 22:36, 16 September 2010 (UTC)

Influences/Influenced???

Why is there no section on Wittgenstein's influences/influenced? He is one of the most influential individuals in history, especially in recent times. --96.253.50.139 (talk) 03:36, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

Because you haven't written one. :) SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 15:57, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

(e/c) The article is undergoing revisions, so that may be on its way. wait for a bit.

that being said, though, W in not as influential as one might think. In academic circles, at any rate, Wittgenstein is acknowledged but not used all that much. People who want to work with Analytic Philosophy tend to stick to Russell (I think they avoid the Tractatus because Wittgenstein overtly rejected it), and nobody much works with Wittgenstein's 'therapeutic' approach because it assumes that most philosophical ideas are dysfunctional to start (not a comfortable stance for a professional academic philosopher). Wittgenstein doesn't have the popular appeal of someone like Einstein, and he's not notorious or controversial the way Neitzche or Marx were, his approach was never really adopted by a school (I think mostly because of the dominance of the Vienna School at that time and the rise of post-modernism in philosophy), and frankly it's just very esoteric material. We are accustomed to objective theories, and it's hard to know what to do with a theory that is fully and self-consciously self-reflexive.

Plus, what Slim said. --Ludwigs2 16:17, 18 September 2010 (UTC)

How long does it take? It's only the influences. --96.253.50.139 (talk) 01:04, 23 September 2010 (UTC)

Out of what? 5, 10, 20, 100?

"In his leaving certificate, he received a top mark only once, in religious studies; a 2 for conduct and English, 3 for French, geography, history, mathematics and physics, and 4 for German, chemistry, geometry and freehand drawing." jnestorius^(talk) 15:53, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

I don't know what the lowest mark would have been; I'll look to see if a source mentions that. Other sources compare it to A, B, C, and D, so I assume anything below 3 (C) was a fail. I believe he did fail his written German, and it seems that was a 4. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 21:09, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

It may be an ordinal scale rather than an interval one (1, 2, 3, 4 equivalent to A, B, C, D), so it may not be 'out of' anything at all. --Ludwigs2 22:12, 24 September 2010 (UTC)

Is his marks really relevant for one general article? We can also put number of his passport and general data. I understand this article as general introduction in Wittgenstein life and work, not reinterpretation of some good book about him (like Monks biography). --Vojvodae please be free to write :) 06:50, 25 September 2010 (UTC)

Some Influences

I know that Wittgenstein was influenced by Hume, Kant, Marx, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Einstein, Frege, and Russell. Can we please put this back up with all of the other influences?--96.253.50.139 (talk) 23:36, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

I put in the influences/influenced section. Those are all the people I know who influenced, or were influenced by Wittgenstein. Please add more if you know of them. --96.253.50.139 (talk) 00:59, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

You'll need sources for the influenced-by part, and it doesn't make sense to add people he has influenced, because it's basically everyone. SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 01:03, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

Agree with Slim. --John (talk) 04:20, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

Can you please tell me why it is only the Wittgenstein article that needs sources for all of the influences while I cannot think of any other article where that is the case? There aren't sources for everything on wikipedia, and you know when reading Wittgenstein, taking philosophy courses, and reading books about him, who he influenced and who he was influenced by. I also know that he has had an incredible influence in intellectual thought. However, if you go to the article on Nietzsche, who has had just as big an influence or even more than Wittgenstein, it says he influenced Wittgenstein without a source, it also said he was influenced by Pascal without giving a source. If Wittgenstein is somehow too important to add lesser intellectuals on his page that influenced him, then I suggest deleting the influence sections on Plato, Aristotle, Nietzsche, and even Kant's pages. Plato had a larger influence than any other philosopher, but it still states in his 'Influenced' section: "Most of subsequent western philosophy", along with names like Aristotle, Descartes, Nietzsche. Heidegger, etc. --96.253.50.139 (talk) 00:01, 21 October 2010 (UTC)