Here is Wittgenstein from the preface of his most important work, The Philosophical Investigations.

Now, this of course doesn't mean that he rejected everything from the Tractatus. But the main project of the Tractatus was to give a complete account of meaningfulness - understood as how meaning would work in a perfect language. This is what Wittgenstein is saying in your quotation, that philosophical attempts to find the logical structure of concepts and propositions should not assume that they actually have such a structure, or have any meaning at all. In particular, much of the traditional preoccupations of philosophers are literally without meaning - they are making statements with no propositional content. So they should shut up. Wittgenstein himself took this advice, quit philosophy, and went off to teach elementary school in rural Austria.

However, he later came to believe that the view of language put forward in the Tractatus was incorrect. Most importantly, he changed from a conception of meaning as a representation of the world to a conception of meaning as the use to which language is put. This was a rejection of the entire way in which the Tractatus attempted to understand language, as a development from first principles to a grand theory of language.

Instead, he claimed that words can be used in a variety of ways, and if we want to understand them we have to see how they are actually used. More specifically, he claimed that words gain meaning within specific "language games," which have localized rules, rules that do not apply to how those words are used in other language games and contexts. Thus, there is no longer a theoretical basis for the famous ending of the Tractatus. There is no central theory of language that gives you warrant to declare certain kinds of discussions out of bounds.

So yeah, he did change his mind about being silent.

I think you are saying that you aren't talking about meaning in a literal sense but only about meaning understood as significance, importance, value, etc., and so you aren't disagreeing with me.

Saying that meaning in language is derived from context/use or 'context-dependent' in other words, is nothing new. Wittgenstein knew this well before writing the Tractatus, so I hope that you can understand my disbelief at the notion that all of a sudden he reverted back to a philosophy of language that I myself believe to be inferior.

In other words, whether he did, or didn't change his mind about being silent, doesn't change the truth-value of his work, which I personally believe in.

A key point that always seems to be skipped in first cause arguments is the hidden assumption that everything that is caused is caused by an 'intelligent entity'. Or something like that.

The Earth was made by lots of lumps of rocks randomly bumping into each other and sticking. Then as the lump go bigger it got better at attracting colliding bits of rock. Until most of the lumps of rocks floating around had already 'bumped' into something. (OK so I am not an astronomer!)

It seems to me that if the universe was created it was created by a similar random act of creation as the Earth, free of intelligent interference. Intelligence seems to be rare in the universe, so its seems that the initial assumption that intelligence is not involved in any extraterrestrial event seems the better starting hypothesis.

FWIW I personally don't even believe in causality, so the whole first cause thing is a non starter for me, but that is another topic.

+1 the most obvious flaw in the KCA is that the first premise is just a sort of anthropocentric appeal to intuition

"personal Creator" in Craig's version.


I think he argues that without a causal chain being in place, intent or will of a mind or something like that is necessary to start one, but yeah it's pretty much just another anthropocentric assumption pulled out of his ass.

I'm not seeing how these examples correspond in a meaningful way to ex nihilo, given they require a starting medium of some kind even if it's empty space.

Good. Because these arguments do not address that.

Check the context of the conversation, including "War and Peace" coming into existence.

Did. I thought fraleyight was asking specifically for an example of matter appearing from nothing, or at least trying to ask, not reconfiguration of a medium.

This is an exceedingly strange reading of the following statement:

By not accepting that there was a time at which "War and Peace" did not exist is sufficient evidence that your reading is wrong.

No biggie. He wasn't expressing himself well, but I thought it was clear from other posts his intended context was specifically matter/ex nihilo. He even asked when the "material" that made the book came into existence after OP used it as an example.

I'm not sure you really understand what is going on in Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations. Think of it this way. What does it mean to say that something is true? Philosophers have most typically said that truth is a relationship between the world and statements - that to say of some proposition that it is true is to say that in some way it corresponds to or accurately represents some feature of reality.

This presupposes an understanding of language where the meaning of a statement is this representation of reality (what Wittgenstein called its picture of the world in the Tractatus. In other words, the word "apple" means the object or kind: apple. Thus, the statement that "the apple is green" is true if the reality it is supposed to represent corresponds to that statement: i.e. the object we are referring to by the word "apple" really is the color we refer to as "green."

The Tractatus is an attempt to fully analyze how language relates to reality on the basis of this (and other) assumption about how language works. This is why Wittgenstein wants to mark off some words or concepts as not actually having meaning. Armed with a theory of meaning, he is able to distinguish between statements that actually mean something (that is, communicate a representation of the world) and those which don't (statements that do not communicate a picture of the world). Some words, e.g. "god" perhaps, don't really match onto the world in any recognizable way, and so statements about "god" don't actually have meaning as descriptive statements. Thus, he would say that in the most literal sense that descriptive statements about these kinds of things are meaningless - that is, without sense or propositional content.

This assumption about the relation between language and the world is what he rejects in the Philosophical Investigations. In the PI Wittgenstein is not arguing for the trivial claim that the meaning of a language is context-dependent, but that the meaning of a word or statement is not a representation of an external reality, but rather the way in which that word or statement is used. Here is SEP:

Think of how this entirely undercuts the final proposition of the Tractatus. Should we say that talk about god (or first causes) has no meaning, or that we shouldn't do it? Sure, maybe this talk doesn't try very hard to model reality. But so what? That is only one of many uses to which we can put language. And it is very clear that talk about god has many, many other uses (think of how people sing or pray about/to god, or how god-talk can be used as a motivator for action).

EDIT: For what it's worth, I do think that Wittgenstein's ideas about language and truth have some very interesting implications for religion and its relation to reason (some of them briefly discussed here).

thanks for this

Aaron, I was referring to matter coming into existence. I highlighted examples so you don't think I am moving the goalposts.

If there is a big brained God (all knowing, even before the big bang, and a choice not to bang) and he created everything and nothing would be without him. I would think he was the first cause of War and Peace....but i think weird apparently.

Everything must happen for a reason. This reason is the sum total of unbridled field of possibility. In this unbridled field of possibility there exists a God that is transcendent to absolutely everything. You could say that he is the cause of his own existence.

The last part is often ridiculed, but unjustly so. All things are actually the cause of their own existence. By which I somehow change my argument for the existence of God, but at this point, I don't really care all that much if you do believe or not. Most people know God exists (including little children) , the other imagine themselves as uniquely rational scientists, while they often resemble the very primitives they like to makes us out to be (us believers).

Everything is an illusion. Only God is real.

P.S. And I apologize for the tone of this post; I'm simply tired, but I wanted to make a modest contribution. So much for that..


Btw. I'd add that I don't consider the 'first cause' argument a very strong one. It might actually be sufficient if it's laid out very carefully, but it's not one that's very easy to follow. Also - linear time is a subset of non-linear time, which is a subset of time that we're not really sure about - let's say it's timeless time, which is a subset of ..

Now is a good time to present the following argument.

Everything is infinite. We've somehow missed that point. Everything has infinitely many parts and it goes both ways. A field has hardly any objective width. A field is a field, and a field is infinite. The Universe resembles a field that simply has no boundary.

And if you think something is impossible. Think again. You are implying a limitation to a field.

'Whence limitations?'

If you think something is impossible, I'd say that it simply requires another 'impossible' thing in order to exist. An infinite set of such things serves to create itself. And an infinite tree dissolves into a field. And this field doesn't even have a boundary. Somewhere around there is what we call God.

This infinite basis of reality is what the Pre-Socratics termed 'the Aperon'.

Since there are no limits, we should look into the idea that there is an infinite multidimensional paradox underlying the very Universe itself.

So.. God can pull himself out of the hat, thank you very much.

And we know he did.. because we exist.

As I said, photons don't exist, then they do exist. Or are photons not matter?

I don't want to demean or offend anyone (and I really hope I won't and there'd be no reason for that whatsoever) , but you should really look into alternative views on the topic of 'matter'.

I remember in math school, they talked to us a few times of how ridiculously hard it is to define what 'point' or 'line' or 'number' is. 'Matter' is the same thing. You think you're speaking about something that is easy to understand, but it's actually not that easy.

Pretty much all the Quantum Physicists tell us that matter is not real, stop buying the Dawkins propaganda that QM is simply a tool to sell you new age fiction.

Well, say what you will about the first cause argument, at least it is an argument.

Well, I don't even know what you mean by that and I'm certainly not motivated enough to even try to understand.

I'm stating my position. The arguments can be found between the lines if anyone finds the general idea compelling. I've given a lot of thought to it; it's hard enough to remember my opinions, without remembering the reasons for them.. (Nietzsche). ^^

P.S. I get what you mean - my argument would be that we have no reason to attribute limitations to the Universe and Reality. I'd even call it a mistake. When we remove the limitations - it's only natural to take God for granted. (and you can fill in the gaps, I'm sure) That's how children's minds work.

Those gaps are too big to be filled.

1) There is no reason to believe that the next time I flip this coin it will be heads.
2) Therefore, next time I flip this coin it will be tails.

You are absolutely wrong and I don't find you interesting enough to engage in any meaningful discussion.

For the record - I was relying on deconstructing the faulty every day notions of limitations and structure to show that they are perfectly unnecessary and that without them one can look into the void and find something miraculous.

I was not trying to construct a step-by-step argument, and I don't see why anyone would expect that. In all fairness - a perfect step-by-step argument is borderline impossible in linear terms without bridging the gaps by some means of human imagination and ingenuity. Therefore your argument is invalid, and you sir are a troll.

On topic, though this might not seem very apparent. This is one of the good guys.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/076...A18C8IEYS3CA7E

Fair enough, what is the "cause" for photons coming into existence then? Are you under the impression this cause can not be natural?

There are many ways to understand that. For photons coming into existence on the basis of electrons dropping to a lower energy state, you can say all of the following:

* The cause is random.
* The cause is the inherent property of matter in which high energy particles seek to return to lower (more stable) lower energy levels.
* The cause is the electron being in a higher energy state.
* The cause is whatever put the electron in the higher energy state.

Since there's matter-energy equivalence, there's a sense in which my choice to raise my hand generates potential energy, and that potential energy could be converted into things that cause electrons to be in higher energy levels that would be released as photons. So raising my hand generates photons where there were no photons before.

What is "natural"?

Edit: Tangentially, I'm curious about your response to OrP's War and Peace concept. Do you think that "War and Peace" only exists as particular instances of the physical book? That if all the books of War and Peace ever written were destroyed in a fire, that there would no longer be something that we could refer to as "War and Peace"?

The bolded is probably your biggest mistake then. First, many people will expect an argument (and arguments are step-by-step) when you make broad metaphysical/theological claims like you do here. There is a lot of disagreement about these kind of claims, so people will want to examine the reasons you hold the views you do. Furthermore, historically the main vehicle in which these kinds of claims have been examined--science and philosophy--are based around the public airing of arguments.

Second, you should try to construct step-by-step arguments for your view. Metaphysical claims about the nature of reality are tough going and in presenting your own view is easy to ignore difficulties, difficulties that are often laid bare by making our assumptions, and the implications we are trying to draw from those assumptions, explicit. Arguments are one of the most useful tools we have for increasing our understanding of even our own beliefs.