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22On WittgensteinIn Sascha Bru, Wolfgang Huemer & Daniel Steuer (eds.), Wittgenstein Reading, De Gruyter. pp. 96-107. 2013.
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5Die Baumstruktur des Tractatus: Genesis, Lesarten, EditionenWittgenstein-Studien 14 (1): 223-262. 2023.Tree-Structured Readings of the Tractatus : I argue that the numbering system of the Tractatus lets us see how it was constructed, in two closely related senses of that term. First, it tells us a great deal about the genesis of the book, for the numbering system was used to assemble and rearrange a series of drafts, as recorded in MS 104. Second, it helps us understand the structure of the published book, as cryptically summarized in the opening footnote. I also discuss an unpublished letter fro…Read more
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1The Practical TurnIn Stephen P. Turner & Paul A. Roth (eds.), The Blackwell Guide to the Philosophy of the Social Sciences, Blackwell. 2003.This chapter contains sections titled: What is Practice Theory? What is a Practice? Being‐in‐the‐World and Practical Holism Two Philosophers and an Antiphilosophy: Kripkenstein, Winchgenstein, and Therapeutic Quietism Winchgensteinian Practice Theory From Winchgenstein to Frankenstein Investigating Practices Note.
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5Wittgenstein's Texts and StyleIn Hans-Johann Glock & John Hyman (eds.), A Companion to Wittgenstein, Wiley-blackwell. 2017.Wittgenstein's principal works, the Tractatus Logico‐Philosophicus and Philosophical Investigations, are each written in such strikingly unconventional ways that it takes considerable effort to translate them into conventional philosophical writing. The most important aspect of Wittgenstein's style for an understanding of his philosophy is his use of multiple voices, and the way he forces his reader to engage with those voices in order to understand him. This chapter provides an outline of the l…Read more
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7The Uses of Wittgenstein's Beetle: Philosophical Investigations §293 and Its InterpretersIn Guy Kahane, Edward Kanterian & Oskari Kuusela (eds.), Wittgenstein and His Interpreters, Blackwell. 2007.This chapter contains section titled: Introduction: Baker on the Private Language Argument Strawson's and Malcolms Interpretations of the Beetle Story Pitcher's, Cook's, and Donagan's Interpretations of the Beetle Story Cohen's Repudiation of the Beetle Story Hacker's and Baker's Interpretations of the Beetle Story.
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4A New Book by Wittgenstein? The Place of the Kringel-Buch in the Wittgenstein PapersIn Josef G. F. Rothhaupt (ed.), Kulturen und Werte: Wittgensteins "Kringel-Buch" als Initialtext, De Gruyter. pp. 97-112. 2013.
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Wittgenstein on Ethical Concepts: A Reading of Philosophical Investigations §77 and Moore’s Lecture Notes, May 1933In Martin G. Weiss & Hajo Greif (eds.), Ethics, society, politics: proceedings of the 35th International Ludwig Wittgenstein Symposium, Kirchberg am Wechsel, Austria, 2012, De Gruyter Ontos. pp. 55-68. 2013.
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8Wittgenstein: Lectures, Cambridge 1930–1933, From the Notes of G. E. MooreIn Aidan Seery, Josef G. F. Rothhaupt & Lars Albinus (eds.), Wittgenstein’s Remarks on Frazer: The Text and the Matter, De Gruyter. pp. 85-98. 2016.
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69The return of the subject?: Power, reflexivity and agencyPhilosophy and Social Criticism 26 (5): 109-122. 2000.The deconstruction of the subject associated with postmodernism cannot be said to have simply carried the day. Opponents and critics of postmodernism have held that we must return to the subject and to autonomy as a necessary condition of thinking about ethics, politics, agency and responsibility. Indeed, Peter Dews has recently argued that efforts to displace the subject repeat rather than dissolve the problems generated by subject-centered theories, a charge he takes to be devastating. The imp…Read more
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13Parables in Midrash: Narrative and Exegesis in Rabbinic LiteratureJournal of the American Oriental Society 113 (3): 500. 1993.
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97Wittgenstein’s Place in Twentieth-Century Analytic PhilosophyPhilosophical Review 108 (3): 449. 1999.Originally conceived as a forty-page conclusion to Hacker’s twenty years of work on the monumental four-volume Analytical Commentary on the Philosophical Investigations, this book “rapidly assumed a life of its own”. A major contribution to the history of analytic philosophy, this substantial volume delivers even more than the title promises. The eight chapters are best approached as a six-chapter book, itself some 220 pages long, on Wittgenstein’s contribution to twentieth-century philosophy, f…Read more
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52Wittgenstein, Finitism, and the Foundations of Mathematics (review)Dialogue 40 (3): 624-625. 2001.More than half of Wittgenstein’s writings from the years between his return to philosophy in 1929 and the completion of Part I of the Philosophical Investigations in 1945 are about issues in the philosophy of mathematics. In 1929 he wrote that “There is no religious denomination in which so much sin has been committed through the misuse of metaphorical expressions as in mathematics”. But what sins, and which misuses, was he criticizing in his writings on the philosophy of mathematics? Wittgenste…Read more
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27Tree-structured readings of the TractatusNordic Wittgenstein Review 11. 2023.I argue that the numbering system of the Tractatus lets us see how it was constructed, in two closely related senses of that term. First, it tells us a great deal about the genesis of the book, for the numbering system was used to assemble and rearrange a series of drafts, as recorded in MS 104. Second, it helps us understand the structure of the published book, as cryptically summarized in the opening footnote. I also discuss an unpublished letter from Anscombe to von Wright from 1948 which con…Read more
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Wittgenstein and Moore on grammarIn Wittgenstein in the 1930s: Between the Tractatus and the Investigations, Cambridge University Press. 2018.
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4Reflections on editing Moore's notes in Wittgenstein: Lectures, Cambridge 1930-1933Belgrade Philosophical Annual 30 225-234. 2017.The essay begins by briefly reviewing the complex history of the collaborative long-distance editing work that led to the publication of Wittgenstein: Lectures, Cambridge 1930-1933 (Cambridge UP, 2016). It then turns to a discussion of the rationale for the innovative editorial policies we ultimately developed and implemented, and some of the broader methodological issues that they raise.
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40Wittgenstein and the 'Philosophical Investigations'Tijdschrift Voor Filosofie 63 (1): 205-205. 2001.
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26Wittgenstein in the 1930s: Between the Tractatus and the Investigations (edited book)Cambridge University Press. 2018.Wittgenstein's 'middle period' is often seen as a transitional phase connecting his better-known early and later philosophies. The fifteen essays in this volume focus both on the distinctive character of his teaching and writing in the 1930s, and on its pivotal importance for an understanding of his philosophy as a whole. They offer wide-ranging perspectives on the central issue of how best to identify changes and continuities in his philosophy during those years, as well as on particular topics…Read more
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70Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations: An IntroductionCambridge University Press. 2004.In this new introduction to a classic philosophical text, David Stern examines Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations. He gives particular attention to both the arguments of the Investigations and the way in which the work is written, and especially to the role of dialogue in the book. While he concentrates on helping the reader to arrive at his or her own interpretation of the primary text, he also provides guidance to the unusually wide range of existing interpretations, and to the reason…Read more
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18Wittgenstein Reads Weininger (edited book)Cambridge University Press. 2004.Otto Weininger was one of the most controversial and widely read authors of fin-de-siècle Vienna. He was both condemned for his misogyny, self-hatred, anti-semitism and homophobia, as well as praised for his uncompromising and outspoken approach to gender and morality. For Wittgenstein Weininger was a 'remarkable genius'. He repeatedly recommended Weininger's Sex and Character to friends and students and included the author on a short list of figures who had influenced him. The purpose of this n…Read more
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7Wittgenstein: Lectures, Cambridge 1930-1933: From the Notes of G. E. Moore (edited book)Cambridge University Press. 2016.This edition of G. E. Moore's notes taken at Wittgenstein's seminal Cambridge lectures in the early 1930s provides, for the first time, an almost verbatim record of those classes. The presentation of the notes is both accessible and faithful to their original manuscripts, and a comprehensive introduction and synoptic table of contents provide the reader with essential contextual information and summaries of the topics in each lecture. The lectures form an excellent introduction to Wittgenstein's…Read more
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10Sociology of Science, Rule Following and Forms of LifeVienna Circle Institute Yearbook 9 347-367. 2002.Ludwig Wittgenstein was trained as a scientist and an engineer. He received a diploma in mechanical engineering from the Technische Hochschule in Charlottenburg, Berlin, in 1906, after which he did several years of research on aeronautics before turning to the full-time study of logic and philosophy. Hertz, Boltzmann, Mach, Weininger, and William James, all important influences on Wittgenstein, are authors whose work was both philosophical and scientific. The relationship between everyday life, …Read more
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433Moore’s Notes on Wittgenstein’s Lectures, Cambridge 1930-1933: Text, Context, and ContentNordic Wittgenstein Review (1): 161-179. 2013.Wittgenstein’s writings and lectures during the first half of the 1930s play a crucial role in any interpretation of the relationship between the Tractatus and the Philosophical Investigations . G. E. Moore’s notes of Wittgenstein’s Cambridge lectures, 1930-1933, offer us a remarkably careful and conscientious record of what Wittgenstein said at the time, and are much more detailed and reliable than previously published notes from those lectures. The co-authors are currently editing these notes …Read more
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33The significance of jewishness for Wittgenstein's philosophyInquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy 43 (4). 2000.Did Wittgenstein consider himself a Jew? Should we? Wittgenstein repeatedly wrote about Jews and Judaism in the 1930s, and biographical studies make it clear that this writing about Jewishness was a way in which he thought about the kind of person he was and the nature of his philosophical work. Those who have written about Wittgenstein on the Jews have drawn very different conclusions. But much of this debate is confused, because the notion of being a Jew, of Jewishness, is itself ambiguous and…Read more
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Wittgenstein's epistemology in the 1920s and 1930s: from the picture theory to'philosophical pictures.'In Paul Weingartner & Gerhard Schurz (eds.), Proceedings of the 11th International Wittgenstein Symposium, Hölder-pichler-tempsky. 1987.
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152Recent work on Wittgenstein, 1980–1990 (review)Synthese 98 (3): 415-458. 1994.While Wittgenstein wrote unconventionally and denied that he was advancing philosophical theses, most of his interpreters have attributed conventional philosophical theses to him. But the best recent interpretations have taken the form of his writing and his distinctive way of doing philosophy seriously. The 1980s have also seen the emergence of a body of work on Wittgenstein that makes extensive use of the unpublished Wittgenstein papers. This work on Wittgenstein's method and his way of writin…Read more
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The availability of Wittgenstein's philosophyIn Hans D. Sluga & David G. Stern (eds.), The Cambridge Companion to Wittgenstein, Cambridge University Press. 1996.
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Ludwig Wittgenstein |
20th Century Analytic Philosophy |
Philosophy of Mind |
Philosophy of Language |