Ethics and the Limits of Language in Wittgenstein's Tractatus

Abstract

Ethics and the Limits of Language in Wittgenstein's Tractatus B. A. WORTHINGTON THIS ARTICLEIS A STUDY of the "mystical" passages at the end of Wittgenstein 's Tractatus and will put forward an interpretation of Wittgenstein's doctrines of the inexpressibility of ethics and metaphysics.' My first principal claim is that the rejection of metaphysics is based on a belief, evident in the mystical passages, that metaphysical reflection is inseparable from metaphysical anxiety and is therefore to be avoided. Wittgenstein's ethic of "life in the present" is put forward as a means by which freedom from metaphysical concerns may be achieved. Since "life in the present" is presented in the Notebooks as a means of overcoming "the misery of the world," I suggest that this part of Wittgenstein's system is based upon his acceptance of Schopenhauer 's doctrine that "the misery and suffering of life" is the source of man's metaphysical impulse, and, moreover, that "life in the present" is itself a derivative of Schopenhauer's prescription of "the denial of the will" and "the liberation of knowledge from the will." Since indifference to the facts will be incompatible with evaluation of the facts, I argue that the prescription of "life in the present" entails and explains the doctrine of the inexpressibility of ethics. My second principal claim is that the association of metaphysical reflection and metaphysical anxiety is an indispensable support of the central semantic doctrine of the Tractatua: that language cannot be used to describe its own semantic structure. If this second claim is correct, it means that technical semantic considerations founded on the problems of propositional My very real gratitude is due to ProfessorJ. A. Farisand to Ms. A. C. Stubbs.Mythanks are alsodue to Mr. J. C. B. Gloverfor his kindnessand encouragementduring the earlystages of the work on this article. [481 ] 482 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY self-reference are integrated into a single system with quasi-existentialist doctrines concerning self-consciousness. It is this aspect of the Tractatus which I believe holds the greatest promise of future development. 1. THE INEXPRESSIBILITY OF ETHICS IN TIlE "TRACTATUS" Commentators have offered little explanation of Wittgenstein's arguments for the inexpressibility of ethics. Most commentators mention 6.4n, which asserts that value cannot lie in the world on the grounds that "all that happens and is the case is accidental." Little attempt, however, has been made to explicate the argument; and P. M. S. Hacker, no doubt as a result of this failure, has felt able to write: "The argument for the ineffability of ethics is tenuous to say the least, it hangs on nothing more than the non-contingency of the ethical, a point asserted rather than argued."" Against Hacker I will argue that both the exclusion of value from a contingent world and the consequent inexpressibility of ethics are doctrines with a clear and coherent base which is found in the text of the Tractatus. I will argue that both derive from Wittgenstein's prescription of asceticism. This itself, which is apparently derived from Schopenhauer, receives lengthy supporting arguments in the Notebooks and appears again, with laconic but clear support, in the Tractatus. I will first turn to 6.41: 6.41 The sense of the world must lie outside the world. In the world everything is as it is, and everything happens as it does happen: in it no value exists--and if it did, it would have no value. If there is any value that does have value, it must lie outside the whole sphere of what happens and is the case. For all that happens and is the case is accidental. What makes it non-accidental cannot lie within the world, since if it did it would itself be accidental. It must lie outside the world: The most important word here is "accidental," and the most important assertion is evidently that value "must lie outside the whole sphere of what happens and is the case." The word "accidental" must be used in the sense of "not logically necessary." It is used in this sense at 2.ot2--"ln logic nothing is accidental"--and at 6.3--"Outside logic everything is accidental." The...