Grammar and the Formal Identity of Name and Object

Abstract

In this paper, I will be arguing that the basic infrastructure of an ineffable formal identity between name and object which is presented in the Tractatus is still very much involved in Wittgenstein's early development of the concept of grammar. First, it will be necessary to clearly describe how the identity between name and object is initially formulated in the Tractatus. Hence, in section 1, I will show how the 'picture theory' is ontologically grounded on the identity of linguistics' and worldly atomic structural elements. I will discuss the ‘picture theory’ only briefly, since my main interest is to illuminate how that infrastructure remains a core aspect of Wittgenstein's “middle period” thinking: that is, in what way the identity of name and object is contained and presupposed within his concept of grammar and how it is still used as a condition for our symbolism to make sense. Another way to describe this paper's aim, this time from its end backwards, would be to say that it is to reveal that grammatical systems of rules are nothing other than the implementations of that special kind of identity, for the latter is always and already manifest within our symbolism