By means of a reductio argument, Wittgenstein’s Tractatus calls into question the very idea that we can represent logical form. My paper addresses three interrelated questions: first, what conception of logical form is at issue in this argument? Second, whose conception of logic is this argument intended to undermine? And third, what could count as an adequate response to it? I show that the argument construes logical form as the universal, underlying correlation of any representation and the reality it represents. (...) I further show that the argument seeks to undermine core commitments of Frege’s and Russell’s. But the reductio, as I read it, is not intended to establish the falsity of any of their specific assumptions. Rather, its aim is to make manifest the indeterminacies that underlie the language in which these assumptions are framed, and establish the need for a transformation of that language. So understood, Wittgenstein’s argument exemplifies his idea that philosophy is not a theory, but an activity of elucidation. The interpretation I propose bears on one of the central debates in the literature, namely how we should understand Wittgenstein’s contention that his elucidations succeed despite being nonsensical. (shrink)

This paper outlines a solution to what can be called “the problem of domination by reason”, “conceptual domination” or “clarificatorory injustice”, connected with how a philosopher may appear to be in a position to legitimately coerce, by means of arguments, an interlocutor who shares with her a concept or a conceptual system to accept a philosophical characterization of a concept or whatever the concept concerns. The proposed solution is based on a particular interpretation of what Wittgenstein means by agreement in (...) his later philosophy, when he says that philosophy only states what anyone grants to it. Wittgenstein’s view and the proposed solution are characterized by their continued recognition of the value of logic and reason, truth and knowledge, as opposed to attempting to solve the problem by embracing relativism and questioning the value of the logic, reason, truth and knowledge. Relevant kind of disagreements licence no relativistic conclusions, because problems relating to them can be solved without going this far. Keywords: domination, relativism, Wittgenstein, method, agreement. (shrink)

A paradox, according to Wittgenstein, is something surprising that is taken out of its context. Thus, one way of dealing with paradoxical sentences is to imagine the missing context of use. Wittgenstein formulates what I call the paradigm paradox: ‘one sentence can never describe the paradigm in another, unless it ceases to be a paradigm.’ (PG, p.346) There are several instances of this paradox scattered throughout Wittgenstein’s writings. I argue that this paradox is structurally equivalent to Russell’s paradox. The above (...) quotation is Wittgenstein’s version of the vicious circle principle which counteracts the paradox. The prohibition Wittgenstein describes is, however, limited to a certain language-game. Finally, I argue that there is a structural analogy between a noun being employed as a self-membered set and a paradigmatic sample being included in or excluded from the set it generates. Paradoxical sentences are not prohibited forever; they can indicate a change in our praxis with a given paradigm. (shrink)

The article argues for a contextualised reading of Wittgenstein’s Tractatus. It analyses in detail the role that use and application play in the text and how that supports a conception of transcendentality of logic that allows for contextualisation. The article identifies a tension in the text, between the requirement that sense be determinate and the contextual nature of application, and suggests that it is this tension that is a major driver of Wittgenstein’s later ideas.

The aim of this article is to investigate the sensualist naturalism in the Logic of the priest and French philosopher Étienne Bonnot de Condillac. This author has been very little studied in our language; being almost non-existent in philosophy journals published in the Hispanic world. This paper is divided into four parts. A first part, where whoever reads us will find the most general naturalism as the humus of the logic written by Mureaux’s priest. In the second part, we will (...) study the reasons for the sensualist qualifier that underlies this original logic and, finally, in the third part, we will show how to articulate the images, genres, classes in the simplified language of a logic that is in accordance with the sensitive organic system of the human being, along with the other important sciences. We will finish this work with our conclusions on how Condillac, moved by his naturalistic and sensualistic background, admonished the essentialist and synthesist logic of his time, rehearsing a renewal through an unusual critical sagacity. (shrink)