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March 27, 2006
Roughly speaking...
I've been reading Wittgenstein's Tractatus for a class I'm teaching tomorrow and the following line just kills me:
I think it's because, before reflection, it sounds as if it has a lot in common with these sentences:
or
or
I think these are funny in two different respects. Firstly, the embedded sentence is so absurd that the fact that the author takes the care to say "roughly speaking" - as if you might be about to jump in and correct him on some small point - is hilarious. And secondly, it's hard to see how the state of affairs described could be "roughly" right. One wants to say: look mate, do teddy-bears eat people or not? I might have children to save! What's all this "roughly" business?
But after some consideration I suppose Wittgenstein's sentence isn't really like that. He thinks that objects are strictly property-less, and so "objects are colourless" might seem like one way to express that they don't have any colour properties. But of course to say that would strictly be to ascibe a property to them (the property of being colourless) and so it isn't strictly true either.
My German copy is in my office, otherwise I'd be checking the original of the "roughly speaking" - maybe this is a translation thing.
Posted by logican at March 27, 2006 11:49 PM
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That's the original translation. The newer translation has here ``In a manner of speaking, objects are colourless.'' The German is Beiläufig gesprochen: Die gegenstände sind farblos. (The site I just linked to has the original translation, as well as the German. I find it fantastic for getting a feel for the structure of the Tractatus. The numbers are there in print, sure, to give us the hierarchy, but psychologically it's hard to ignore the intervening stuff between propositions at a certain level---whereas check this or this for example.)
Posted by: Nick Smith at March 28, 2006 03:32 AM
“Beiläufig gesprochen: Die Gegenstände sind farblos.”
Doesn't this mean more like: “Oh yes, and on a sidenote:...”?
Posted by: Jan Adriaenssens at March 28, 2006 07:36 AM
In my Routledge 1990 copy, instead of a comma there is a colon. Does this make a difference?
By the way, if objects are colorless, then the word 'color' is bogus. After all, if objects are colorless what can possibly have color?
Posted by: Varol Akman ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.logicandlanguage.net/nav-commenters.gif)
at March 29, 2006 02:44 AM
Is it "colourless" or "colorless" in the translations?
This could matter! The Australian Labour Party (formed in 1891) changed its name officially to the Australian Labor Party in 1912 to show solidarity with the US labor movement.
Posted by: Peter at March 29, 2006 02:46 PM
Jan, I think it can mean in passing (and so on a side note is definitely one way to translate it in general), but it can also mean something like casually. The other translation of the Tractatus that I have (Pears and McGuiness - I think that's probably the one Nick mentions) goes for "In a manner of speaking", which is kind of an interesting translation decision. I suspect that captures pretty much what Wittgenstein meant to convey, despite it's non-literality.
Nick - that website is great - I see what you mean about having the 7 propositions laid out one after another.
Posted by: Gillian Russell at March 30, 2006 08:57 AM