by Alp Kaan Kılınç
“Philosophy, as we use the word, is a fight against the fascination which forms of expression exert on us.”
L. Wittgenstein
In Offret (Sacrifice – 1986), a movie by Andrei Tarkovsky, there’s a scene where the little boy lies under the tree and asks: “At the beginning was the word. Why is that Papa?”. A word, that is, a movement, a spark, a reason for the beginning, and what’s chosen to describe it was again “word”. The sentence before the question is derived from the Bible. “And the word was God” it goes on in John 1.1. There’s a similar emphasis on “word” in other religious scriptures too.
It’s clear that language has been an important subject for ages. In Ancient Greek, for instance, Platon discusses the issue whether names reflect the essence of things or not in Cratylus dialogues. In this aspect, there are basically two different ideas: 1. Names are given to things randomly and they don’t have a relation. 2. Names are given to things in a sensible way and they have a relation. This discussion can be an example for the first arguments related to language and similar discussions were made later on. However, it is mainly with Wittgenstein that this area gained speed.
In his first book, Tractatus Logico – Philosophicus, Wittgenstein says: “The world is all that is the case”. By “case”, he actually means “facts”. As we live in a world which has a system, and our language belongs to this system, whatever we utter beyond the borders of facts, our sentences will be meaningless. For example, if we speak about metaphysics, whatever we say won’t have a meaning according to this theory because language cannot go beyond the world. It is inherent to it. While expressing these, Wittgenstein, in fact, criticises philosophers as they do not see this nature of language. He claims that many philosophical expressions are senseless, instead of being true or wrong. In his ideas, language is like a picture of things. If we do not or cannot have a picture, there’s no meaning. He says “Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent” and “The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.”. Interestingly, he also argues that the meaning of language is not in this world just as the meaning of the world is not in this world. That’s what he calls mystery: “There are, indeed, things that cannot be put into words. They make themselves manifest. They are what is mystical” and this argument creates a dilemma in the book. Therefore, he says “My propositions are elucidatory in this way: he who understands me finally recognizes them as senseless, when he has climbed out through them, on them, over them.”.
In his later work “Philosophical Investigations”, however, he changes his ideas. In the previous perspective, we come up with a number of senseless words even though we use them in daily language. Thus, he suggests another term “language games”. This is similar to what we call “pragmatics”. Language is formed in everyday life. Meaning cannot be seperated from the use of words. “Words are actions” he says. “the meaning of a word is its use in the language”. Instead of labelling words with things, we should look at what we understand from the context. This means a lot because a word or sentence may mean very differently in different periods. It depends on the use and how it makes sense.
At this point, we should refer to Foucault and Heidegger too. Foucault claims that there’s a relation between knowledge and power. In a period of time, what’s called true depends on the sovereign, in other words. Therefore, power changes, knowledge changes. In his classification, he uses the term “episteme”. An episteme is a code which affects the knowledge system in a period. For example, Renaissance and the Age of Enlightenment have different epistemes. Every age has a different code, and this code affects our knowledge system as well as our language because whenever we talk about thinking process, we must refer to language too. This situation is related to what Wittgenstein claims in Philosophical Investigations. Language and meaning changes. What we understand from nationalism now will not be the same what a French understands from it just before the French Revolution.
When we look at the relation between truth and language, we should consider those epistemes and daily uses. When it comes to Heidegger, his main concern in philosophy is the question towards “being”. He uses the word “dasein” for human beings, but “being” in its own is a broader concept. It’s the being of human beings (In Turkish, “varlık” is used for human beings, but for the broader concept we use “Varlık” with the first letter capitalized). Therefore, he regards this as the main issue of philosophy. However, the problem is how we can make it a question. When we ask “what does being mean?”, he suggests that we already seem to have some idea related to this question. As meaning is associated with language, and as we know about epistemes or even paradigms of the age, how can we isolate ourselves from being a product of our era and answer the question freely? As our brains and thinking abilities develop within these borders, there occurs a problem to ask this question towards the meaning of “being”.
In short, 1. We cannot go beyond the borders of language. 2. We can play language games as much as possible in these borders. 3. Meaning is not a picture or label that language attaches to things. Meaning appears in use. 4. Therefore, meaning is changeable. It differs over time and is affected by epistemes. 5. Meaning is also related to sovereignty. The idea of accumulating knowledge is deceptive.
For this kind of reasons, Wittgenstein argues that we are still dealing with the same problems the ancient Greeks had because we don’t understand the nature of our language. If we manage to understand it, we will be able to see our limits.
About Wittgenstein:
Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein (26 April 1889 – 29 April 1951) was an Austrian-British philosopher who worked primarily in logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of language. From 1939–1947, Wittgenstein taught at the University of Cambridge.During his lifetime he published just one slim book, the 75-page Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1921), one article, one book review and a children’s dictionary. His voluminous manuscripts were edited and published posthumously. Philosophical Investigations appeared as a book in 1953 and by the end of the century it was considered an important modern classic.Philosopher Bertrand Russell described Wittgenstein as “the most perfect example I have ever known of genius as traditionally conceived; passionate, profound, intense, and dominating (Wikipedia)
Online Sources:
http://agraphadogmata.wordpress.com/2012/06/23/foucault-ve-yazar-islevi
https://www.academia.edu/6418292/Epistem_ve_Dil-Michel_Foucaultda_Tarih_ve_Eklemlenme_-Episteme_and_Language_History_and_Articulation_in_Michel_Foucault
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/wittgenstein/
Other Sources:
Ludwig Wittgenstein – Tractatus Logico – Philosophicus
Ludwig Wittgenstein – Philosophical Investigations
Pierre Hadot – Wittgenstein ve Dilin Sınırları
Barbara Bolt – Yeni Bir Bakışla Heidegger
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