Picturing, Showing,
and Solipsism in Wittgenstein’s Tractatus
Logico-Philosophicus
Philosophy
and Cognitive Science, William Paterson University, New Jersey
Of
all the enigmatic remarks running through Wittgenstein’s Tractatus, none are a
greater source of puzzlement to this reader than the endorsement of solipsism
in 5.6-5.641. Wittgenstein writes
“I am my world”, but, even though “what solipsism means, is quite correct...it cannot be said, but it shows itself” (5.63; 5.62). More intriguing still, he writes:
5.64 Here
we see that solipsism strictly carried out coincides with pure realism. The I in solipsism shrinks to an
extensionless point and there remains the reality co-ordinated with it.
What
sense can be made of these remarks?
In what way, if any, are these comments on solipsism continuous with the
semantical project that dominates the Tractatus?
Note
that in 5.62, Wittgenstein employs his famous distinction between showing and
saying. Getting clear on what this
distinction amounts to is crucial to understanding his remarks on solipsism.
In
this paper I attempt to show how Wittgenstein’s Tractatarian views on solipsism
follow from a certain construal and elaboration of the picture theory of
intentionality. I do this by first
reconstructing Wittgenstein’s famous distinction between showing and saying in
terms of the key notion of the picture theory: that aboutness is equivalent to
resemblance. I interpret the
distinction between showing and saying as a distinction between two different
ways that facts can manifest intentionality (aboutness). It is only with this construal of the
distinction in hand that Wittgenstein’s remarks on solipsism can be properly
understood.
The
organization of this paper is as follows.
In §1 I briefly remark upon
the central idea of the picture theory.
This discussion carries over to §2 in which I present my reconstruction of the distinction between
showing and saying. In §3 I attempt to show how the Tractatarian take on
solipsism follows from the notions of picturing and showing. In §4 I focus on the parts of 5.6-5.641 that concern the
enigmatic “metaphysical I”.
The
picture theory is a theory of intentionality, i.e., aboutness. At the heart of the theory is the identification
of aboutness with resemblance: something is about that which it resembles.
2.161 In
the picture and the pictured there must be something identical in order that
the one can be a picture of the other at all.
...
2.171 The
picture can represent every reality whose form it has.
The spatial picture, everything spatial, the coloured,
everything coloured, etc.
This
intuition is pumped by observations of how paintings and photographs represent
their subjects. A color photograph
represents a red ball in virtue of having properties like redness and roundness
in common with the ball.
Equating
aboutness with resemblance allows a world view whereby the exhibition of
aboutness by our thoughts is a wholly mundane affair. For Wittgenstein, unlike Brentano, intentional properties
are not indicative of ontological extravagance: the bearers of intentional
properties are chunks of reality--facts--just like any other (2.141
“The picture is a fact).
I
take several points to follow from the identification of aboutness with
resemblance. First, a particular
thing can resemble many other things.
For instance, a penny resembles the moon in being round and shiny, but
resembles a dime in being able to fit in my pocket. Thus, a particular thing can be about as many other things as it can resemble.
Second,
since resemblance admits of degrees (he penny resembles the dime more than it
resembles the moon, and it resembles another penny even more), it would seem,
then, that aboutness admits of degrees also. According to this construal of the picture theory, then,
what some fact most resembles is what that fact is most about. This point is extremely important to
the main arguments of this paper.
It is foundational to my reconstruction of the Tractatarian points
regarding solipsism and the saying/showing distinction.
In
the picture theory, aboutness is not the only semantic property defined in
terms of resemblance--truth is also cashed out in pictorial terms. This is a correspondence theory of
truth in which correspondence is a species of resemblance.
A
picturing fact has aboutness in virtue of resembling some possible states of
affairs. A picturing fact is true
if and only if the possible state of affairs also happens to be actual.
What
a picturing fact most resembles is that with which it has the most properties
in common. Thus, that which it is
most accurately about is that with
which it has the most properties in common.
What
a fact most resembles is itself--what a fact has the most properties in common
with is itself. Thus, that which
it is most accurately about is itself.
In
being about itself, a fact cannot fail to be true of itself. The possible state of affairs that a
fact most resembles is a possible state of affairs that has all of its
properties in common with the fact.
Since the fact is actual, the possible state of affairs that it most
resembles is an also actual state of affairs.
Since
the state of affairs that the fact is most about is actual, in being about
itself a fact is necessarily true.
It could only be false if the possible state of affairs it most
resembles was non-actual i.e., a nonexistent state of affairs. But if the state of affairs it is about
is nonexistent, and it is about itself, then it is non-existent, i.e., it is
not a fact.
A
fact about itself is necessarily true, it is a tautology. A tautology conveys no information
because it does not get beyond itself.
There
are two ways that a fact instantiates aboutness. The first way
is in being about itself. The
second way is in being about something else. In other words, the first is self-directed, the second
other-directed.
One
way in which the other-directed mode of aboutness differs from self-directed
aboutness is that facts exhibiting other-directed aboutness are not necessarily
true. The things that a fact
resembles that are not itself differ from it in varying ways and varying
degrees. One of the ways that it
may differ from that which it represents is in being actual. Some of the possible states of affairs
that the fact resembles will be actual and some will not. Thus, some of the things that fact is
about will be truths and others falsehoods. The truth values of a picturing fact considered under the
other-directed mode of aboutness is not intrinsic to the picturing fact
itself. They are not given a
priori. They are true or false not
of necessity but of contingency.
Indeed, it is only in virtue of being other-directed that picturing
facts can fail to be false at all:
2.173 The picture represents its object from without
(its standpoint is its form of representation), therefore the picture
represents its object rightly or falsely.
I
take the distinction between two modes of aboutness to map directly onto Wittgenstein’s
distinction between showing and saying.
I take showing to be the same as self-directed aboutness and saying to
be the same as other-directed aboutness.
Wittgenstein
often talks about that which cannot be said (described, mentioned, represented)
but can only be shown. On my
interpretation, I take this to mean that for such things, the only things that
can be about them is themselves.
That
that which Wittgenstein describes as shown is the same as what I’m calling “self-directed aboutness” is evident in Wittgenstein’s language in
such descriptions. When
Wittgenstein talks about that which is shown, the shown shows itself. For
instance, at 5.62 he writes “that the world is my world, shows itself....”
That
Wittgenstein construes saying (representing, describing, etc.) as
other-directed is evident when he writes:
2.173 The picture represents its object from
without....
Wittgenstein
holds that “What can be shown cannot be said” (4.1212). This necessary exclusiveness is explained by construing the
distinction in terms of self- and other-directedness. What is shown is shown by itself. What is
said is said by something else. Thus, what is shown is necessarily not
sayable, since what something is is necessarily not something other than what it
is.
Given
this construal of picturing and the distinction between showing and saying, how
does a version of solipsism follow?
A
world is that which something can be about. Think of a mind as a set of ideas, that is, a set of things
that manifest aboutness. That
which these ideas most resemble are themselves. Thus, as per the picture theory, that which these ideas are
most about are themselves. This is
the sense in which the mind is its world.
This is the sense of Wittgenstein’s remark at 5.63 that “I am my
world. (The microcosm.)”.
How,
then, are we to derive Wittgenstein’s point at 5.64 about solipsism coinciding
with pure realism? The solipsistic
result of the last paragraph was reached by starting with a mind and deriving
its identity with its world. A
similar result can be had by starting with the world. We must begin with
realism, that is, we must begin by assuming the existence of the world.
1.1 The
world is the totality of facts....
As
facts, they can be construed as pictures.
And as pictures, that which they most resemble is themselves. That is, that which the totality of
facts most represents is itself.
But if a mind just is a collection of ideas, that is, a collection of
facts exhibiting aboutness, then construing the world, the totality of facts,
as manifesting aboutness, is to construe it as a mind. The solipsist result again obtains,
this time by assuming realism.
This is one way in which solipsism and pure realism coincide. Given the picture theory, the I is
identical to its world even on the assumption of realism.
Wittgenstein
writes that even though “what solipsism means is quite correct [i.e., that I am
all that exists],” it nonetheless cannot be expressed but instead only
shown. On my reading, the
inexpressibility of solipsism follows from its truth. If all that exists is my mind, a collection of ideas, then
there is nothing that those ideas can be about except themselves. The aboutness they manifest cannot be
other directed (since there is nothing else)--they can only be
self-directed. Thus, if only I
exist, then that only I exist cannot be said but only shown.
Another
way in which solipsism coincides with pure realism involves the vanishing of
the I.
If
I am identified with my ideas, my expressible thoughts, then that which I can
say or describe cannot be myself.
What I can say is that
which my ideas are about in the other-directed mode of aboutness. Thus, I cannot appear among that which
is describable by me. Insofar as
my world is that which is describable, etc. by me, I do not appear in it.
5.631 The
thinking, presenting subject; there is no such thing.
If I wrote a book “The world as I found it”, I should
also have therein to report on my body and say which members obey my will and
which do not, etc. This then would
be a method of isolating the subject or rather of showing that in an important
sense there is no subject: that is to say, of it alone in this book mention
could not be made.
That
of which mention could not be made is that which can only be shown, which is to
say that the only thing that can be about it is itself. It must be passed over in silence.
Wittgenstein continues:
5.632 The
subject does not belong to the world but is a limit of the world.
5.633 Where
in the world is a metaphysical subject to be noted?
You say that this case is altogether like that of the
eye and the field of sight. But
you do not really see the eye.
And from nothing in the field of sight can
it be concluded that it is seen from an eye.
5.6331
For the field of sight has not a
form like this:
5.634
This is connected with the fact that no part of our experience is also a
priori.
Everything we see could also be otherwise.
Everything we can describe at all could also be
otherwise.
There is no order of things a priori.
Everything
I can see, experience, and describe is that which is other than myself. Seeing, experiencing, and describing
are only manifestations of aboutness in the other-directed mode. This point is nicely illustrated in
Wittgenstein’s metaphor of the eye: it can see only that which is other than
itself. Further, that there is an
eye is a necessary condition of there being a visual field. The existence of a visual field
necessitates the existence of the eye.
That
there is an eye is shown by the existence of the visual field. This is entirely compatible with
Wittgenstein’s remark that “from nothing in the field of sight can
it be concluded that it is seen from an eye.” Here Wittgenstein points out that the existence of the eye
is not entailed by any particular
thing seen in the field. That
there’s a field at all, however, does entail that there is an eye. There is a strong sense in which the
eye is not separate from the from the field of view. Even though the eye is not an object visible in the field of
view, that it is a necessary condition of the existence of a visual field makes
it, in a sense, constitutive of the field.
Analogous
to the eye is the I. Analogous to
the field of view is language (logic).
Analogous to visible objects are describable states of affairs-- things
that may or may not obtain.
Analogous to the eye being constitutive of the field of view is the
subject being constitutive of the world.
5.6 The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.
5.632 The
subject does not belong to the world but is a limit of the world.
In
a sense, the subject is not merely constitutive of the language, but identical
to it. Like language (logic), the
subject limits the world.
5.61 Logic fills the world: the limits of the world
are also its limits.
We cannot therefore say in logic: This and this there
is in the world, that there is not.
For that would apparently presuppose that we exclude
certain possibilities, and this cannot be the case since otherwise logic must
get outside the limits of the world: that is, if it could consider these limits
from the other side also.
What we cannot think, that we cannot think: we cannot
therefore say what we cannot
think.
Since
logic fills the world, it cannot be other-directed towards it. Infusing the totality of the world, the
way in which is about the world must be self-directed. The aboutness of logic and the world,
then, is the aboutness of showing, not of saying.
There
is much in these remarks to lead one to believe that Wittgenstein took
language, logic, world, and self to be coextensive. If this is so, then nothing that has been “said” in the Tractatus can really be said, but only shown. This would be one way in which to
derive the famous closing remarks of the Tractatus:
6.54 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. (He must so to speak throw away the ladder, after he has
climbed up on it.)
He must surmount these propositions; then he sees the
world rightly.
7 Whereof
one cannot speak, thereof one must remain silent.
It
is notoriously difficult to see how Wittgenstein’s remarks on solipsism fit
with the rest of the text of the Tractatus. While I am not confident
that I’ve settled these issues here, I hope to have shed some light on a
possible connection between these remarks and the rest of the text. Specifically, I’ve tried to show a link
between the remarks on solipsism and the picture theory. I’ve argued that the link is a
reconstruction of the distinction between showing and saying in terms of two
types of intentional phenomena, two modes of aboutness: aboutness which is
self-directed and aboutness which is other-directed.