Philosophical Investigations
2001 · book
Philosophische Untersuchungen is, with the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, one of two major works by 20th-century philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein. In it, he discusses numerous problems & puzzles in fields of semantics, logic, philosophy of mathematics & the philosophy of mind. He asserts that conceptual confusions surrounding language use are at the root of most philosophical problems, contradicting & discarding much the argument of the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. The book is often considered one of the most important works of the 20th century, continuing to influence contemporary philosophers studying mind & language. The book wasn't ready for publication when Wittgenstein died in 1951. G.E.M. Anscombe translated the ms & it was published in 1953. It's now in a 3rd edition incorporating Anscombe's final revisions & is repaginated. There are two popular editions of Philosophical Investigations: Prentice Hall, 1999 (ISBN 0024288101) Blackwell Publishers, 2001 (ISBN 0631231277)--bilingual. The text is divided into two parts, consisting of what Wittgenstein calls, in the preface, Bemerkungen, translated by Anscombe as "remarks". In the 1st part, these remarks are rarely more than a paragraph long & are numbered sequentially. In the 2nd part, the remarks are longer & numbered using Roman numerals. In the index, remarks from the 1st part are referenced by their number rather than page; however, references from the 2nd part are cited by page number. The comparatively unusual na