---
# System prepended metadata

title: Wittgenstein

---

# Wittgenstein

(under construction ... to be continued)

## [Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus](http://tractatuslogicophilosophic.us/tde.html)

|German | English
|:---:|:---:|
|alles was der Fall ist | everything that is the case|
|Tatsachen | facts
|Sachverhalte | atomic facts
|Verbindung von Gegenstaenden | combination of objects
|Sachen, Dinge|  things, entities
|Bestandteil | constituent part
|zufaellig | accidental
|... | ...

"Die Sprache verkleidet den Gedanken". - - - "Language disguises the thought."

"Was sich überhaupt sagen läßt, läßt sich klar sagen; und wovon man nicht reden kann, darüber muß man schweigen." - - - "What can be said at all can be said clearly; and whereof one cannot speak thereof one must be silent."

"Dagegen scheint mir die Wahrheit der hier mitgeteilten Gedanken unantastbar und definitiv. Ich bin also der Meinung, die Probleme im Wesentlichen endgültig gelöst zu haben. Und wenn ich mich hierin nicht irre, so besteht nun der Wert dieser Arbeit zweitens darin, daß sie zeigt, wie wenig damit getan ist, daß diese Probleme gelöst sind." - - - "On the other hand the truth of the thoughts communicated here seems to me unassailable and definitive. I am, therefore, of the opinion that the problems have in essentials been finally solved. And if I am not mistaken in this, then the value of this work secondly consists in the fact that it shows how little has been done when these problems have been solved."

From the [Introduction](http://tractatuslogicophilosophic.us/aintro.html) by Russell:
- "The essential business of language is to assert or deny facts. Given the syntax of language, the meaning of a sentence is determined as soon as the meaning of the component words is known. In order that a certain sentence should assert a certain fact there must, however the language may be constructed, be something in common between the structure of the sentence and the structure of the fact. This is perhaps the most fundamental thesis of Mr Wittgenstein's theory. That which has to be in common between the sentence and the fact cannot, he contends, be itself in turn said in language. It can, in his phraseology, only be shown, not said, for whatever we may say will still need to have the same structure.""


### References

- Awodey, Carus: [Carnap’s dream: Gödel, Wittgenstein, and Logical Syntax](https://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/awodey/preprints/CD.pdf) has valuable insights on the influence of Wittgenstein on logicians of his time.


