Rush Rhees - Böcker

This is Volume VIII of nine in a studies in Ethics and the Philosophy of Religion. Originally published in 1969 and holds a collection of papers on talks to first year students not reading philosophy; science and questioning; and discussions on social engineering, politics and science as well as questions like 'where does the world come from?'

This is Volume VIII of none in a studies in Ethics and the Philosophy of Religion. Originally published in 1969 and holds a collection of papers on talks to first year students not reading philosophy; science and questioning; and discussions on social engineering, politics and science as well as questions like 'where does the world come from?'

Rush Rhees, a close friend of Wittgenstein and a major interpreter of his work, shows how Wittgenstein's On Certainty concerns logic, language, and reality - topics that occupied Wittgenstein since early in his career. * Authoritative interpretation of Wittgenstein's last great work, On Certainty, by one of his closest friends. * Debunks misconceptions about Wittgenstein's On Certainty and shows that it is an essay on logic. * Exposes the continuity in Wittgenstein's thought, and the radical character of his conclusions. * Contains a substantial and illuminating afterword discussing current scholarship surrounding On Certainty, and its relationship to Rhees's work on this subject.

In 1933 Ludwig Wittgenstein revised a manuscript he had compiled from his 1930-1932 notebooks, but the work as a whole was not published until 1969, as Philosophische Grammatik. This first English translation clearly reveals the central place Philosophical Grammar occupies in Wittgenstein's thought and provides a link from his earlier philosophy to his later views.

Wittgenstein wrote the Philosophical Grammar during the years 1931 to 1934 - the period just before he began to dictate the Blue Book. Although it is close to the Investigations in some points, and to the Phiosophische Bemerkungen at others, the Philosophical Grammar is an independent work which covers new ground. It is Wittgenstein's fullest treatment of logic and mathematics in their connection with his later understanding of 'proposition', 'sign', and 'system'. He also discusses inference and generality - critisizing views of Frege and Russell as well as earlier views of his own - and the treatment of mathematical proof in this book, especially of inductive or recursive proofs, is deeper and more extensive than previously.

This substantially revised edition of Wittgenstein's Remarks on the Foundations of Mathematics contains one section, an essay of fifty pages, not previously published, as well as considerable additions to others sections. In Parts I, II and III, Wittgenstein discusses amongst other things the idea that all strict reasoning, and so all mathematics, are built on the 'fundamental calculus' which is logic. These parts give the most thorough discussion of Russell's logic. He writes on mathematical proof and the question of where the proofs of mathematics get their force and cogency, if they are not reducible to proofs in logic. Thsi leads him to discuss'contradiction in mathematics' and 'consistency proofs'. He works against the view that there is a sharp division between 'grammatical propositions' and 'empirical prepositions'. He asks us at one point to imagine a people who made no distinction between the applied mathematics and pure mathematics, although they counted and calculated. Could we say they had proofs? Here is a feature of his method which becomes more imporatnt; what Wittgenstein calls, at least half seriously, 'the anthropological method in philosophy'. This emerges in Parts V, VI and VIII. In Part VI, published here for the first time, Wittgenstein brings togeher the view that in mathematics proofs ae 'concept forming' and the view that language and logic and mathematics 'presuppose' common ways of acting and of living among the people who give tham and are convinced by them. Part VIII now has a fuller discussion of difficulties in the notion of 'following a rule' in calculation and the notion of logical necessity.

When in May 1930, the Council of Trinity College, Cambridge, had to decide whether to renew Wittgenstein's research grant, it turned to Bertrand Russell for an assessment of the work Wittgenstein had been doing over the past year. His verdict: The theories contained in this new work. . . are novel, very original and indubitably important. Whether they are true, I do not know. As a logician who like simplicity, I should like to think that they are not, but from what I have read of them I am quite sure that he ought to have the opportunity to work them out, since, when completed, they may easily prove to constitute a whole new philosophy.

This first of two volumes on the Greeks by Rush Rhees addresses the central philosophical question: In what sense does philosophy investigate reality? In answering this question, Rhees brings the work of the Presocratics into close relation with contemporary philosophy. D.Z. Phillips's editorial commentary is particularly helpful in assisting the reader with their bearings as they approach the text and in elucidating the developments in Rhees's thinking. How is the philosophical investigation of reality different from that of science and can it be said that science investigates aspects of reality, whereas philosophy investigates reality as such? In this first volume Rhees affirms that most of the Presocratics seemed to be seeking a science of being qua being, looking for an essence of reality that simply is. Rhees asks, if the existence of reality cannot be denied, then how can it be asserted either? Does it make sense to say that reality exists? If we speak of something existing, we speak of the conditions of its existence that are independent of the 'something' in question, so how can this be said about reality? What conditions can be other than reality itself? Rhees argues that whatever unity reality has, it cannot be the unity of a thing. Rhees brings out how individual Presocratics are aware of their predecessors' difficulties, only to fall prey to new difficulties of their own. Rhees suggests that what is philosophically deep in their questionings can be found in discussing the relation of discourse and reality. Does what we say to each other depend on an underlying logic that determines what can and cannot be said, or on a system of unchanging meanings; or is the distinction between sense and nonsense rooted in our actual ways of thinking and acting? In discussing these Wittgensteinian themes, Rhees is not simply elucidating the Presocratics but is in dialogue with them.

This second of two volumes on the Greeks by Rush Rhees takes up the questions bequeathed by the previous volume. If reality does not have the unity of a thing, can it have any kind of unity at all? The alternative seems to be that reality has the unity of a form. In this volume Rhees brings the perspective of a modern Wittgensteinian philosopher to bear on the dialogues of Plato. In his treatment of the Georgias and the Symposium Rhees emphasizes Socrates' claim that it is important to seek understanding although one cannot say, in the form of a theory or philosophical thesis, what that understanding amounts to. In considering the Phaedo, Theaetetus, Parmenides and Timaeus, Rhees pursues these questions in a way which relates them to live issues concerning the relation between logic and discourse. Rhees shows that Plato's Forms can neither be thought of by analogy with 'ultimate' particles in physics, nor as fixed concepts that determine what can and cannot be said. Finally, D. Z. Phillips includes two treatments by Rhees of the Republic separated by fifteen years. In the first he criticises Plato for a fixed view that an order predetermines and makes possible growth in understanding, showing how this is the very antithesis of growth. In the second he returns to the tension in Plato's thought between 'answerability to reality' and the view that understanding and growth can only be achieved through a seeking in dialogue. Rhees concludes that language is not a collection of isolated games, rather we speak in the course of lives that we lead and what we say has its meaning from the place it occupies in the course of a life.

This two volume set of Rush Rhees's In Dialogue with the Greeks brings together Rhees's work on the Presocratics and on Plato. The first volume addresses the central philosophical question: In what sense does philosophy investigate reality? In answering this question Rhees brings the work of the Presocratics into close relation with contemporary philosophy. The second volume takes up the questions bequeathed by the first. If reality does not have the unity of a thing, can it have any kind of unity at all? The alternative seems to be that reality has the unity of a form. In this second volume Rhees brings the perspective of a modern Wittgensteinian philosopher to bear on the dialogues of Plato concluding that language is not a collection of isolated games, rather we speak in the course of lives that we lead and what we say has its meaning from the place it occupies in the course of a life. D.Z. Phillips' editorial commentary is particularly helpful in assisting the reader with their bearings as they approach the text and elucidating the developments in Rhees's thinking.

A distinguished discussion of Weil's views on social philosophy, science, ethics, and religion.The work of Simone Weil has not garnered the attention it deserves in the Anglo-American tradition. In this book, Rhees, the noted thinker trained by Wittgenstein, provides the most sustained critique to date of Weil's views on science and religion. In this decidedly Wittgensteinian spin on the philosophy of religion, Rhees' observations on the major themes in Weil's work-social philosophy, science, ethics, and religion-are presented. The book shows how Rhees wrestled with difficulties he found in the work of Weil, someone he held in the highest regard.

This first of two volumes on the Greeks by Rush Rhees addresses the central philosophical question: In what sense does philosophy investigate reality? In answering this question, Rhees brings the work of the Presocratics into close relation with contemporary philosophy. D.Z. Phillips's editorial commentary is particularly helpful in assisting the reader with their bearings as they approach the text and in elucidating the developments in Rhees's thinking. How is the philosophical investigation of reality different from that of science and can it be said that science investigates aspects of reality, whereas philosophy investigates reality as such? In this first volume Rhees affirms that most of the Presocratics seemed to be seeking a science of being qua being, looking for an essence of reality that simply is. Rhees asks, if the existence of reality cannot be denied, then how can it be asserted either? Does it make sense to say that reality exists? If we speak of something existing, we speak of the conditions of its existence that are independent of the 'something' in question, so how can this be said about reality? What conditions can be other than reality itself? Rhees argues that whatever unity reality has, it cannot be the unity of a thing. Rhees brings out how individual Presocratics are aware of their predecessors' difficulties, only to fall prey to new difficulties of their own. Rhees suggests that what is philosophically deep in their questionings can be found in discussing the relation of discourse and reality. Does what we say to each other depend on an underlying logic that determines what can and cannot be said, or on a system of unchanging meanings; or is the distinction between sense and nonsense rooted in our actual ways of thinking and acting? In discussing these Wittgensteinian themes, Rhees is not simply elucidating the Presocratics but is in dialogue with them.

Rush Rhees, a close friend of Wittgenstein and a major interpreter of his work, shows how Wittgenstein's On Certainty concerns logic, language, and reality – topics that occupied Wittgenstein since early in his career. Authoritative interpretation of Wittgenstein's last great work, On Certainty, by one of his closest friends. Debunks misconceptions about Wittgenstein's On Certainty and shows that it is an essay on logic. Exposes the continuity in Wittgenstein's thought, and the radical character of his conclusions. Contains a substantial and illuminating afterword discussing current scholarship surrounding On Certainty, and its relationship to Rhees's work on this subject.

This original critique of Wittgenstein’s analogy between language and games, written by one of the philosopher’s literary executors and closest friends, has now been updated to include two additional articles. Updated edition of this original critique of Wittgenstein’s analogy between language and games. Rush Rhees was one of Wittgenstein’s literary executors and closest friends, as well as being an outstanding philosopher in his own right. D.Z. Phillips was Director of the Rush Rhees Archive and the Associated Centre for Wittgensteinian Studies. Constitutes a major contribution to Wittgenstein scholarship and to philosophical debates about the possibility of discourse. The second edition includes as a preface Rhees’ article, ‘The Fundamental Problems of Philosophy’, first published in 1994. It also includes as a second appendix some of Rhees’ reflections of Wittgenstein, his teacher.

Rush Rhees, a close friend of Wittgenstein and a major interpreter of his work, shows how Wittgenstein's On Certainty concerns logic, language, and reality – topics that occupied Wittgenstein since early in his career. Authoritative interpretation of Wittgenstein's last great work, On Certainty, by one of his closest friends. Debunks misconceptions about Wittgenstein's On Certainty and shows that it is an essay on logic. Exposes the continuity in Wittgenstein's thought, and the radical character of his conclusions. Contains a substantial and illuminating afterword discussing current scholarship surrounding On Certainty, and its relationship to Rhees's work on this subject.