Ayokunle Afuye, a longtime non-academic reader of the blog from Nigeria who is interested in philosophy, writes with the following provocatively put question:
I am here to pose an honest question to you and your readers. One that has left me disconcerted and conflicted over the years. The question is this: Is Ludwig Wittgenstein (“LW”) truly a hero of philosophy? I am of the opinion that we can do our analytic philosophy (all fair and square) without bothering ourselves with the wankings of Mr Wittgenstein!
I should add the following:
(i) I do think that a lot of people do not regard him as a true hero of philosophy and are too afraid to speak up because everyone else thinks he is a hero of philosophy. By “hero of philosophy” I mean ‘someone that has made invaluable, peerless contributions to philosophy’. David Lewis comes to mind! Lewis is in my opinion, a quite special dude and one of the most exceptional people to ever exist in philosophy.
(ii) Even if we agreed LW probably is a hero, he did not make any ingenious contributions in the fields he worked- language, mind, logic, etc. When I think of heroes in the field of language, I am thinking: Frege, Russell, Montague, Lewis, Davidson, Grice, etc. In mind: Nagel, Chalmers, Searle, Putnam, Ned Block, etc. In logic: Frege, Russell, Godel, Church, Tarski, etc. LW’s contributions are lightweight and are more like things already out there in the world (“The Picture Theory of Meaning,” for example, is an absolute scam!). In other words, in the more analytic aspects of philosophy: Formal Epistemology, Philosophy of Science, Analytic Metaphysics, Philosophy of Language and Linguistics, LW is of absolutely no use!
I understand that LW was a fascinating figure majorly because of his highly unusual mannerisms and oracular pronouncements. His major contribution to philosophy is that he had an unnecessarily pernicious counterproductive influence on the field. For example, he thought most philosophical problems arose out of a misuse of language- which is a blatant lie!
There have been dudes who have stated that we need to calm down about this Wittgenstein dude: Timothy Williamson (“How did we get here from there? The transformation of analytic philosophy”), Paul Horwich (https://archive.nytimes.com/opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/03/was-wittgenstein-right/), Ian Ground (https://www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/ludwig-wittgenstein-honesty-ground/) and many more peeps besides.
Please, Professor Leiter, kindly help pose this to your readers with the expectation that they say how exactly relevant LW is in the areas he worked and in philosophy more broadly.
I look forward to reading the comments this question generates with a view to learning from your readers. Thank you!
What say you readers?
