Please wait a minute...
Frontiers of Philosophy in China

ISSN 1673-3436

ISSN 1673-355X(Online)

CN 11-5743/B

Postal Subscription Code 80-983

Front. Philos. China    2021, Vol. 16 Issue (1) : 46-66    https://doi.org/10.3868/s030-010-021-0004-9
SPECIAL THEME
Truth and Nonsense: A Unified Reading of the Tractatus
DAI Haiqiang()
Center for Studies of Values and Culture, School of Philosophy, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China
 Download: PDF(241 KB)  
 Export: BibTeX | EndNote | Reference Manager | ProCite | RefWorks
Abstract

Upon reading the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, readers might be confused about the nature of the book, since there seems to be a paradox introduced by the author’s two claims: a) the book conveys truths; b) propositions in the book are nonsense. Commentators disagree as to how best to resolve this paradox. Some hold that there are ineffable truths conveyed by nonsense propositions. Others deny this kind of truth, arguing that the book is not all nonsense, for there are some propositions in the book expressing at least the therapeutic truth that philosophical propositions are just nonsense. Recently, some interpreters have claimed that there is no truth at all. While the incoherence of the context is genuine, the purpose of the book is ethical. By diagnosing these interpretations, this paper intends to provide a new perspective toward reading the book by resolving the paradox. The truth of the Tractatus is not a propositional truth, but a specific true thought. The nonsense of the Tractatus is a transcending nonsense, rather than a pure nonsense. The book intends to attain the true thought about the mystical ethics by way of transcending nonsense. In this case, the Tractatus is not an incoherent work at all, since the paradox is not genuine. The fact that the nonsense part is a means to fulfill its ethical purpose makes the book a unified whole.

Keywords truth      nonsense      unified reading      the mystical      ethics     
Issue Date: 15 April 2021
 Cite this article:   
DAI Haiqiang. Truth and Nonsense: A Unified Reading of the Tractatus [J]. Front. Philos. China, 2021, 16(1): 46-66.
 URL:  
https://academic.hep.com.cn/fpc/EN/10.3868/s030-010-021-0004-9
https://academic.hep.com.cn/fpc/EN/Y2021/V16/I1/46
[1] YAO Xinzhong. Wall, Gate and Self-Other Dynamics: A Confucian Ethics of Separation and Interconnection[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2020, 15(4): 567-585.
[2] ZHANG Wei. Formalism and Heteronomy qua Logonomy—On Max Scheler’s Critique and Development of Kant’s Ethics[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2020, 15(3): 380-394.
[3] ZHU Qin. Confucian Moral Imagination and Ethics Education in Engineering[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2020, 15(1): 36-52.
[4] XU Difei. Hintikka’s Logical Revolution[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2019, 14(4): 630-648.
[5] John Robert Williams. A Couple Nagging Interpretive Difficulties in Zhuangzi Studies vis-à-vis William James on the Ethics and Psychology of Belief[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2019, 14(4): 593-611.
[6] Rina Marie Camus. “Athl-Ethics”: Virtue Training in Mencius and Aristotle[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2019, 14(1): 152-170.
[7] Jan Szaif. Drunkenness as a Communal Practice: Platonic and Peripatetic Perspectives[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2019, 14(1): 94-110.
[8] HUANG Yong. Confucian Ethics: Altruistic? Egoistic? Both? Neither?[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2018, 13(2): 217-231.
[9] Selusi Ambrogio. Mou Zongsan and Martin Heidegger: Reopening a Debate on Ontology and Ethics[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2018, 13(1): 55-71.
[10] Ellen Y. Zhang. The Face/Facelessness of the Other—A Levinasian Reading of the Ethical of the Zhuangzi [J]. Front. Philos. China, 2017, 12(4): 533-553.
[11] Bo R. Meinertsen. Towards Gratitude to Nature: Global Environmental Ethics for China and the World[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2017, 12(2): 207-223.
[12] YANG Tongjin. Is There an Identity Crisis in Environmental Ethics?[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2017, 12(2): 195-206.
[13] Timothy O’Leary. Critique, Ethics, and the Apparatus of Experience: A Foucauldian Framework[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2017, 12(1): 120-136.
[14] Alicia Hennig. Three Different Approaches to Virtue in Business- Aristotle, Confucius, and Lao Zi[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2016, 11(4): 556-586.
[15] Tara Kennedy. The Ethics of Treating Animals as Resources: A Post-Heideggerian Approach[J]. Front. Philos. China, 2016, 11(3): 463-482.
Viewed
Full text


Abstract

Cited

  Shared   
  Discussed