Some Notes on Ludwig Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Methods

Abstract

In his article “Wittgenstein: universalismo, lógica, gramática y lengaje,” Alejandro Tomasini Bassols argues that the trouble Wittgenstein faces at the end of Tractatus””that the propositions contained in his work are elucidations and nonsensical””started with his mistake in considering logic and not language the most universal. Bassols further asserts that the so-called “paradox of the Tractatus” was not a threat against the second Wittgensteinian philosophy, because Wittgenstein himself did not make the same mistake. This article argues that the propositions in Tractatus are paradoxical as a consequence of the picture theory of meaning, and regardless of the ontology in Tractatus. In addition, against Bassols’s opinion concerning the existence of a genuine philosophical progress between Wittgenstein’s first and second philosophies, this article highlights how the main issue in Wittgenstein’s first philosophy is also the main issue in his second philosophy: the paradox of Wittgenstein never having followed his own methods.