Essay Examples - Philosophy Essays
What does Wittgenstein's idea of a 'Form of Life' tell us about our moral beliefs?
Wittgenstein is one of those rare philosophers to have worked out two powerful but opposed philosophical systems in his lifetime. Here I refer to his early work, culminating in the Tractus-Logico-Philosophicus and his later work, best represented by the Philosophical Investigations (henceforth PI).
In the Tractatus, Wittgenstein held an essentialist view of language according to which the limits of significance are established by the logical form of the proposition. The later Wittgenstein rejects the essentialist view of language in favor of a pragmatist view of language. On this view, it is our actual practices of language use which actually defines language against the background of a particular 'form of life'.
The most important concepts in Wittgenstein's later philosophy are of language-game and forms of life, both are inexorably connected to one another. A language-game is an activity that involves spoken (or written) words. These words have a natural place in the activity; it is this place, the role they play in the activity that makes them mean what they mean. Wittgenstein is arguing against the general formulation that language is made of names that every word has a definite meaning fixed once for all, against this Wittgenstein is saying that the meaning of a word is in its use in the language (PI, 43).
This means that language has no essential core in which meaning of the word is located and which is then common to everyone, rather language is dynamic, the meaning is not located in the word but it is determined by its usage which a society or a group has come to agree upon. This makes language a social phenomenon and that's what Wittgenstein means by 'form of life'. The language-game is always embedded in what he calls a 'forms of life'. A 'form of life' can be anything to a society, culture, group, institution, discipline or a religion.
As Wittgenstein says the term 'language-game' is meant to bring into prominence the fact that the speaking of language is part of an activity, or of a 'form of life'. (PI, 23) Wittgenstein is clearly saying that a language-game is a not itself a form of life but a part of it. The linguistic symbols we use and exchange are dependant upon a particular form of life in which it operates.
It is what human beings say that is true and false; and they agree in the language they use. That is not agreement in opinions but in form of life. (PI 241)
It is the form of life which constitutes the pattern of judgments through its shared practices and procedures which are enclosed in the language of the particular group. Wittgenstein systematically reverses the absolutist and metaphysical order of explanation of meaning and moral values. Moral and ethical values are not some transcendental values given to us from above, moral values like other practices are part of a language game of a particular form of life. Wittgenstein is saying that these values are not absolute or metaphysical values, but are agreed upon values.
Moral beliefs and ethical practices involve fine-grained, subtle, mutually recognized and understood, responses and reactions. They are developed by humans and understood properly are necessary part of any satisfactory account of shared lived of humans. Moral beliefs and ethical values are thus part of a form of life and they can vary in different forms of life, one thing intrinsic to them is that these are reaction, practices and responses of inherently social beings. Wittgenstein is not reducing language to action or vice versa, but is trying to get us to grasp the two as interwoven. So to agree in the language we use is not just to share natural propensities; it is to agree in this interweaving of language and action.
Wittgenstein further elaborates this point when he says: "agreement is required not only in definitions but also (queer as this may sound) in judgments" (PI 242). This clearly makes a solid connection between judgments and form of life and we can see how our judgments, as against our opinions are not outcome of a rational and logical thinking process. Rather judgments, values and beliefs portray our inclination to respond to the world in certain ways. In order to have understanding, to have beliefs and values at all, it is necessary that we must share out judgments to some significant degree. This is what our form of life is, because we are similar organism subjected to similar training and environment.
Customs, practice, the activities make up a 'form of life' which is further dependent on culture, context, history. We humans give value to things, we are the measure of things, and it is the human agreement that makes things true. It is we in a sense that all our moral, ethical values and measures are conventional; they are all depended on customs, uses of language, and forms of life. We can clearly see that Wittgenstein espousing a relativistic view of 'forms of life' and our beliefs in moral and ethical judgments.
Wittgenstein as we have discussed has an anti-essentialist view of language, justification has its limits and there comes a point where I can only display my form of life, the language-game I play. This is what I do, how I live, the way I understand, mean things and follow rules; this is my form of life. Thus there are different 'forms of life' and different language-games, and arguments in favor of one of them presuppose the standards of argument and evidence characteristic of that very form of life, so reasons do not get a grip on a different form of life with different standards and rules of reasoning.
Science and religion are different forms of life having different language-games, though some actions and words may be similar, but they have totally different usage and purpose, in addition they have different kind of certainty. Wittgenstein is not suggesting that these two forms of life cannot communicate, they can on some level, but they have different purposes.
Back to: Example Essays...
Conclusion
It is now evident what Wittgenstein's idea of language-game and form of life tells us about our moral beliefs. Moral beliefs are part of a language-game embedded in a form of life. We believe certain things are true because we have agreed upon them, the moral beliefs are just these truths, being part of a form of life is how we act. Thus my moral beliefs can be different from lets say morals beliefs of a tribe living in Amazon forest, but that is not to say that my beliefs are any truer than theirs, as Wittgenstein puts it At the foundation of well-founded beliefs lies belief that is not well-founded.
There can be certainty but to an extent, there cannot be an absolute objective certainty. Our life consists in being content to accept many things. This is Wittgenstein holds a difficult realization; we keep wanting to ask the same old why-questions, can't we yearn to ask, somehow justify our form of life? No says Wittgenstein, because it is groundless, it is simply what we do. And what we do may not be what they do. Philosophy cannot dig deeper than practices and customs that define our form of life. We do have certainties but they are groundless.
Bibliography
Wittgenstein, Ludwig. On Certainty, trans. G.E.M. Anscombe and D. Paul , (Oxford: Blackwell, 1969)
Wittgenstein, Ludwig. Philosophical Investigations, trans. G.E.M. Anscombe (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1958)
Norman, Malcolm. Ludwig Wittgenstein: A Memoir (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1958)
More Free Philosophy Essays...
Get free philosophy essays from our extensive online resource library. Hundreds of example essays available from all the major essay topics to help you with your research...
