3.334 The rules of logical syntax must be self-evident if one only knows how each one of the signs signifies.
Are the rules of logical syntax identical with the ways of signification?
My plan is to post translations of and comments on Ludwig Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. Please feel free to comment.
4 comments:
Do you think this is inconsistent with W's claim that the meaning of signs cannot play a role in logical syntax?
Well, I'm not sure exactly what to make of any of the Tractatus, but I'm inclined to say No. How a sign signifies is not necessarily the same thing as what it signifies. If we take the meaning to be what is signified, then there is no apparent inconsistency here.
I guess I'm not quite sure what to make of "how" a sign signifies. It seems to me that Wittgenstein is drawing a distinction between, say, how a name and how function sign signify, i.e., that one refers to an individual and the other to a property (this, of course, already assumes a controversial interpreation of the Tractatus). Thus, while "how" a sign signifies doesn't concern what, in particular, it signifies, it does concern what type it refers to.
I think something like that must be right.
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