"My propositions are elucidatory in this way," writes Wittgenstein in the Tractatus (6.54): "he who understands me finally recognizes them as senseless." It's a stunning reversal, where one of the founding documents of analytical philosophy reaches the limits of what can be said with language. "There is indeed the inexpressible. This shows itself; it is the mystical" (6.522). It is, in my view, the sort of thing one can recognize, and yet not be able to express. This post - an interview with Graham Priest - discusses the end of the Tractatus. What can we say about it? There's Bertrand Russell, who writes, "what causes hesitation is the fact that, after all, Mr. Wittgenstein himself manages to say a good deal about what cannot be said." And there's Wittgenstein himself, who says "Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent" (7).
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