File spoon-archives/lyotard.archive/lyotard_1999/lyotard.9907, message 22


Date: Thu, 08 Jul 1999 00:45:13 -0700
From: Lois Shawver <rathbone-AT-california.com>
Subject: Re: Foucault and Lyotard?




hugh bone wrote:
> I remember some references to Wittgenstein in "Le Differend", not in
> PMC.  Except for his apparently original concept that the meaning of
> language and the ways it is used is developed from social situations,
> and the term "games", what I have read of Wittgenstein (not much) was
> like math and logic...valuable and useful, but not something I wanted to
> pursue.

Wittgenstein has two stages of philosophy, often referred to as early
Wittgentsein and later Wittgenstein.  Early Wittgenstein reduced
philosophy to math and logic. Later Wittgenstein deconstructs his own
earlier philosophy,often explicitly, showing the reader how his later
thinking differs from his early thinking. And his newer philosophy
brought forth some very inspiring ideas that, to my reading, caught
Lyotard's imagination.  Lyotard is not one to give a lot of weight to
preserving the ideas he borrows in pristine form in his own way of
thought (and I think that's good), but in PMC, they are more or less
preserved although he builds on them in his own direction.  Same is so,
I'd say, in Just Gaming.  By Le Differend things start to take a
slightly different direction, but still related, and still visibly
inspired by LW's concept of a language game.

Judy, by the way, reads Wittgenstein, and can comment on this-- if she's
here (I think she is pretty busy right now).  Perhaps she'll give her
perspective, but I think she'll be able to see Wittgenstein in Lyotard's
philosophy, perhaps noticing somewhat different dimensions that I
notice.

Still, it seems clear to me, as i think it was to Lyotard, that he was
able to take Wittgenstein's idea of a langauge game and tun with it.

..Lois Shawver

   

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