Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889 - 1951) was an Austrian-British philosopher and logician whose work on logic, language, and meaning made him one of the most influential thinkers of the twentieth century. [1] He is best known for two contrasting books, the early Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus and the posthumous Philosophical Investigations, which together redirected the modern philosophy of language. [2]
Early life and education
Wittgenstein was born on 26 April 1889 in Neuwaldegg, near Vienna, into one of the wealthiest families of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. [1] He was educated at home and later at a Realschule in Linz before studying mechanical engineering at the Technische Hochschule in Berlin. [1] Pursuing an interest in aeronautics, he moved to the Victoria University of Manchester, where research into propeller design drew him toward the foundations of mathematics. [1] In 1911 he went to Trinity College, Cambridge, to study logic under Bertrand Russell, who quickly recognised his exceptional ability. [2]
The Tractatus
During the First World War Wittgenstein served in the Austro-Hungarian army, was decorated for bravery, and completed a manuscript at the front. [1] Published in 1921, the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus set out a compressed series of numbered propositions arguing that language pictures the world and that many traditional philosophical problems arise from misunderstandings of logic. [2] Believing he had resolved the essential problems of philosophy, he withdrew from the discipline for much of the 1920s, gave away his inherited fortune, worked as a village schoolteacher in rural Austria, and helped design a modernist house in Vienna for his sister. [3]
Return to Cambridge
Renewed doubts brought Wittgenstein back to Cambridge in 1929, where the Tractatus was accepted as his doctoral thesis. [1] He was appointed to a professorship in 1939 but interrupted his academic work to serve as a hospital porter during the Second World War. [3] In these years his thinking shifted decisively away from the logical framework of his early work toward the study of ordinary language and its everyday use. [2]
Later philosophy and legacy
His later views were gathered in the Philosophical Investigations, published posthumously in 1953, which introduced the notions of language-games and family resemblance and argued that meaning derives from use within shared social practice. [2] Wittgenstein died in Cambridge on 29 April 1951. [1] His two contrasting bodies of work each shaped major currents of modern thought, influencing logical positivism, ordinary language philosophy, and later debates in the philosophy of mind and language. [3]
