Wittgenstein’s Philosophy in Psychology by Gavin Brent Sullivan

Author:Gavin Brent Sullivan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan UK, London

Wittgenstein’s remark challenges the view that “what we do in our language-game always rests on a tacit presupposition” (p. 179). Its relevance to psychology is that it reduces any compulsion to feel that we must always be able to articulate the basis for our practices (i.e., either in theoretical or more ordinary terms). Wittgenstein therefore asks “doesn’t a presupposition imply a doubt?” and answers that “doubt may be entirely lacking. Doubting has an end” (p. 180). The overall point is that when explanations can no longer be offered “the end is not an ungrounded presupposition: it is an ungrounded way of acting” (Wittgenstein, 1979a, p. 17e); although Wittgenstein also suggests that we will often feel quite different and distant from people who vary significantly from such judgements (i.e., one can react as if there is nothing in common with someone who contradicts something we take to be tacit or basic). For example, Wittgenstein (1979a) imagines responding to another’s extreme doubts without being sure how the response will restore a sense of certainty:If someone said to me that he doubted whether he had a body I should take him to be a half-wit. But I shouldn’t know what it would mean to try to convince him that he had one. And if I had said something, and that had removed his doubt, I should not know how or why. (p. 34e)

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