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roachboy · 04-20-2009, 01:49 PM

see, you know stand before the curious tunnel that is trying to determine what a rule is.
wittgenstein pulled on this string to great effect in philosophical investigations. if you're feeling inclined to head down the rabbithole for a while, that's a lovely ride. not easy though--it requires attention. and it messes with your head.

what holds proper nouns together as a class is more what wittgenstein calls a family resemblance than the application of a particular rule.

this is maybe a general hand-waving in the direction of an introduction.

what the good comrade b-g outlined above is a sequence of oppositions that delimits (by showing) the boundary that separates inside/outside for the class "proper noun."

you can grasp the distinction intuitively by looking at the list, which means the resemblance are most powerful when there's a sequence--you can see the regularity, and what you're talking about really with a class like "proper noun" is a resemblance.

but when you go from description to generating--in other words when you abstract a rule from a sequence unified through a family resemblance--you get in to trouble.

does that mean there is no rule?

uh..

no. but does the fact of a rule explain the resemblance?

uh....

no. but proper nouns as a class does seem to hold together....

but maybe the problem follows from a too-narrow interpretation of what a rule is.

how would you bend the notion of a rule to incorporate the production(?) or reproduction (?) of a particular type of similarity? this is how wittgenstein ends up with the notion of family resemblance.

but the underlying question is: so what exactly is a rule?

and it's down the rabbithole.

04-20-2009, 01:49 PM	#19 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	see, you know stand before the curious tunnel that is trying to determine what a rule is. wittgenstein pulled on this string to great effect in philosophical investigations. if you're feeling inclined to head down the rabbithole for a while, that's a lovely ride. not easy though--it requires attention. and it messes with your head. what holds proper nouns together as a class is more what wittgenstein calls a family resemblance than the application of a particular rule. this is maybe a general hand-waving in the direction of an introduction. what the good comrade b-g outlined above is a sequence of oppositions that delimits (by showing) the boundary that separates inside/outside for the class "proper noun." you can grasp the distinction intuitively by looking at the list, which means the resemblance are most powerful when there's a sequence--you can see the regularity, and what you're talking about really with a class like "proper noun" is a resemblance. but when you go from description to generating--in other words when you abstract a rule from a sequence unified through a family resemblance--you get in to trouble. does that mean there is no rule? uh.. no. but does the fact of a rule explain the resemblance? uh.... no. but proper nouns as a class does seem to hold together.... but maybe the problem follows from a too-narrow interpretation of what a rule is. how would you bend the notion of a rule to incorporate the production(?) or reproduction (?) of a particular type of similarity? this is how wittgenstein ends up with the notion of family resemblance. but the underlying question is: so what exactly is a rule? and it's down the rabbithole. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite Last edited by roachboy; 04-20-2009 at 01:52 PM..