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ERIC Number: EJ807528
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2008-Sep
Pages: 17
Abstractor: As Provided
Reference Count: 0
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0013-1857
Wittgenstein's "Relativity": Training in Language-Games and Agreement in "Forms of Life"
Stickney, Jeff
Educational Philosophy and Theory, v40 n5 p621-637 Sep 2008
Taking Wittgenstein's love of music as my impetus, I approach aporetic problems of epistemic relativity through a round of three overlapping (canonical) inquiries delivered in contrapuntal (higher and lower) registers. I first take up the question of scepticism surrounding "groundless knowledge" and contending paradigms in "On Certainty" (physics versus oracular divination, or realism versus idealism) with attention given to the role of "bedrock" certainties in providing stability amidst the Heraclitean flux. I then look into the formation of sedimented bedrock knowledge, or practices of knowing, by comparing Wittgenstein's remarks on animal habituation and initiate training into human forms of life. In the latter case, mastery of techniques--our common education--secures agreement in judgment. Finally, I entertain Wittgenstein's obscure references to Einstein's Relativity in "Zettel", showing initiate training as a way of "setting the clocks" with variable degrees of certainty, relative to the language-games played. Together, these three approaches help us to stop the "endless circling" when philosophers try to address knowledge questions through the logic of object and designation, or verification of correspondence between propositions and things. Instead, attention moves to the way we educate our children and how we employ agreements and bedrock certainties in practices.
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Descriptive
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers: N/A