The Later Wittgenstein

In 1930, Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) returned to Cambridge, England and to philosophy, more than a decade after having solved, in his earlier work, all its problems to his satisfaction.  He now had some doubts.  In 1933, he began to dictate to his students a series of notes on his revolutionary new ideas "so that they might have something to carry home with them, in their hands if not in their brains."  These notes were not published during his lifetime but were circulated privately; they eventually came to be known as The Blue Book.  This course will primarily be a slow reading and discussion of this seminal, original, and radical work, and will serve as an introduction to Wittgenstein's later thought on language, mind, and philosophy.

 

Requisite: two courses in PHIL. Limited to 15 students. Spring semester. Professor George.