Philosophy in the modern world a new history of western philosophy, volume 4 (new history of western philosophy) ( PDFDrive ) (1) 151

LANGUAGE The relationship between the toys in court is a fact, and this led Wittgenstein to say that a picture, a proposition, is a fact and not a mere collection of objects or names It is a fact that could have been otherwise The possibility of structure—in the case of the toys in court, their threedimensionality—is called by Wittgenstein pictorial form Pictorial form is what pictures have in common with what they picture, the common element that enables one to be a picture of the other at all Thus, a picture represents a possibility in the real world (TLP 2.161) How does the picture connect with the reality it represents? This is done by the choice of an object qua object with a certain pictorial form If I select a set of toys as three-dimensional proxies for three-dimensional objects, I at the same time make their three-dimensional properties the pictorial form of the picture I make the connection with reality by making the correlation between the elements of the picture and the elements of the situation it is to represent How I make this correlation? When he wrote the Tractatus Wittgenstein thought this was an empirical matter of no importance to philosophy Pictures can be more or less abstract, more or less like what they picture: their pictorial form can be more or less rich The minimum that is necessary if a picture is to be able to portray a situation is called by Wittgenstein logical form (TLP 2.18) The elements of the picture must be capable of combining with each other in a pattern corresponding to the relationship of the elements of what is pictured Thus, for instance, in a musical score the ordering of the notes on the page from left to right represents the ordering of the sounds in time The spatial arrangements of the notes is not part of the pictorial form, since the sounds are not in space; but the ordering is common to both, and that is what is logical form Wittgenstein applied his general theory of representation to thoughts and to propositions A logical picture of a fact, he said, is a thought, and in the proposition a thought is expressed in a manner perceptible to the senses (TLP 3, 3.1) Though, in the Tractatus, thoughts are prior to propositions and give life to propositions, Wittgenstein has much less to tell us about thoughts than about propositions, and in order to understand him it is better to focus on propositions as pictures than on thoughts as pictures If we ask what are the elements of thoughts, for instance, we are given no clear answer; but if we ask what are the elements of propositions an answer immediately presents itself: names 134