Ludwig Wittgenstein Quotes - Page 14

Just be indipendent of the external world, so you don't have to fear for what's in it.

We could present spatially an atomic fact which contradicted the laws of physics, but not one which contradicted the laws of geometry.

That which cannot be said must not be said. That which cannot be said, one must be silent thereof.

Frazer is much more savage than most of his savages, for they are not as far removed from the understanding of spiritual matter as a twentieth-century Englishman. His explanations of primitive practices are much cruder than the meaning of these practices themselves.

Black seems to make a colour cloudy, but darkness doesn't. A ruby could thus keep getting darker without ever becoming cloudy; but if it became blackish red, it would become cloudy.

Golden is a surface colour.

One age misunderstands another; and a petty age misunderstands all the others in its own ugly way.

One can defend common sense against the attacks of philosophers only by solving their puzzles, i.e., by curing them of the temptation to attack common sense.

Schiller writes in a letter [to Goethe, 17 December 1795] of a 'poetic mood'. I think I know what he means, I think I am familiar with it myself. It is the mood of receptivity to nature and one in which one's thoughts seem as vivid as nature itself.

Only let's cut out the transcendental twaddle when the whole thing is as plain as a sock on the jaw.

It is one of the chief skills of the philosopher not to occupy himself with questions which do not concern him.

Logic must look after itself. In a certain sense, we cannot make mistakes in logic.

All propositions are of equal value.

Our civilization is characterized by the word "progress." Progress is its form rather than making progress being one of its features. Typically it constructs. It is occupied with building an ever more complicated structure. And even clarity is sought only.

The form is the possibility of the structure.

If we were to imagine an orange on the blue side or green on the red side or violet on the yellow side, it would give us the same impression as a north wind coming from the southwest.

Burning in effigy. Kissing the picture of one's beloved... it aims at nothing at all; we just behave this way and then we feel satisfied.

Your questions refer to words; so I have to talk about words. You say:;: The point isn't the word, but its meaning, and you think of the meaning as a thing of the same kind as the word, though also different from the word. Here the word, there the meaning.

In the world everything is as it is and happens as it does happen. In it, there is no value, - and if there were, it would be of no value.

This procedure [selecting the simplest law], however, has no logical justification but only a psychological one.

It is possible--indeed possible even according to the old conception of logic--to give in advance a description of all 'true' logical propositions. Hence there can never be surprises in logic.

Everything that can be thought at all can be thought clearly. Everything that can be said can be said clearly. Ludwig Wittgenstein