Wittgenstein's own writings are far from lucid prose by the standards of the English speaking community.

His works are often complex and difficult to understand, presenting a challenge to those who attempt to engage with them. However, Janik and Toulmin offer an excellent introduction to the cultural milieu that helped shape his thought.

By exploring the historical, social, and intellectual context in which Wittgenstein developed his ideas, they provide the English speaking reader with an excellent backdrop to help decipher the meaning in his own thoughts.

This introduction not only enriches our understanding of Wittgenstein's work but also offers valuable insights into the broader cultural and intellectual currents of his time.

It serves as a useful guide for those who are new to Wittgenstein's thought and for those who wish to deepen their understanding of his ideas.

Overall, Janik and Toulmin's work is an important contribution to the study of Wittgenstein and a valuable resource for anyone interested in philosophy and intellectual history.

I first read Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (TLP) in a class in 1975.

In 1976 - 77, I decided to compile what I named a "Cultural-Historical Introduction to Wittgenstein's Tractatus." However, I soon found out that a similar book had been published in 1973, achieving almost everything I had intended to do, and doing it much better. This book is a must-read for anyone interested in the TLP.

This is approximately the 4th time I've read the book, but I'm only now listing it on Goodreads because my listings only cover what I've read since 2006. The book provides all the Austrian background to Wittgenstein that Anglophone students were generally not aware of.

I have recently returned to my original project - now as a collection of materials that influenced Wittgenstein in his composition of the TLP. So, I went back to this book for help in finding references. But it was more than just useful for that. The book is co-authored, and I have come to know the first author, Allan Janik. In fact, my current copy of the book is signed by him - he is a fine scholar and a great man.

He emphasizes the significance of Karl Kraus for formulating the problems that Wittgenstein addressed in the TLP. I recently read a new edition and commentary on some of Kraus's writings. Both books consider what Kraus means for today (even though "today" in this book was the early 1970s). While the applications in this book (Chapter 9) are a bit outdated, its account of Kraus and his relevance as a cultural critic is far better than Franzen's discussion.

Even if you're not a philosopher interested in Wittgenstein, this book offers a comprehensive account of cultural issues in general, touching on figures like Schoenberg (music), Loos (architecture), Musil (literature), Hertz (physics), and many others.

Too often, I find myself falling victim to the belief that something is good when in reality, it is only good for what it is. This is not just limited to books; it extends across various aspects of my life such as food, friends, romantic partners, movies, articles of clothing, and living situations. This particular book served as a reminder of what true "good" is. It made me realize that some of the books I had read in the past months, which I thought were "good," at least "for what they were," were actually not good at all. Encountering these kinds of books is crucial because they remind us that the human mind is indeed capable of brilliant thought, whether we believe it or not. They also reassure us that we are not crazy for thinking that a lot of other things are just mediocre, even if many people claim to have liked them. Because in truth, they often are.

Great stuff indeed! This is intellectual history that delves deeply into the philosophical conundrums of the age. It's not for the faint of heart. Prepare yourself for heavy doses of some of the most influential philosophers in history. Kant, with his complex theories on knowledge and morality, will challenge your thinking. Schopenhauer, known for his pessimistic view of the world, will make you question the meaning and purpose of life. Kierkegaard, the father of existentialism, will force you to confront your own existence and choices. And let's not forget Wittgenstein, whose work on language and logic revolutionized the field of philosophy. This is a journey through the minds of some of the greatest thinkers of all time, and it's sure to leave you with a new perspective on the world and your place in it.

The book contains a plethora of data, addresses, and names, along with a bit of Wittgenstein's life and ideas. However, it also provides a somewhat introduction to the public life and coffee culture of the Viennese elite from the second half of the 19th century to the first half of the 20th century.

Although there is a focus on various details and personal information, it also manages to give a glimpse into the social and cultural context of that particular time and place. The description of the Viennese elite's way of life and their coffee culture adds an interesting dimension to the narrative.

Overall, while the book may not be an in-depth exploration of Wittgenstein's philosophy or a comprehensive history of the Viennese society during that period, it does offer a unique blend of information that can pique the reader's interest and provide some valuable insights.

Truly interesting read!

This statement implies that the piece of writing being referred to is engaging and captivating. It piques the reader's curiosity and holds their attention from start to finish.

An interesting read can take many forms. It could be a fictional story with a unique plot and well-developed characters, or a non-fiction article that presents new and thought-provoking ideas.

When we describe something as a truly interesting read, we are highlighting its ability to transport us to another world, to make us think, and to evoke emotions within us.

Whether it's a thrilling mystery, a heartwarming romance, or an informative scientific study, an interesting read has the power to enrich our lives and expand our perspectives.

So, the next time you come across a book, article, or blog post that you find truly interesting, take a moment to appreciate the power of words and the joy of reading.

Wittgenstein has examined the social conditions and environments in which he has been. And the possible impacts that could be derived from the environment. Overall, it was good. But in many cases, it was not convincing!

Wittgenstein's exploration of the social conditions and environments is an important aspect of his work. By delving into these areas, he attempts to understand how they shape our experiences and thoughts. However, while his analysis has its merits, there are also limitations.

In some cases, his arguments may seem less than convincing. This could be due to a variety of reasons, such as insufficient evidence or a lack of clarity in his reasoning. Nevertheless, his work still provides valuable insights into the complex relationship between the individual and society.

Despite its shortcomings, Wittgenstein's examination of social conditions and environments remains an important contribution to the field of philosophy. It serves as a reminder of the significance of context in understanding human behavior and thought.

An interesting exploration of Wittgenstein and the Vienna where he spent his formative years. It delves into the Tractatus and situates it within a tradition of Viennese thought that I had been entirely ignorant of. This provides a fresh perspective on Wittgenstein's work and his intellectual context.

For those who are intrigued by Wittgenstein not only as a philosopher but also as a complex human being, this is a great read. It offers insights into the influences that shaped his ideas and the environment in which he developed his unique philosophical perspectives.

The article presents a fascinating account of Wittgenstein's relationship with Vienna and how it contributed to the formation of his philosophical oeuvre. It is a must-read for anyone interested in understanding the rich tapestry of Wittgenstein's life and thought.

I wonder if a book like this could’ve been written today? A book that tells the story of a city - Vienna - through the lens of a man - Wittgenstein - and then tries to understand his philosophy from within the context of the culture of the place and its preoccupations.

The book really begins from where Schorske's book, Fin de Siecle Vienna left off: a crumbling society. The first part of the book is very reminiscent of Schorske and goes over similar ground tracing this dying Hapsburg empire and the intellectual giants who, in reacting against the empire, pave the way for the modern world. There is less stress on architects Wagner and Loos and more stress - great stress on Karl Kraus. This then leads into a dazzling chapter on Kierkegaard. I was not aware that it was during this time in Vienna that he was basically discovered, maybe in the way Mendelssohn "discovered" Bach. For according to this book, Vienna was much taken over by Kierkegaard and Tolstoy.

Through this supposition, the authors then do what must have been a tour de force when the book came out in the 70s.

My undergraduate degree was in philosophy but I am not very knowledgeable about Wittgenstein. Of course, I knew he was considered to be a kind of founder of positivist philosophy, and I also recall some of his innovations in formal logic. But that said, I always felt so puzzled by his ladder remark and the way he absolutely insisted that his work (Tractatus) was being taken in the wrong way - in particular saying that Russell's introduction was completely wrong-headed. These two things were hard to understand. Because he never clarified sufficiently what he really meant and how Russell got it wrong but just insisted that Russell's interpretation of his work was completely wrong. He proceeded to walk away from philosophy (which in the end he was never formally a philosopher was he?) and wasn't heard from until his second book which did in fact attempt to undermine what he had done in Tractatus.

Many philosophers will say that it was either he or Heidegger who was the greatest mind in the 20th century. This is ludicrous. Even reading about his family and his wonderfully interesting life and realizing that he was a kind man and a good man (not the usual case with philosophers) still clearly Heidegger is the greatest philosophical mind of the 20th century.

Anyway, Janik and Toulmin then turn the Wittgenstein story on its head. Basically saying that Wittgenstein clarified what can and cannot be said (in his truth tables and postulates) and declared using a style not unlike the scientific method that we can call truth statements facts when they are borne out in the real world. But, that does not mean we are saying anything "true" about the real world but only what is true in how we perceive it. This is his ladder. Then instructing us to kick the ladder away (Wittgenstein's stroke of genius) he posits all the things in life worth thinking about as those which are not covered by truth tables... he specifically discusses ethics. I do not see any evidence that W was directly influenced by Kierkegaard, but reading W vis-a-vis Kierkegaard is extremely fruitful.

This book was a joy to read. An old-fashioned philosophy book. I have three copies. One so my husband could keep a copy in his briefcase and I wouldn't get annoyed when he never gave it back because I had my own and a second "me" copy because I found out how stunning the cover is on the first edition with W's face overlaid on a line drawing of the secessionist building in Vienna! Schorske's book, Fin de Siecle Vienna remains the most gorgeous paperback book I have but this one was quite wonderful to behold too!

An unusual book with an unexpected structure, it took time for me to warm up to it. But upon finishing, I was definitely a fan. Janick and Toulmin (J&T) initially seem to follow a similar path as Schorske’s “Fin-De-Siècle” and cover a similar cast of characters (Klimt, Schoenberg, Otto Wagner, Karl Lueger, Herzl).

However, they then delve into a philosophy-heavy meditative analysis of the interrelation between philosophy, science, ethics, and language. Finally, they level off with unintended side-effects for the future of western culture and intellectual thought.

In comparison to Schorske in part one of the book, J&T pay more attention to Karl Kraus and Adolf Loos than to Schindler and Wagner/Smitte. J&T show how Kraus and Loos assaulted the cultural status quo from independent but complementary directions. Kraus famously criticized the feuilleton as a genre that conflates reality and fantasy, blinding society to both. To Kraus, ethics is of paramount importance. He believes that modern man has lost his character and ethical vector, and Kraus is keen to reinject values and ethics into society through his writing.

Similarly, Loos, the architect’s architect, hated the conflation of form and function, as his war against unnecessary ornamentation attests. To him, an artistic ornament on a functional object is a sign of society refusing to deal with reality, and he may have had a point.

While Kraus and Loos were obsessed with reality vs fantasy and function vs form, Arnold Schoenberg was mainly concerned with discipline and inspiration. Schoenberg sensed how “inspiration” was becoming the necessary and sufficient condition for artistic expression and insisted that discipline and technical mastery of the underlying art-form must also be present. Inspiration without skill is ineffective. Given the state of modern art today, his fear was more than justified.

A&J also cover Hugo Hofemannsthal and his struggle with the limits of the “sayable”. I loved the story of his early beautiful Goethe-like poetry and how he abruptly stopped writing once he became more self-conscious and intellectual. This naturally leads to the limits of language and what it can represent.

Now A&J start shifting to science and philosophy. They discuss Ernst Mach, who was so radically anti-metaphysical that he denied the existence of atoms, even when Max Planck couldn’t convince him otherwise. A&J move on to Heinrich Hertz’s “models” and “pictures” as scientific representations, and of course, they cover Ludwig Boltzmann, entropy, and the space of possible states of a given system. Then we do a deep dive into Kant (limits of reason, a priori truths), Schopenhauer (critique of Kant, will and representation), and Kierkegaard (Christian tenor, indirect communication, individualism).

The stage is set for Wittgenstein: language is already compromised (Hofemannsthal, Mauthner), the exhaustion of post-Kantian analysis envelopes continental Europe, and GE Moore and Bertrand Russell are promoting the opium of analytic philosophy in Britain. Wittgenstein is well aware of all this and is also quite enamored with Kraus and his ethical vector. Wittgenstein believes that such a vector is best expressed through Kierkegaardian indirect communication, as seen in Tolstoy’s late writings, for example.

It is in this context that Wittgenstein writes his “Tractatus Logico-Philosophicos” in which he attempts to transcend the limits of language and generalize all of philosophy along Boltzmann-Hertz lines. That is, to consider language as a type of Hertz-like “model” and consider all valid Boltzmannian states that such a model can possibly express. It was a bold attempt indeed. After all, as a student of Russell, Wittgenstein must have been painfully aware of the failed attempts to systematize mathematics (i.e. Whitehead&Russell’s “Principia Mathematica”), let alone philosophy or language in general.

Nobody to this day fully understands what Wittgenstein was trying to say, but it is certain that instead of transcending language, he succeeded in delineating its limits. He brilliantly conveyed this himself in a letter to one of his publishers: “My work consists of two parts: of the one which is here [Tractatus], and of everything that I have not written. And precisely this second part is the important one”. A&J speculate that to fill the void of the missing second part, Wittgenstein would have directed his readers to the writings of Kraus and Tolstoy.

At the end of the book, A&J bring us back to Vienna where they assess the legacy left by the Viennese fin de siècle thinkers and the fate of their philosophies in the post-war European climate (20s/30s). Prepare to be unpleasantly surprised:

o Technical experimentation in arts and culture, which was meant as a means, became an end in itself. The technique became more important than the art itself, and we see the rise of disjoint bureaucratic professional circles that suppress creativity and prevent the cross-pollination of ideas among different disciplines.

o The ideas of Loos and Schoenberg were reinterpreted and co-opted: aesthetic functionalism for a unique purpose was perverted into a generic all-purpose structuralism.

o Perhaps most ironically, Wittgenstein’s “Tractatus” was repurposed as a manifesto for Austrian and German political positivists and social engineers.

Overall, it seems that the Viennese fin de siècle explosion of thinkers and theories, which aimed to subvert the old orthodoxies of the stifling Austro-Hungarian empire, simply brought about new ones. But I think we can generalize further and safely concede that the rotation of orthodoxy is not unique to Vienna in the early 20th century. Unfortunately, just like Steven Pinker’s “euphemism treadmill”, orthodoxies don’t die; they merely reincarnate. And that, my friends, is most likely a natural aspect of the human condition.

What really stuck with me in this cultural gloss of Wittgenstein's philosophy is the fascinating notion of a philosophical "phase space", or more simply, the boundaries of language and, by extension, philosophy.

Using the logical formalism developed by Russell, Wittgenstein meticulously characterizes the "possible states" of philosophical propositions. He then goes on to argue that truly rigorous ethical propositions are, in fact, impossible.

This is an incredibly engaging read, and it is truly surprising to see just how interconnected this cultural milieu was. For instance, Wittgenstein was set to study with Boltzmann, but unfortunately, the latter committed suicide. Additionally, Wittgenstein was involved in bankrolling Rilke.

These connections add another layer of depth and complexity to our understanding of Wittgenstein's philosophy and the cultural context in which it emerged. It makes one wonder about the many other hidden connections and influences that may have shaped this important philosophical work.

Overall, this exploration of Wittgenstein's philosophy through a cultural lens provides a fresh and interesting perspective that is well worth delving into.

Another book that I read for class was truly an interesting experience. Back then, when I first read it, I didn't quite understand it, and I would just laugh it off. However, upon taking a second look, I realized that it offers a completely different, philosophical, and extremely valuable cultural perspective on Vienna in 1900.

It's fascinating to see how the author presents the ideas and concepts related to that particular time and place. There are certain passages that still elude my understanding, and I readily admit that. But despite that, the overall essence and the unique insights provided in the book make it a worthwhile read.

It gives me a better understanding of the cultural and intellectual climate of Vienna during that era, and I can't help but appreciate the depth and complexity of the author's work.

I look forward to delving deeper into it and perhaps uncovering more of its hidden gems.