Preproceedings 2006 - Austrian Ludwig Wittgenstein Society

Normativity, Experience and Concrete Case
Regina Queiroz, New University of Lisbon, Portugal
In the pragmatic conception of Wittgenstein’s language,
rules are neither exact nor definitively established (PI 68).
Philosophical studies should not be understood as
preliminary stages for a determined end of an exact and
total regulation (Ibid., 88, 133) of the use of language,
without taking into consideration the specific case of what
the rule applies to. Philosophy should consider specific
cases in the application of rules. It is not a mere
description of the use of language rules, but includes
reflection on the adequate or inadequate criteria for the
application of rules to concrete cases.
This relationship between rules and concrete cases
links philosophy to experience. The criticism of the ideal of
the definitive answer of logical rules to philosophical
questions, independently of experience (Ibid., 92), and the
association of clarity to experience (Ibid., 180), show how
the deliberation of normative philosophy is empirical.
Wittgenstein, however, maintains the problematic
distinction between grammatical and empirical propositions
(Ibid., 251) on the basis of the criteria of indubitableness,.
The indubitable rules are grammatical, philosophical and
normal and the dubious rules are empirical and abnormal
(Ibid., 142). But what should the philosopher do when he is
confronted with empirical propositions? He may invoke a
rule that eliminates the uncertainties. This solution, which
offers a criterion for the application of rules — between two
competing rules of action, we should follow the one that
produces the more evident consequences (Ibid., 238), and
is correct in its application (Ibid., 324) — implies
undesirable consequences. It excludes from the domain of
philosophy the ambiguity of language and is not an
attainable end, even in the perspective of the requirement
of indubitableness, associated to ambiguity. Let’s suppose
that the same rule is followed indubitably by two people, as
it so happens, for example, in the image of the forefinger.
Although the opposing directions correspond, in the
perspective of who sees them, to indubitable rules, its dual
aspect implies contrary orders to which people give
different answers. Rules do not determine definitively
concrete cases, nor do they imply a determinist and
internal relation to the concrete case as defended by
Baker and Hacker. For them, the +2 rule determines once
and for all an unlimited series of possible cases and there
is no ‘third thing’ between the rule and the act (Baker and
Hacker, 1985, 243). This is seen as an extension, because
when the rule is given so too is its extension (Ibid.). For
that reason, I refute their interpretation that grammatical
rules are normative, autonomous and arbitrary, but not
empirical. According to them, rules are normative because
they only delimit the limits of sense and arbitrary by not
being justified by reality (Ibid., 54). Grammatical rules are
also not empirical because they do not report to
descriptions, explanations or predictions (Ibid., 267).
Nevertheless, grammatical arbitrariness is delimited
by Wittgenstein when he clarifies that grammatical rules
are only arbitrary ‘if that is to mean that the aim of the
grammar is nothing but that of the language’ (PI 497). The
propositions have an end, that of determining the validity
of linguistic norms. This assertion is problematic because it
questions the notion of arbitrariness: grammatical
propositions are related to an end, that of determining the
normative validity of empirical propositions. The difference
between grammatical and empirical propositions also
points to an illegitimate distinction between propositions
referring to things, empirical propositions, those
susceptible to being true and false, and the propositions
that are purely logical, the grammatical ones. In
Philosophical Investigations the meaning of propositions
does not depend on the thing the word or proposition
refers to, but on its usage; and the grammatical
propositions refer to linguistic facts, associated with nonlinguistic
practices — the forms of life — such as
commanding, questioning, recounting, chatting, but also
walking, eating and playing (PI 25). Although there are
only five allusions to this concept in Philosophical
Investigations (Ibid., 19, 23, 24, II, i 174, xi 226), those
forms are the ultimate fact for which language, as an
activity, should refer to and are also the grounds for the
rules’ normativity. Before the contrary order, but
indubitable in the perspective of who follows it, such as it
was presented in the example of the forefinger, the criteria
that decides which of the two should offer a guide for the
action is an agreement regarding the forms of life (Ibid.,
224). These forms are an unequivocal sign of the
existence of an external relationship between rules and
acts.
Although Baker and Hacker establish a relationship
between forms of life and the process of following a norm
(Ibid., 242), both interpret the agreement on rules based
on the identity of the process of following them (Ibid., 249).
There is an agreement between rules because people
refer to the same actions ‘acting in accord with the rule’
(Ibid.). Since forms of life are plural and cultural (Ibid.,
241), they contradict the identity of the grammatical rule,
and cannot be the basis for the normativity of rules.
The valorisation of the identity of the norm with itself
and the Wittgensteinian distinction between philosophical
and empirical propositions, grounded in their
indubitableness, seems to justify their interpretation.
Wittgenstein reiterates the importance of the equality of
the rule with itself (PI 222, 223). However, the importance
of the valorisation of the relationship of rules with concrete
cases diminishes the preoccupation with its identity and
the distinction between grammatical and empirical
propositions.
In the description of the nature of understanding,
Wittgenstein criticizes himself for having shared the idea
that who pronounces a proposition and understands it puts
a calculation functioning with determined rules (Ibid., 81).
This conception of thought is refuted when, concerning the
understanding of a rule, it refuses the identification of the
expression “Now I know how to go on” as ‘short for a
description of all the circumstances which constitute the
scene for our language game’ (Ibid., 179). This
abbreviation supposes that in its enunciation the totality of
conditions that determine it are given (Ibid.,183). But,
understanding, thinking, consists in the application of rules
to concrete cases.
Applying, besides being a criterion for
understanding (Ibid., 146), consists in projecting an image
(Ibid., 139), whose expectation of application is based on
the fact that people generally make that application (Ibid.,
141). This projection depends on the circumstances,
whose importance for understanding is evidenced when
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