[koglist] invitation to a talk on "How to express things in works - Envisioning Wittgenstein's Tractatus - 2 October, 5.30 PM

From the point of view of the later Wittgenstein, his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus can be read as providing an (albeit incomplete) reconstruction of a particular language game and its attendant form of life, namely the game of (scientifically) describing the world, or of producing a catalogue of true statements about the world. This catalogue enumerates facts, and not things - and this is because facts but not things can be expressed in speech (ausgesprochen). Wittgenstein's point but also the limits of his project become salient when expression-in-speech is contrasted to other forms of expression, e.g. musical expression or the expression of values through the life one leads. When these are taken into consideration, the world of things also comes back into view - and the question arises how things are expressed e.g. in an artwork, in a technical device, or in technoscientific working knowledge.