Western Books to Start With, Part 4

Philosophical Investigations, by Ludwig Wittgenstein. 4th Edition. West Sussex, U.K.: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009 (first edition published posthumously in 1953).

(Review by Tomas Sander)

Ludwig Wittgenstein, born in 1889 in Vienna, Austria, is one of the most influential and charismatic philosophers of the 20th century. A Google search for his name in July 2012 brought up 10.6 million hits. He is the subject of at least four authoritative book-length biographies. He had a reputation as a fiery, passionate, unconventional, insightful and brilliant intellect. In the middle of the 20th century, he revolutionized philosophy by putting language front and center:

Like anything metaphysical, the harmony between thought and reality is to be found in the grammar of the language.

This is astounding. Shouldn't the harmony between thought and language be guaranteed by something “objective,” rather than something as loose and malleable as grammar?

Wittgenstein takes us through a philosophical “therapy” at the end of which we realize the emptiness of many of our philosophical demands and certainties about the world. He shows us the non-sensicality of our common theories of how language operates, what rules are and how we think we can “truly” follow them.

He also takes a fresh look at our inner states, thoughts, feelings. He undermines the idea that we have absolute, independent, self-explanatory access to them. His journey goes even deeper to include such mainstays of our certainty and rigidity as mathematics and logic. He thereby liberates us from the idea that even these endeavors have any claim on absolute truth.

Philosophical Investigations

If you are studying emptiness, then Philosophical Investigations is the best Wittgenstein's book to begin with. First published in 1953, this is an anti-realist masterpiece, deconstructing objectivity and absolute certainties in novel and effective ways.

It is, however, a difficult read. Not because it presents highly technical philosophy, but because its method, aim and goals are so unusual. Unlike most authors in philosophy, Wittgenstein doesn't present a particular theory or linear arguments that he wants the reader to believe. Instead, he gives you lots of examples aimed to free you from deeply held philosophical assumptions.

Emptiness teachings have a similar goal. What makes Philosophical Investigations powerful for an emptiness student is that it addresses highly salient targets such as our inner states. For example, we tend to believe that we understand inner states such as sensations, beliefs, understanding, pain, perceptions through introspection alone. We think of these things as if they were given to us in a direct and self-explanatory way. It makes them seem as if they existed “all by themselves” or “inherently” as the Madhyamakas would say.

But by showing how these states depend on language, Wittgenstein leads you to a place where it doesn't make any more sense to think that they exist all by themselves. These are seminal insights for an emptiness student, because inner states are so crucial to what we take ourselves to be. Once they are seen as dependent and not foundational, then a lot of other sticky notions such as “identity” and “self” are loosened up as well.

Marie McGinn's Commentary

As you might expect for a writer with over 10 million Google hits, there is an entire commentarial body of literature on Wittgenstein. One of the most readable and insightful commentaries has been written by Marie McGinn. Her introduction, Wittgenstein and the Philosophical Investigations, makes Wittgenstein's great book accessible to the beginner. McGinn focuses on Wittgenstein's therapeutic approach to philosophy, which is exactly what an emptiness student would want to get from Wittgenstein.

Working one's way through her book is deeply rewarding. I found several things to happen to me along the way. I found a new sense of freedom from rules and laws, and a lightness that came from seeing the supposedly inherent self as illusory. I also found an expansiveness and openness of being that came from giving up the Cartesian dualism of “inner” and “outer.”