Meaning is Use Part I: Argument

While writing “Wittgenstein's Toolkit” it became clear to me that I have unfinished business with the notion of meaning as use. Several aspects of it still puzzle me. First off, I’m intrigued and slightly uneasy about the flow of Wittgenstein’s argument on this subject. In the course of the opening 43 sections his position (or, at least, his prima facie position) gradually appears to shift. I suspect this is intentional, but it can lead to a lot of head-scratching – indeed, each time I reach the end of §43 I wonder whether Wittgenstein really is claiming that meaning is use at all. I think we’d better consult the text.

The first mention of use comes in §1 when, after the “five red apples” scenario, the interlocutor asks: “But what is the meaning of the word ‘five’?” And the reply comes: “No such thing was in question here, only how the word ‘five’ is used.” Considered literally, this suggests that “meaning” and “use” have nothing to do with each other. Of course, Wittgenstein is being disingenuous; he’s preventing us (via the interlocutor) from dashing down a blind ally, and – for reasons yet to be explained – keeping us focused on use. Still, it’s a long way from “use, not meaning” to “use is meaning”.

That journey begins at §5 when he explains the role of his primitive language-games:

[….] the general concept of the meaning of a word surrounds the working of language with a haze which makes clear vision impossible. – It disperses the fog if we study the phenomena of language in primitive kinds of use in which one can clearly survey the purpose and functioning of the words.

Here, then, we have a connection in terms of helpfulness: when considering meaning it is helpful (demystifying) to look at use. Obviously, there’s still no claim that meaning is use, but the two have, so to speak, inched closer together.

Next, at §§8-9, Wittgenstein outlines an extended version of the builder’s game (introduced in §2) involving number-words, colour samples and indexicals. This prompts the following question: “Now what do the words of this language signify?” (§10). “Signify” is a slippery word in this context. For example, is it synonymous with “mean” or “indicate” or “denote” or all three? And is there a nod here to its technical use in semiotics? But such questions aside, there seems to be a clear link with the interlocutor’s question in §1. They both suggest an underlying impulse to correlate a word with a thing in order to explain meaning. This time, however, Wittgenstein’s reply is markedly different: “How is what they signify supposed to come out other than in the kind of use they have?” Here, it seems, the connection has shifted again: use is not merely helpful when considering meaning, it is essential.

The reply is provocative because it’s natural to assume that, when grasping signification, an object is what we really need rather than an account of use. To put it in Russellian terms, we want acquaintance but instead we’re being offered description as a more pertinent alternative. Actually, this is the start of Wittgenstein’s discussion of ostensive definition – a discussion which will rumble on intermittently over the next 30 or so sections. I am not going to address its specific points in this post, but it is important to note that a) his attack on the philosophical account of ostensive definition is an attack on the link between object and meaning, and b) it is indicative of Wittgenstein’s general approach that his substantive arguments in this area are almost all negative. He seems less concerned with proving that use has the right of succession than with killing off its rivals to the crown.

The importance of use is next suggested in §§19-20 during a discussion of how the command “Slab!” might be meant either as a single word or an elliptical version of “bring me a slab”. Here Wittgenstein is glancing at a second pretender to the throne: meaning as a mental object or activity. The temptation is to think that the key difference between the two ways someone might mean “Slab!” lies in “something different going on in him when he pronounces it” (§20). Wittgenstein argues against this, and at the end of the section suggests the strongest connection so far between meaning and use: “doesn’t their having the same sense consist in their having the same use?” As with “signify”, “sense” ought to be approached with caution; it doesn’t necessarily mean “meaning”. Assuming even a rough equivalence, however, we are confronted with the idea that use is not just an essential part of considering meaning; meaning consists in use. This is getting mighty close to saying that meaning is use. Note, however, that neither the comment at §10 nor the one at §20 are presented categorically. They are framed as questions. The onus is put on us to decide (and this, of course, is Wittgenstein’s therapeutic method in action). Nevertheless, it’s becoming progressively harder to miss the direction he wants us to go in.

So far meaning has been considered in three different guises: straightforwardly as “meaning” itself, as “signifying” and as “sense”. Each time, use has been implicated in the process, and each time its role has become more central: use helps clarify meaning (§5); only use shows what words signify (§10); and sense consists in use (§20). At §37, however, Wittgenstein turns his attention to naming (although this is prefigured at §15), and at §39 he introduces a pronoun in the guise of Siegfried’s magic sword “Nothung” (NB: previous translations of the Investigations substituted “Excalibur”). Here, it seems, we are tackling the word/object connection in its strongest possible manifestation. Surely, no matter how things function elsewhere, the meaning of a pronoun is the object it names? And this, of course, is precisely what Wittgenstein denies.

The discussion hinges upon making clear the hardness of the “is” involved in the statement “the object is the meaning”. This is an identity-claim, so it’s not like “grass is green” but like “Johnny Rotten is John Lydon”. (Note how “green is grass” is nonsense, but “John Lydon is Johnny Rotten” is not. Likewise, the nouns in “the object is the meaning” are interchangeable.) Wittgenstein’s task, then, is to force us to confront the full implications of this claim. To this end he points out that if the object (or person) is the meaning of the pronoun then the word must cease to have meaning if the object is destroyed (or dies) because the meaning itself is thereby destroyed. Yet clearly this doesn’t (usually) happen. Why not? In answering this, he first considers (§41) a situation where it would be right to say that the object’s destruction renders the word meaningless. If a named tool in the builder’s game is broken then it could be said that the symbol for that tool is meaningless, but only because the symbol no longer achieves anything. It has no use because no convention has been established about what to do in such a case. As soon as a convention is put in place (eg, builder B shakes his head whenever he’s asked for a broken object) then the symbol continues to function. It has a meaning because it has a use. In the same way, for us names have meaning in phrases such as "Jones is dead" because we have a whole series of linguistic conventions relating to talking about the deceased. In fact, such is the primacy of use over object as the grounds for meaning that it is even possible to imagine a meaningful name that signifies no object whatsoever (see §42). All the name needs is a role in the language-game. This, I think, amounts to a devastating attack on the attempt to equate “meaning” with “object”. The final stronghold has been breached.

During §§1-42 the object/meaning correlation is doggedly tracked through various manifestations, backed into a corner and exposed as empty. Surely now (we think) Wittgenstein can stop skirting round the issue and categorically assert that meaning is use? Instead, we get this:

For a large class of cases of the employment of the word “meaning” – though not for all – this word can be explained in this way: the meaning of a word is its use in the language.

And the meaning of a name is sometimes explained by pointing to its bearer.

Philosophical Investigations §43

Taken by itself, “the meaning of a word is its use in the language” is exactly the categorical statement we were hoping for. Unfortunately, it comes at the end of a passage which seems expressly designed to undercut the potency of its message and perhaps mangle it beyond recognition. Why, for example, has Wittgenstein suddenly moved from what meaning is (or isn’t) to how the word “meaning” is explained? What is the implication of the caveat “though not for all”? If some explanations of meaning don’t involve use, is it because the object is the meaning in such cases? But that would directly contradict the arguments outlined above! So if the explanation doesn’t involve use and the meaning isn’t the object then what the hell is meaning in such situations? And, anyway, which situations are we actually talking about? Which explanations of meaning fall under “though not for all”? And, while we’re listing our grievances, what are we supposed to make of the second paragraph of §43? It seems to fly in the face of the important distinction Wittgenstein makes at §40 between the meaning of a name and its bearer. Surely we don’t explain meaning by pointing at the bearer; we explain who the bearer is?

Once we’ve resisted the urge to throw our copy of the Investigations across the room, we might gather our litany of complaints into one central question: in what sense (if any) does Wittgenstein actually say that meaning is use? He spends a lot of time presenting powerful arguments to show what meaning isn’t, and all the while nudges us closer and closer to the idea that use is the only thing that fits the bill. But then, at the crucial moment, he seems to pull back. Or, rather, he both does and he doesn’t. He both says the words and retracts them at the same time. So instead of a straightforward declaration we get a caveat within a caveat that leaves us with more questions than answers.

How are we to make sense of this? I think the key lies in Wittgenstein’s descriptive approach to philosophy. Before we get to that, however, we need to consider an issue I side-stepped earlier: the role of ostensive definition. And that will be the subject of the next post.#

Meaning is Use Part II

Wittgenstein, Names, Meaning and Use

The first 45 sections of the Investigations touch upon a wide range of topics, but their central concern is to combat the picture of language suggested by the quote from Augustine in §1: “the words in language name objects [….] Every word has a meaning. This meaning is correlated with the word. It is the object for which the word stands.”

Wittgenstein’s first criticism of this account is that words do far more than simply name objects. The language-game he outlines in §2 (where a builder calls out “slab”, “block”, etc, and his assistant brings the appropriate objects) demonstrates this by its very primitiveness. Since our language goes way beyond the basic functions allowed for in Augustine’s description, his version clearly doesn’t capture the whole picture (a point Wittgenstein makes explicitly at §3-4).

In §8 Wittgenstein extends the building language-game to include number-words, colour samples and the words “this” and “there” – ie, examples of the sorts of features left out of Augustine’s account – and then (at §10) makes the following remark:  

Now what do the words of this language signify? – How is what they signify supposed to come out other than in the kind of use they have? And we have already described that.

The terminology here moves from “name” to “signify” – and the italics show that this is not meant to escape our notice. Why introduce this new term? Well, “signify” is akin to, but not identical with, “name”; it is broader, more diffuse – we can either say, for example, that the word “ring” names or signifies the object I put on someone’s finger; but while that ring can signify my love, it cannot name it. So (the thought goes) although we may concede that words do more than name, perhaps we can still show that something similar is going on by adopting “signify”.

Wittgenstein’s response to this rejects such a move. In fact, he seems to consider it an example of what he elsewhere (§254) calls a “typical expedient in philosophy” – in this case, using a flexible term (or form of words) to shoe-horn different activities into the same category. Thus, although it is possible to say both “’X’ signifies the number…” and “’Y’ signifies the colour…” this does not make the use of number-words and the use of colour samples the same any more than the word “ring” signifying a ring is the same as a ring signifying undying love. In a specific context “’X’ signifies the number…” could be useful – ie, it could remove a particular misunderstanding – but here it is part of an inappropriate imitation of scientific reductionism, blurring the facts rather than revealing an underlying connection. Indeed the fact that it is possible to represent markedly different activities using the same basic sentence-structure is one of the linguistic features that tempts us to assume there is such a thing as the “ultimate essence” of language. For me, Wittgenstein debunks this spurious type of assimilation rather effectively when he says (§22):

We might very well also write every assertion in the form of a question followed by an affirmative expression; for instance, “Is it raining? Yes!” Would this show that every assertion contained a question?

Notice also how Wittgenstein’s immediate response to the question at §10 is to bring things back to the matter of use. This is a recurrent pattern in the Investigations: a particular notion (or theory) of meaning leads to puzzlement at which point we are urged to consider how the relevant word or phrase is actually used in various situations.

Why does this help? Because words are like tools (§11) and language is what we do with those tools. And so “what does this word mean?” is akin to “what is this tool for?” or “how is it used?” And, as with tools, the answer may not be as straightforward as you think. Consider a hammer: I can use it to knock in a nail, or pull a nail out, or smash away an obstruction or stop my instructions blowing away in the wind, or even as an ornament (but I can’t use it to glue a tile to the wall – not everything is “up for grabs” and it is significant that there are limits to the flexibility of language as well as hammers).

It follows from this that explaining meaning is not a matter of forming a reductive hypothesis but of painstakingly describing what we already know: how words are used. This insight will form the basis of Wittgenstein’s whole approach to philosophy.

The importance of use is glanced upon at various points in the Investigations’ opening sections until, at §43, he more or less lays his cards on the table:

For a large class of cases of the employment of the word “meaning” – though not for all – this word can be explained in this way: the meaning of a word is its use in the language.

And the meaning of a name is sometimes explained by pointing to its bearer.

I must admit, I have always found this crucial passage troubling. In fact, thinking about it often produces precisely the sort of “mental cramp” Wittgenstein mentions in relation to such questions as “What is meaning?” (The Blue Book, page 1).

I shall describe my confusion not simply to highlight my own dimness – though that’s always worth bearing in mind – but as an example of how infuriatingly difficult it is to break free of the misleading conceptions of language “which send us in pursuit of chimeras” (§94). Academic commentators such as (the excellent) Peter Hacker tend to make it look dauntingly easy: this is why the Augustinian picture of language doesn’t work, and this is the Wittgensteinian version we should replace it with. Job done. All I can say is that I’ve been studying Wittgenstein on and off for over twenty years and I still sometimes find myself falling into the same old traps. It is a comfort, however, to realise that Wittgenstein himself seems to have had a similar problem. Again and again in his later works he complains about how hard it is “to keep our heads above water” (§106) and only days before his death he commented “I do philosophy now like an old woman who is always mislaying something and having to look for it again; now her spectacles, now her keys” (On Certainty, §532).

Anyway, on with the philosophy. I have no difficulty with the general message of §43 (that meaning is use), but there is a further aspect to it which often sends my mind reeling, namely: what sorts of words does its caveat (“though not for all”) refer to? Take a moment to read the passage again, consider it, and see what you think.

It is all too easy to suppose that Wittgenstein is saying there are some types of words whose meaning is somehow “untainted” by any particular use. Such words would, so to speak, “carry their meaning with them” from situation to situation. It should go without saying that this is a startlingly un-Wittgensteinian conception (and that alone ought to alert us to the possibility that we’ve taken a wrong turn).

All the same, this reading seems to be confirmed by the final sentence of §43. Isn’t Wittgenstein here saying that in the case of proper names (eg, “Jones”) the bearer is the meaning of the name? That would at least provide an example of a word which carried its meaning with it, but it would also directly contradict a point Wittgenstein has emphatically made just three sections earlier:

It is important to note that it is a solecism to use the word “meaning” to signify the thing that ‘corresponds’ to a word. That is to confound the meaning of a name with the bearer of the name.

Philosophical Investigations §40

Either we conclude that Wittgenstein has made a remarkable blunder and started arguing against himself, or we go back and think more carefully about what he’s actually saying in §43. So which is it?

Well, after a lot of thought, I realised this: §43 is simply about the different ways we explain the term “meaning”. It says we do not always explain meaning in terms of use. It does not say that there are some words whose meaning is totally independent of their use. One might reword it as follows:

“In most cases the employment of ‘meaning’ can be explained as a reference to the use of the word in question. A description of use is what we mean by ‘meaning’ in such cases. But even when it is not done this way – eg, where a name’s meaning is explained by pointing at the bearer – it is still not the case that the bearer is the meaning.”

Or, to put it in the form of a dialogue:

A: What is meant by “meaning”?

B: Most of the time the meaning of a word is its use in the language. But in this case I explain the meaning of “Jones” by pointing to him, thus →.

A: So he → is the meaning of “Jones”?

B: No! He is a human being. How can a human being be a meaning? No object can be a meaning because meaning is not a thing. He → is the bearer of the name “Jones” – in other words, he is the person I want you to bring when I say “fetch me Jones”.

Or, finally, to express it as a grammatical distinction: One does not say, “Hello, I am the meaning of the word ‘Jones’.” One says, “Hello, I am Jones.”

Even as I typed them out, I could feel my grasp of the above points squirming to get away from me. There is something eerie about how difficult it is to keep these (seemly simple) conceptual distinctions in focus. Again, this was something Wittgenstein often remarked upon:

 [Philosophical problems] are solved through an insight into the workings of our language, and that in such a way that these workings are recognized - despite an urge to misunderstand them. [...] Philosophy is a struggle against the bewitchment of our understanding by the resources of our language.

Philosophical Investigations §109