Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951)
Author of Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
About the Author
Born in Vienna, Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein was educated at Linz and Berlin University. In 1908 he went to England, registering as a research student in engineering at the University of Manchester. There he studied Bertrand Russell's (see also Vol. 5) Principles of Mathematics by chance and show more decided to study with Russell at Cambridge University. From 1912 to 1913, he studied under Russell's supervision and began to develop the ideas that crystallized in his Tractatus. With the outbreak of World War I, he returned home and volunteered for the Austrian Army. During his military service, he prepared the book published in 1921 as the Tractatus, first translated into English in 1922 by C. K. Ogden. Wittgenstein emerged as a philosopher whose influence spread from Austria to the English-speaking world. Perhaps the most eminent philosopher during the second half of the twentieth century, Wittgenstein had an early impact on the members of the Vienna Circle, with which he was associated. The logical atomism of the Tractatus, with its claims that propositions of logic and mathematics are tautologous and that the cognitive meaning of other sorts of scientific statements is empirical, became the fundamental source of logical positivism, or logical empiricism. Bertrand Russell adopted it as his position, and A. J. Ayer was to accept and profess it 15 years later. From the end of World War I until 1926, Wittgenstein was a schoolteacher in Austria. In 1929 his interest in philosophy renewed, and he returned to Cambridge, where even G. E. Moore came under his spell. At Cambridge Wittgenstein began a new wave in philosophical analysis distinct from the Tractatus, which had inspired the rise of logical positivism. Whereas the earlier Wittgenstein had concentrated on the formal structures of logic and mathematics, the later Wittgenstein attended to the fluidities of ordinary language. His lectures, remarks, conversations, and letters made lasting imprints on the minds of his most brilliant students, who have long since initiated the unending process of publishing them. During his lifetime Wittgenstein himself never published another book after the Tractatus. However, he was explicit that the work disclosing the methods and topics of his later years be published. This work, Philosophical Investigations (1953), is esteemed to be his most mature expression of his philosophical method and thought. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Image credit: Photo by Moritz Nähr / Ludwig Wittgenstein circa 1930 / Photo © ÖNB/Wien
Series
Works by Ludwig Wittgenstein
The Blue and Brown Books (Preliminary Studies for the Philosophical Investigations) (1958) 1,328 copies
Tractatus logico-philosophicus. Tagebücher 1914 - 1916. Philosophische Untersuchungen. (1960) 108 copies
Wittgenstein's Lectures on the foundations of mathematics, Cambridge, 1939 : from the notes of R.G. Bosanquet, Norman… (1976) 107 copies
Last Writings on the Philosophy of Psychology: Preliminary Studies for Part II of Philosophical Investigations, Vol. 1 (1982) 66 copies
Wittgenstein's Lectures, Cambridge, 1930-1932: From the notes of John King and Desmond Lee (Phoenix Series) (1980) 49 copies
Last Writings on the Philosophy of Psychology: The Inner and the Outer, 1949 - 1951, Volume 2 (1993) 39 copies
Letters to C.K. Ogden With Comments on the English Translation of the Tractatus Logico-Philosophus (1973) 31 copies
Ludwig Wittgenstein, Cambridge Letters: Correspondence With Russell, Keynes, Moore, Ramsey and Sraffa (1995) 12 copies
Os pensadores: Wittgenstein 9 copies
Wittgenstein 5 copies
Philosophica : Tome 3, Conférence sur l'éthique, Remarques sur le rameau d'or de Frazer, Cours… (2001) 3 copies
The Essential Wittgenstein 2 copies
Ludwig Wittgenstein, Briefe und Begegnungen — Author — 1 copy
ricerche filosofiche 1 copy
Wittgenstein [Opere di] 1 copy
Wittgenstein (Volume quarto) 1 copy
Revue Europe 906, Octobre 2004 : Wittgenstein — Contributor — 1 copy
Du 586: Weiss 1 copy
The Quotable Wittgenstein 1 copy
Rules and Private Language 1 copy
Wittgenstein Ludwig 1 copy
Some Remarks on Logical Form 1 copy
Scritti scelti 1 copy
Os pensadores 1 copy
Annotazioni filosofiche 1 copy
Isomorfismo 1 copy
Obras Wittegenstein I 1 copy
Wittgenstein's Nachlass 1 copy
درباره اخلاق و دین 1 copy
Vortrak über Ethik 1 copy
Lectures, Cambridge 1 copy
Cultura e Valor 1 copy
Tark Aur Darshan Ka Vivechan 1 copy
Wittgenstein (Volume terzo) 1 copy
Associated Works
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Canonical name
- Wittgenstein, Ludwig
- Legal name
- Wittgenstein, Ludwig Josef Johann
- Other names
- WITTGENSTEIN, Ludwig Josef Johann
WITTGENSTEIN, Ludwig - Birthdate
- 1889-04-26
- Date of death
- 1951-04-29
- Burial location
- Ascension Parish Burial Ground, Cambridge, UK
- Gender
- male
- Nationality
- Austria (birth)
UK (naturalized 1939) - Country (for map)
- Austria
- Birthplace
- Vienna, Austria-Hungary
- Place of death
- Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, England, UK
- Cause of death
- prostate cancer
- Places of residence
- Vienna, Austria
Linz, Austria
Berlin, Germany
Manchester, England, UK
Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, England, UK
Skjolden, Norway (show all 7)
Trattenbach, Austria - Education
- University of Cambridge (PhD|Philosophy|1929)
Technical University of Berlin (Dipl.|1908)
Victoria University of Manchester - Occupations
- philosopher
professor
logician
mathematician - Relationships
- Russell, Bertrand (teacher)
Moore, G. E. (teacher)
Anscombe, G. E. M. (student)
Black, Max (student)
Geach, Peter (student)
Malcolm, Norman (student) (show all 9)
Wright, Georg Henrik von (student)
Engelmann, Paul (friend)
Ambrose, Alice (student) - Organizations
- University of Cambridge
Austro-Hungarian Army (WWI) - Awards and honors
- Band of the Military Service Medal with Swords (1918)
Silver Medal for Valour, First Class (1917)
Military Merit Medal with Swords on the Ribbon (1916) - Short biography
- Ludwig Wittgenstein, born in Vienna, Austria to a wealthy family, is considered by some to have been the greatest philosopher of the 20th century. He continues to influence philosophical thought in topics as varied as logic and language, perception and intention, ethics and religion, aesthetics and culture. As a soldier in the Austrian army in World War I, he was captured in 1918 and spent the remaining months of the war in a prison camp, where he wrote the notes and drafts of his first book, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. It was published in 1921 in German and then translated into English the following year. In the 1930s and 1940s, he conducted seminars at Cambridge University, his alma mater, and wrote his second book, Philosophical Investigations, which was published posthumously. His conversations, lecture notes, and letters, have since been published in several volumes, including Ludwig Wittgenstein and the Vienna Circle, The Blue and Brown Books, and Philosophical Grammar.
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- Works
- 148
- Also by
- 9
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- ISBNs
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- Favorited
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