Here are 100 books that The Early Wittgenstein on Metaphysics, Natural Science, Language and Value fans have personally recommended if you like
The Early Wittgenstein on Metaphysics, Natural Science, Language and Value.
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I have been reading Wittgenstein since I was an undergraduate student in the mid-nineties. Later in life, I designed courses on Wittgenstein’s philosophy and taught them for almost two decades. I wrote numerous articles on Wittgenstein and became the treasurer, and later the secretary, of the British Wittgenstein Society. My book, Wittgenstein on Other Minds, was first published last year and is now out in paperback. I am currently writing a book titled Wittgenstein’s Lion for Bloomsbury.
No top five list of books on Wittgenstein would be complete without Ray Monk’s magisterial biography Wittgenstein: The Duty of Genius.
This was the first biography to cover Wittgenstein’s entire life. It possesses the rare achievement of relating difficult philosophical ideas to the subject’s personality in a manner that remains highly readable without sacrificing depth.
I challenge anyone to read it and not want to then read Wittgenstein’s works!
It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.
The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run…
I have been reading Wittgenstein since I was an undergraduate student in the mid-nineties. Later in life, I designed courses on Wittgenstein’s philosophy and taught them for almost two decades. I wrote numerous articles on Wittgenstein and became the treasurer, and later the secretary, of the British Wittgenstein Society. My book, Wittgenstein on Other Minds, was first published last year and is now out in paperback. I am currently writing a book titled Wittgenstein’s Lion for Bloomsbury.
I first read Peter Hacker’s Insight and Illusion in its second edition, when studying for my undergraduate degree.
One of the things I loved about it was that its author did not shy away from heavily criticizing his own past interpretation of Wittgenstein in the book’s first edition.
Insight and Illusion was the first single-authored book to cover all phases of Wittgenstein’s life and thought. There have been many excellent introductions to Wittgenstein since then, not least those by Severin Schroeder, Edward Kanterian, and Chon Tejedor, but I&I (as I like to call it) shall always remain my first love.
I was honoured to write the Foreword to its 3rd edition in 2021.
Peter Hacker's Insight and Illusion is a thoroughly comprehensive examination of the evolution of Wittgenstein's thought from the Tractatus to his later 'mature' phase. This is a reprint of the revised and corrected 1989 edition, with a new foreword by Constantine Sandis. Hacker's book is now widely regarded as the best single volume study covering both the 'early' and the 'later' Wittgenstein. Until this third edition, the book had been out of print for 25 years.
I have been reading Wittgenstein since I was an undergraduate student in the mid-nineties. Later in life, I designed courses on Wittgenstein’s philosophy and taught them for almost two decades. I wrote numerous articles on Wittgenstein and became the treasurer, and later the secretary, of the British Wittgenstein Society. My book, Wittgenstein on Other Minds, was first published last year and is now out in paperback. I am currently writing a book titled Wittgenstein’s Lion for Bloomsbury.
Danièle Moyal-Sharrock’s Understanding Wittgenstein’s On Certainty was the first book to offer a serious systematic treatment of Wittgenstein’s posthumously published final notes On Certainty.
As well as giving rise to the notion of a ‘Third Wittgenstein’, whose thoughts have moved beyond both his first book (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus) and his second work (Philosophical Investigations), Moyal-Sharrock’s groundbreaking work paved the way for Hinge Epistemology.
Based on Wittgenstein’s metaphor of a hinge for those ungrounded underpinnings of knowledge (without which we could not even have any true or false beliefs), this school of thought has brought Wittgenstein back into mainstream philosophy with a vengeance.
This book sheds unprecedented light on Wittgenstein's third masterpiece, On Certainty , clarifying his thoughts on basic beliefs and rebuttal of scepticism. As an introduction and commentary on Wittgenstein's final major philosophical work, Moyal-Sharrock's book will prove an indispensable guide to the student, scholar and general reader.
I have been reading Wittgenstein since I was an undergraduate student in the mid-nineties. Later in life, I designed courses on Wittgenstein’s philosophy and taught them for almost two decades. I wrote numerous articles on Wittgenstein and became the treasurer, and later the secretary, of the British Wittgenstein Society. My book, Wittgenstein on Other Minds, was first published last year and is now out in paperback. I am currently writing a book titled Wittgenstein’s Lion for Bloomsbury.
One of the many reasons why I love Marie McGinn’s book is that she distinguishes ‘the real problem of others’ from the philosophical problem of 'other minds'.
McGinn’s discussion is informed both by Wittgenstein’s work and by Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s discussions of the various uncertainties that are rooted in the lived experience of our coexistence with others.
While Wittgenstein was pessimistic about our ability to understand one another, McGinn takes care to point out that he was "deeply opposed to the idea that our everyday doubts about others amount to a way of 'living scepticism'." Our doubts about others, no matter how justified, are no vindication of any form of scepticism.
Central to any interpretation of Wittgenstein's later philosophy is an understanding of his philosophical method and the nature of the turn which characterises the evolution from his early to his later work. In the essays in Wittgenstein, Scepticism and Naturalism, Marie McGinn argues that this methodological shift has at its heart a highly distinctive form of naturalism, which has its roots in the works of Goethe. This form of naturalism emphasises achieving a clarified view of complex, natural phenomena in their natural setting, with a view to describing patterns and connections that are in plain view. Wittgenstein is seen as…
I am a philosopher of language (and of art) and have been for 30+ years. Why philosophy of language? Well, it encourages a certain salutary kind of self-consciousness—which is extremely valuable to philosophy—and facilitates greater rigor. But it only got going some one hundred and twenty years ago. So it's modern(ish) as well as deep. And whereas it might seem a narrow slice of the philosophical pie, it isn't; it seems to provide fruitful ways of thinking for almost any philosophical subject. For example, rather than 'What is X?', we ask 'What do we mean by "X"?'; a subtle difference perhaps but the change in perspective might be a key.
I first read this book at age twenty-one and have never stopped returning to it. It gets better and deeper each time.
Ludwig teaches that language and reality are bound up in so many ways. It also contains some famous themes and head-scratchers, such as language games, family resemblance, private language, and rule-following, discussed, as always, in a non-technical way.
Incorporating significant editorial changes from earlier editions, the fourth edition of Ludwig Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations is the definitive en face German-English version of the most important work of 20th-century philosophy The extensively revised English translation incorporates many hundreds of changes to Anscombe's original translation Footnoted remarks in the earlier editions have now been relocated in the text What was previously referred to as 'Part 2' is now republished as Philosophy of Psychology - A Fragment , and all the remarks in it are numbered for ease of reference New detailed editorial endnotes explain decisions of translators and identify references and…
Thomas Cathcart and Daniel Klein have been thinking deep thoughts and writing jokes for decades, and now they are here to help us understand philosophy through jokes, and jokes through philosophy. They like philosophy and they like jokes, not necessarily in that order. Best of all, they like combining them.
About Philosophy is an introductory text that covers all the major fields of philosophy in an easy-to-read language, interspersed with short selections from the major philosophers. It has been a best-selling leader in the field for more than forty years and it is written by an internationally recognized author of more than twenty books.
An Heir of Realms tells the tale of two young heroines—a dragon rider and a portal jumper—who fight dragon-like parasites to save their realms from extinction.
Rhoswen is training as a Realm Rider to work with dragons and burn away the Narxon swarming into her realm. Rhoswen’s dream is to…
I am a philosopher of language (and of art) and have been for 30+ years. Why philosophy of language? Well, it encourages a certain salutary kind of self-consciousness—which is extremely valuable to philosophy—and facilitates greater rigor. But it only got going some one hundred and twenty years ago. So it's modern(ish) as well as deep. And whereas it might seem a narrow slice of the philosophical pie, it isn't; it seems to provide fruitful ways of thinking for almost any philosophical subject. For example, rather than 'What is X?', we ask 'What do we mean by "X"?'; a subtle difference perhaps but the change in perspective might be a key.
I found this book's scientific rigor, systematicity, depth, and wisdom unmatchable. I liked "the passion for desert landscapes" together with the wit.
It’s not easy, at first, to see the philosophical significance of the discussion until you do, and you’re attracted to the idea that philosophy is too often a mere verbal tangle. Quine agrees, and he tries to explain why.
Willard Van Orman Quine begins this influential work by declaring, "Language is a social art. In acquiring it we have to depend entirely on intersubjectively available cues as to what to say and when." As Patricia Smith Churchland notes in her foreword to this new edition, with Word and Object Quine challenged the tradition of conceptual analysis as a way of advancing knowledge. The book signaled twentieth-century philosophy's turn away from metaphysics and what Churchland calls the "phony precision" of conceptual analysis.
In the course of his discussion of meaning and the…
As a clinical psychologist, I listen to thoughts all the time. I’m also having my own, constantly. We rely on our thoughts to help us navigate the world. However, our thoughts can also be a source of suffering. At times, they're not such reliable guides or helpers. Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is a way of thinking about thinking. ACT captured my imagination early in my clinical career. I trained with ACT’s originator, Steven Hayes, in the early 1990’s. I’ve come to believe that being more aware of our own thoughts, and our relationship to them is key to creating positive change and living a life grounded in our values.
In this witty and provocative book, psycholinguistics researcher Steven Pinker explores the role of language in shaping our experience of reality.
Human-style thinking would not be possible without our capacity for language. Thoughts are basically internal language. Among the basic experiences shaped by linguistics is our experience of time.
We use language to construct a spatial metaphor for time, thinking in terms of “moving” “forward” or “backward” in time. Pinker takes us for a walk around the metaphorical space of consciousness, examining how language shapes our experience of the world.
The Pulitzer Prize finalist author of The Blank Slate presents an accessible study of the relationship between language and human nature, explaining how everything from swearing and innuendo to prepositions and baby names reveal facts about key human concepts, emotions, and relationships.
I’ve been fascinated by languages since my teenage years, when I learned English, French, Spanish, Latin, Hebrew, and Esperanto—in addition to my native Russian. But it was in college that I decided to pursue linguistics as a profession! After spending 25 years conducting scientific research and teaching linguistics at various universities, I shifted my focus toward sharing linguistic science with a broader audience of lifelong learners. Whether or not these books inspire you to pursue linguistics as a career, I hope you find these books as enjoyable and rewarding as I have.
A whirlwind tour of what state-of-the-art linguistic science has to offer!
Even after 25 years of working in the field, I discovered fascinating new insights, ranging from how deaf children acquire sign languages to experimental efforts teaching human language to apes.
But what was especially fun for me was a behind-the-scenes glimpse into how Adger designed an alien language for a TV show. It truly inspired me to reflect on how I would have done it differently and how our personal experiences shape our work as scientists.
Language Unlimited explores the many mysteries about our capacity for language and reveals the source of its endless creativity.
All humans, but no other species, have the capacity to create and understand language. It provides structure to our thoughts, allowing us to plan, communicate, and create new ideas, without limit. Yet we have only finite experiences, and our languages have finite stores of words. Where does our linguistic creativity come from? How does the endless scope of language emerge from our limited selves?
Drawing on research from neuroscience, psychology, and linguistics, David Adger takes the reader on a journey to…
A poisonous maiden, a Daoist sex cult, and a violent insurgency.
The polyandrous Yan family in China's rural Shaanxi Province takes in two carpenter brothers. When one brother is convicted of murder after killing their neighbor in a dispute, a constable threatens to expose the family's rumored polyandry and extorts…
My very intelligent, very (self-described) un-literary father taught me all about the complexities and beauty of God. My librarian mother gave me the literature that would introduce me to the most profound descriptions of those complex beauties. As the author of Marvelous Light, numerous metaphor-dependent blog posts, and future allegorical novels, I hope to introduce each of my readers to the divine realities on which I depend daily.
Lakoff famously contends that metaphor is the crux of all human understanding. This classic academic, literary, philosophical, and sociological text suggests that at the root of what it means to be human is an absolute need to describe all experience and knowledge through comparison. Read More Than Cool Reason to begin gaining an appreciation for the theory of how metaphor makes us who we are and establishes our place in the universe.
"The authors restore metaphor to our lives by showing us that it's never gone away. We've merely been taught to talk as if it had: as though weather maps were more 'real' than the breath of autumn; as though, for that matter, Reason was really 'cool.' What we're saying whenever we say is a theme this book illumines for anyone attentive." - Hugh Kenner, Johns Hopkins University
"In this bold and powerful book, Lakoff and Turner continue their use of metaphor to show how our minds get hold of the world. They have achieved nothing less than a postmodern Understanding…
