Wittgenstein and Levinas

Ethical and Religious Thought

Bob Plant

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2005
• ISBN:
  9781134270378
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Philosophy History & Theory

Wittgenstein and Levinas examines the oft-neglected relationship between the philosophies of two of the most important and notoriously difficult thinkers of the twentieth century. By bringing the work of each philosopher to bear upon the other, Plant navigates between the antagonistic intellectual traditions that they helped to share. The central focus on the book is the complex yet illuminating interplay between a number of ethical-religious themes in both Wittgenstein's mature thinking and Levinas's distinctive account of ethical responsibility.

1 Peaceful thoughts
Philosophy as therapy in Pyrrhonism and Wittgenstein

I have noticed that children are rarely afraid of thunder unless the claps are terrible and actually hurt the ear. Otherwise this fear only affects them when they know that the thunder sometimes hurts or kills. When reason brings fear, reassurance comes through habit.

Rousseau, Emile

A philosopher is always someone for whom philosophy is not given, someone who in essence must question the self about the essence and destination of philosophy.

Derrida, Ethics, Institutions, and the Right to Philosophy

Introduction

Wittgenstein once remarked that he had ‘reached a resting place’ insofar as he knew that his method was ‘right.’¹ He proceeded: ‘My father was a business man, and I am a business man: I want my philosophy to be business-like, to get something done, to get something settled’ (Drury 1981: 125–6). Despite Wittgenstein’s awareness of his ‘special’ philosophical ‘ability’ (ibid.: 91), for most of his life he was nevertheless ‘making plans to forsake this work and to live an entirely different mode of existence to that of the academic philosopher.’ Drury concludes:

Now we may indeed be glad that nothing final came of these various plans, and that he continued to work at his philosophical writings up to a few days before his death. But I am certain that we will not understand Wittgenstein unless we feel some sympathy and comprehension for his persistent intention to change his whole manner of life.

(1981: 92)

In short, Wittgenstein’s plans to change his life ‘were not just a transitory impatience but a conviction that persisted for years until the time came when he realized that such a change was no longer a possibility’ (ibid.). These reflections of one of Wittgenstein’s few close friends² are of both biographical and philosophical interest. Drury was right to emphasize that Wittgenstein’s desire to abandon philosophy was no mere psychological idiosyncrasy, but rather central to his conception of good philosophic practice.³ Moreover, in his insistence that we will misunderstand Wittgenstein’s work if we ignore this motivation–or overlook that his work had ‘a real goal’ (ibid.: 96)–Drury identifies the risks involved in ignoring Wittgenstein’s craving for the non-philosophical life.

Of course, conceding this does not eliminate the suspicion that it is Wittgenstein’s anti-philosophical conception of philosophy that betrays something deeply idiosyncratic. But such a judgement would be hasty. For although Wittgenstein rarely showed much interest in his philosophical predecessors,⁴ this should not be conflated with the claim that his approach to philosophy shares nothing with other philosophers. In this chapter I will argue that Wittgenstein’s ‘therapeutic’ conception of philosophy can be aligned with Pyrrhonian Skepticism–a deeply provocative mode of Greek thought revived in the sixteenth century.⁵ My reasons for pursuing this connection are threefold. First, because the Pyrrhonist’s own therapeutic framework provides a way of understanding the philosophical significance of Wittgenstein’s ‘persistent intention’ to abandon philosophy for something more pedestrian, insofar as both Pyrrhonism and Wittgenstein are guided by a philosophical ideal that aims at philosophy’s own undoing. Second, because Pyrrhonism raises a number of substantive questions (regarding, for example, the aporetic nature of judgement criteria, the existential stakes of belief, and the place of ‘the natural’ in philosophical practice) that not only parallel many of Wittgenstein’s concerns but also provide a touchstone for my subsequent engagement with ethical, political and religious themes. And third, because it is the significance of Wittgenstein’s later work for ethical-political questions that ultimately interests me, and specifically whether the philosophical ideal of ‘unperturbedness’ (advocated by both the Pyrrhonists and Wittgenstein) can be transformed into a broader existential ideal encompassing the ethical-political realm. In later chapters we will see how attempts to ‘politicize’ Wittgenstein have relied upon highly selective readings of his later work which neglect its underlying naturalism. Although Wittgenstein’s thought does have ethical-political significance,⁶ my contention is that these implications can only be understood if we take into account where his work relates to–and ultimately diverges from–Pyrrhonism. Before this can be substantiated, however, some of Pyrrhonism’s central motifs require elucidation.

The abandonment of belief: Pyrrhonian naturalism

Therapeutic techniques played a role in a number of Greco-Roman philosophies, but it is in Pyrrhonism that we find their most radical application.⁷ For the Pyrrhonist it is the human tendency toward belief per se that constitutes the malady requiring philosophical ‘treatment.’⁸ Only by eliminating this craving are we released from superfluous existential burdens and can thereby attain the requisite state of ataraxia–an ‘untroubled and tranquil condition of the soul’ (Sextus 1996: 1:10).⁹ It remains contentious whether Pyrrhonism should not be thought of as a technique to be mastered (but rather as a ‘disposition’ (ibid.: 1:8) to be inculcated) is ultimately cogent. Nevertheless, one can appreciate the motivation behind this demarcation. For what Sextus wants to emphasize is both the non-theoretical orientation of the Pyrrhonian attitude, and that no single methodology should dominate here.¹⁰ Rather, just as ‘doctors who treat physical symptoms have remedies that differ in strength… so too the Skeptic sets forth arguments differing in strength’ (ibid.: 3:280).¹¹ It is therefore unsurprising that the Pyrrhonist’s attitude toward reasoned argumentation is extremely pragmatic. Rational procedures are to be valued only insofar as they facilitate the attainment of existential health.¹² Taking these curative aspirations into account it is necessary to determine what, according to the Pyrrhonian therapist, constitutes a ‘healthy’ state of being. In order to answer this question, however, we must first understand both Pyrrhonism’s characterization of traditional philosophic practice and how it understands itself in relation to that heritage.

While Sextus divides traditional philosophy into the ‘dogmatic,’ ‘academic’ and ‘skeptical,’ his principal concern is with the latter–the others supplying a strategic point of contrast.¹³ Indeed, Sextus immediately prob-lematizes this typography by charging both dogmatist and academic with holding equally bold beliefs concerning truth.¹⁴ For while dogmatists assert ‘that they have found it,’ academics claim that ‘it cannot be apprehended’ (ibid.: 1:4). Despite their surface differences, a closer inspection thus reveals a telling congruity between these philosophies insofar as truth retains a pivotal position in both.¹⁵ For Pyrrhonism, however, it is this most elementary of beliefs–and the haughty assertiveness accompanying it–that requires therapeutic dissolution. As such, the Pyrrhonist expunges all explicit reference to ‘truth’ from her conceptual vocabulary,¹⁶ replacing ‘it is’ with the more phenomenological ‘it appears to me to be.’¹⁷ This elimi-native strategy is crucial because by emphasizing only what appears to be the case Sextus hopes to circumvent the aporias of truth-criteria.¹⁸ After all:

[I]n order to decide the dispute that has arisen about the criterion [of competing truth-claims], we have need of an agreed-upon criterion by means of which we shall decide it; and in order to have an agreed-upon criterion it is necessary first to have decided the dispute about the criterion. Thus, with the reasoning falling into circularity mode, finding a criterion becomes aporetic.

(Sextus 1996: 2:20–5)¹⁹

But ‘nobody… disputes about whether the external object appears this way or that, but rather about whether it is such as it appears to be’ (ibid.: 1:23–7).²⁰ The failure of traditional philosophy thus lies in its encouragement of a certain cognitive inflexibility in the face of natural forces. In their respective claims to have provided the necessary foundations upon which to live, philosophers fail to appreciate that their theories simply compound the problems they aim to resolve.²¹ Engagement with any such philosophy requires numerous epistemic and normative commitments, but it is precisely these that augment²² existential disease by hampering natural instinct.²³ What is needed to attain ataraxia is not dogma but the inculcation of a natural pliancy in the face of life’s unpredictabilities.²⁴ In short, the Pyrrhonist wants to extract the normative from her life and thereby emphasize that ‘we can just go on living as nature takes us, without a… view about how things ought to go on’ (Nussbaum 1991: 531). What therefore underpins the Pyrrhonian attitude is an appeal to the realm of animality. Indeed:

When [Pyrrho’s] fellow-passengers on board a ship were all unnerved by a storm, he kept calm and confident, pointing to a little pig in the ship that went on eating, and telling them that such was the unperturbed state in which the wise man should keep himself.

(Diogenes 1925: 481)

Leaving aside for the moment its problematic normativity, this model clearly sits uncomfortably alongside the dominant tendency of Western thought to elevate the human realm far above that of the animal. But for the Pyrrhonist humanity has much to learn from its bestial neighbors if the desire for ataraxia is to be satisfied.²⁵ After all:

What creature escapes being wrecked in the tempest? The creature who goes through life only as natural instinct prompts it, without ambitious enterprises, without oppositional structure… Not builders of fortresses, but nomads, who move along grazing here and there as natural need dictates.

(Nussbaum 1991: 523)

Supplementing his suggestion that a deep congruity exists between dogmatic and academic philosophies, Sextus proceeds to delineate another point of contact, this time between these positions and Pyrrhonism. For academic, dogmatist and skeptic are all said to share the goal of ataraxia–thereby providing the Pyrrhonist with a practical measure against which to assert her superiority. As mentioned above, the divergence between Pyrrhonism and dogmatic philosophy emerges in the latter’s mistaken assumption that the attainment of objective truth is prerequisite to securing this shared liberatory end.²⁶ According to the Pyrrhonist, however, ataraxia can only be achieved through the substitution of the pursuit of truth for the life of momentary phenomenological experience: ‘Not anything that lies beyond this, no, this–the way life actually goes in nature–this is the end’ (ibid.: 532). Pyrrhonism thus questions not merely the possibility of attaining truth but, more radically, the benefit of even trying to do so. Abandoning this obsessive commitment one is freed from theoretical speculation to follow ‘natural animal impulse’ (ibid.: 546).²⁷ Thus, according to Diogenes, Pyrrho himself ‘led a life consistent with this doctrine, going out of his way for nothing, taking no precaution but facing all risks as they came’ (1925: 475). Released from the burdens of commitment one is–like the wild beast–left only with fleeting ‘appearances’ (Sextus 1996: 1:19) and the guidance of instinct.²⁸ The changing world simply ‘strikes’ the Pyrrhonist who, in turn, maintains a state of passive acquiescence, allowing herself to be ‘swayed’ (Nussbaum 1991: 533).

But what is it about belief that impedes the ‘untroubled and tranquil… soul’? Sextus explains:

[T]he person who believes that something is by nature good or bad is constantly upset; when he does not possess the things that seem to be good, he thinks he is being tormented by things that are by nature bad, and he chases after the things he supposes to be good; then, when he gets these, he falls into still more torments because of irrational and immoderate exultation, and, fearing any change, he does absolutely everything in order not to lose the things that seem to him good. But the person who takes no position as to what is by nature good or bad neither avoids nor pursues intensely. As a result, he achieves ataraxia.

(1996: 1:27–8)²⁹

[H]aving in addition a belief [that something is by nature good or bad] is worse than the actual experien...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copright Page
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1: Peaceful thoughts: Philosophy as therapy in Pyrrhonism and Wittgenstein
• 2: Trusting in a world-picture: Knowledge, faith and ethics after On Certainty
• 3: Pluralism, justice and vulnerability: Politicizing Wittgenstein
• 4: Interlude: On preferring peace to war
• 5: Wretchedness without recompense: Wittgenstein on religion, ethics and guilt
• 6: Trespassing: Guilt and sacrifice in Heidegger, Levinas and ordinary life
• 7: The unreasonableness of ethics: Levinas and the limits of responsibility
• 8: Contaminations: Levinas, Wittgenstein and Derrida
• Synopsis
• Notes
• Bibliography