Status Updates From Wittgenstein's Poker: The S...

Despite the familiar questions, there are few topics more baffling than that of accounting for probability. A fundamental question is whether we talk about probability because it is an objective con- stituent of the world or only because we are ignorant of what is go- ing to happen. In other words, is the future intrinsically uncertain, or is uncertainty merely the product of our human limitations?

Russell and the early W. believed that everyday language obscures its underlying logical structure. "The King of France is bald" is a proposition whose logical structure is not immediately apparent on the surface. Language is a covering, like clothing to the body. A baggy jumper may disguise the shape inside. W. II did not take this view: he believed that language is in perfect working order— it hides nothing.

In 1936, Popper was present as a guest at a meeting of the Aristotelian Society where Russell was the speaker. He intervened, but the audience took his remarks as a joke, greeting them with laughter and clapping. 40 years later he wrote, ‘I wonder whether there was anybody there who suspected that not only did I seriously hold these views, but that, in due course, they would widely be regarded as commonplace.’

“Wittgenstein accused Carnap of plagiarism — a crime that he was always scenting and that he believed was actually com- pounded in this case by Carnap's acknowledgment in the book of the debt he owed Wittgenstein. Wittgenstein responded, "I don't mind a small boy's stealing my apples, but I do mind his saying that I gave them to him”

“For an imperial capital that at its zenith ruled over Hungarians, Czechs, Slovaks, Poles, Italians, Galicians, Slovenes, Serbs and Croats —and Austrians— Vienna was a surprisingly tight-knit city.”

?

Ukrainians. They’re Ukrainians. Ruthenians, if you must, but Galicians is not an ethnicity.

(Yes, I understand that Habsburg Galicia includes Poles, but those are mentioned by name)

“‘If a person tells me he has been to the worst of places I have no right to judge him, but if he tells me it was his superior wisdom that enabled him to go there, then I know that he is a fraud.’”

Restarting. Needed an easy read at night. Read first 50 pp. some time ago.