Philosophy and Psycho-Analysis by John Wisdom

First published: 1953

Type of Philosophy: Epistemology, philosophy of language, philosophy of mind

Context

The title of this book is somewhat misleading: Only two of the fifteen essays are concerned with psychoanalysis. Rather, Wisdom shows that there are certain similarities between the approach of the metaphysician and the approach of the psychoanalyst; he also shows that there are similarities between the approach of the metaphysician and that of the lawyer, or the mathematician, the logician, the scientist, the art critic, or even the novelist. Wisdom’s design, therefore, is really to clarify the term “metaphysics.” He suggests in one place that his task is one of “meta-metaphysics,” that is, one of determining the status of metaphysical problems and metaphysical judgments. The essays are united in their common concern with this problem. They extend in time of publication from 1932 to 1953 and are arranged, roughly, in chronological order. Several are critical book reviews. Only one, the last, appears in print for the first time.

Philosophy and Linguistic Analysis

The importance of the book lies in the fact that it clarifies Wisdom’s position in relation to the current attempts to define philosophy as some form of linguistic analysis. Although Wisdom was strongly influenced by Ludwig Wittgenstein, he did not believe, as Wittgenstein and many of the logical positivists did, that metaphysics is nonsense of some sort that becomes evident when its statements are properly analyzed; nor did he believe that metaphysical statements are merely linguistic and that all difficulties can be eliminated by substituting clear words for vague ones and precise grammatical constructions for ambiguous ones; nor did he follow the Oxford School in stressing either the “ordinary language” of the person in the street or his or her beliefs on certain philosophical matters as the final court of appeal for settling all philosophical disputes. He examines these views, as well as others that associate philosophical problems with their mode of expression, and endeavors to state his own view in contrast to them.

Philosophers pose questions such as “Can we really know what is going on in someone else’s mind?,” “Can we really know the causes of our sensations?,” and “What is a chair?” The reader’s task is to determine what philosophers seek when they ask such questions, and what they mean when they reply, “We can never really know what is going on in someone else’s mind,” “A chair is nothing but our sensations,” or “A chair is something over and above our sensations.”

In a sense, Wisdom says, philosophy gives rise to verbal disputes. To state that one cannot know what is going on in someone else’s mind is to utter something that is obviously untrue unless one adopts an unusual meaning for the word “know.” It might be said that one who makes a statement of this kind is uttering nonsense. Suppose that a philosopher asks whether two plus three can ever equal six? Again, the question becomes nonsense unless one adopts unconventional meanings for some of the words it contains. The fact that both statements are nonsensical does not mean that they are nonsensical in the same way. To determine how they differ in their portrayal of nonsense, one would need to make a study that would be at least partially verbal. Thus, philosophical clarification is achieved through an examination of language. Similarly, if a philosopher says that a chair is something over and above human sensations, he or she is not proposing a new definition of “chair” or a new use for chairs, but instead is suggesting the need for a clarification of the meaning of a word. Philosophical questions and answers, therefore, seem to be verbal.

Although the philosopher’s statements are formulated in words, the intention is not to raise verbal issues; the philosopher is not taking over the role of the translator. A translator substitutes a sentence S for a sentence S‗, for the purpose of telling the meaning of S‗. Philosophers do not wish merely to substitute one statement of a fact for another; they wish to transmit insight—insight into the structure of the fact that is asserted by S‗. They equate S with S‗ because they believe that S better indicates the structure of a certain fact than does S‗. This is not a verbal matter.

The nature of philosophical statements can be further clarified by distinguishing their content from their point. Suppose a philosophical statement contains the word “monarchy.” Anyone who knows that “monarchy” means the same as “set of persons ruled by the same king,” and who also knows the meaning of either of these expressions, will find that the philosophical statement becomes clarified if one is substituted for the other. This involves merely clarification in content and is the concern of the decoder rather than that of the philosopher. The philosopher achieves clarification (the point of the utterance) only if the hearer already uses and understands the meaning of both “monarchy” and “set of persons ruled by the same king.” Philosophical statements thus appear to be very curious: They provide information only if the hearer already knows what is being told to him or her. Philosophy is trying to show the “structure” of a monarchy by bringing together the sphere in which “monarchy” is used and the sphere in which “set of persons ruled by the same king” is used. These are different categories, and the philosophical problem is that of showing by means of the structure of the statement how they are related. Wisdom suggests a certain mnemonic device: “It’s not the stuff, it’s the style that stupefies.” It is not what philosophers talk about that makes them unique, but the form in which they expresses themselves. Wisdom apologizes for a suspicion of smartness when he says, “Philosophers should be continually trying to say what cannot be said.”

The Meaning of Analysis

What is really involved in this disclosure of “structure” can be understood only by an examination of what Wisdom means by analysis as the method of all philosophy. Because his use of this word is somewhat technical, the way may be prepared by an examination of the conception of the world that, according to Wisdom, is held by all metaphysicians. They believe, in his words, “that the actual world is made up solely of positive, specific, determinate, concrete, contingent, individual, sensory facts.” They also believe, however, in an apparent “penumbra of fictional, negative, general, indeterminate, abstract, necessary, super-individual, physical facts.” This penumbra is apparent only because observers have not penetrated deeply enough. Philosophers believe that there are not two ways of knowing—one for the nonpenumbral facts and another for the penumbral—yet they also believe that because the nonpenumbral and the penumbral are not identical, there must be two ways of knowing. This produces philosophical perplexity. In the following examples, what is given first may be designated as the penumbral fact, and what is given second as the nonpenumbral fact.

The height of the average man is simply the sum of the heights of the individual men divided by their number.

A chair is simply a collection of sense-data.

A person’s mind is nothing more than his behavior.

The state is something over and above the individuals who make it up.

The statement “Not three people are interested in mathematical logic” may be expressed in this form: “If x is interested in mathematical logic, and y also is interested, and z also is interested, then x is identical with y, or y is identical with z, or x is identical with z.”

“All men are mortal” can be reduced to “John is mortal, and George is mortal, and James is mortal, and so on.”

“Time” means (G. E. Moore) that lunch is over, supper is to come, Smith’s anger is past, and so on.

Analytic propositions are merely verbal propositions.

In these examples, average men, physical objects, minds, states, numerical statements, general statements, time, and analytic propositions are all penumbral. Actual men, sense-data, behavior, individual citizens, the identity of x’s and y’s, John and George being mortal, supper following lunch, and verbal propositions are nonpenumbral. Call the former “X facts” and the latter “Y facts.” Then the question becomes simply this: Are X facts ultimate, or are they reducible to Y facts? If they are reducible, are they completely reducible? That is, are X facts equivalent to Y facts? If they are not completely reducible, are X facts something over and above Y facts?

Wisdom believes that it is misleading to formulate the problem in terms of facts, because that would suggest that the issue can be decided simply by examining the world, either the logical world or the natural world. This is not the case. The question should therefore be expressed in terms of propositions or sentences: Do X sentences stand for the same proposition as any combination of Y sentences? Are X sentences used in the same way as some combination of Y sentences? For a given X sentence, is there a Y sentence that serves the same purpose?

This approach suggests examining the sentences to see under what circumstances one would be inclined to answer the question with a “Yes” and under what circumstances with a “No.” There is no right or wrong answer to these questions; however, dispute can be resolved by explaining what induces each disputant to claim what he or she does. Thus, statements that are metaphysical paradoxes and statements that are metaphysical platitudes are revealed to be not simply false statements and true statements, but penetrating suggestions as to how language might be used to reveal what is completely hidden by its actual use. “Thus it appears how it is that, to give metaphysicians what they want, we have to do little more than remove the spectacles through which they look at their own work. Then they see how those hidden identities and diversities which lead to the insoluble’ reduction questions about forms, categories and predicates, have already been revealed, though in a hidden way.”

Material and Philosophical Analysis

With such issues clarified, one is ready to turn to an examination of what Wisdom means by analysis. A distinction must first be made between material analysis and philosophical analysis. To give a material analysis is simply to give a definition, such as “Wealth is defined as what is useful, transferable, and limited in supply.” A definition of wealth as riches would not be materially analytic, for it does nothing to render explicit the connotation of the word defined. A philosophical analysis is given by a rule for translating sentences about any abstraction (“the state”) into sentences about what it is an abstraction from (“the individual citizens”). A second distinction must be made between formal analysis and philosophical analysis. A formal analysis is the replacement of a sentence by another that more clearly indicates the form of the fact asserted: “Two horses passed him” means “A horse passed him and then another.” This would not be a material analysis because two is not an adjective, and it is not a philosophical analysis because it merely exhibits more clearly the structure of something whose structure was not clear. The distinction between the three types of analysis can be illustrated by the statement “Two men are good.” A formal analysis would be “A man is good and another man is good”; a philosophical analysis would be “A mannish pattern of states contains a high proportion of good ones and another mannish pattern does so also”; and a material analysis would be “A mannish pattern of states contains a high proportion of states likely to cause approval and another does so also.”

Analysis (philosophical analysis) cannot be understood without explaining ostentation. Philosophers have always employed ostentation, though because of their preoccupation with philosophy they have had little time to talk about ostentation. Ostentation is a kind of substitution: It is used on a sentence S‗ when one substitutes for S‗ another sentence S that more clearly reveals the ultimate structure of the fact they assert. Take the sentence “England invaded France.” This has a dyadic structure exhibited by “EIF,” where “E” is a term, “I” is a relation, and “F” is another term. The sentence “EIF” does not, however, exhibit the ultimate structure of its fact. To show this, one would have to formulate sentences about Tom, Dick, and Harry, and about Henri, François, and Jean, and about the former being sent threateningly into land owned by the latter, and so on. One can say that “EIF” directly locates a fact of which England is an element, but it indirectly locates a fact of which Tom, Dick, and the rest are elements. The analysis of the sentence “EIF” into sentences about Englishmen and Frenchmen is a philosophical analysis because the predicates that are applicable to England are definable in terms of the predicates that are applicable to Englishmen. They are, of course, different kinds of predicates because they are exhibited in different kinds of structure. The sentences about Englishmen and Frenchmen become an ostentation of the sentence about England and France; S is an ostentation of S‗. When this is the case, the facts displayed, though not two, are not identical.

The distinction between the penumbral and the nonpenumbral facts thus has been recognized, and the question as to whether the former can be “reduced” to the latter (whether the former are “logical constructions out of” the latter) can be discussed intelligently, pro and con. What is introduced by ostentation is not merely a clearer understanding of the structure of a fact but an increased clearness in the apprehension of the ultimate structure of the fact. One should not say that S is merely a translation of S‗ but that S displays directly what S‗ displays indirectly, or that S‗ displays a fact that is secondary to the fact that S displays. The sentence about Tom, Dick, and the others displays directly what the sentence about England and France displays indirectly, or the fact displayed by the sentence about England and France is secondary to the fact displayed by the sentence about Tom, Dick, and the others. Wisdom concludes the discussion of this topic by stating that the philosopher makes a prayer: “Please give me clearer apprehension of the Arrangement of the Elements of the Fact finally located by the sentence aRb.’” (In this statement, Wisdom uses capital letters to indicate that what the philosopher is seeking is the ultimate arrangement of the ultimate elements of the ultimate fact, not merely the structure that is obviously exhibited by “aRb.”)

The Penumbral and Nonpenumbral

The question of whether the penumbral can be reduced to the nonpenumbral has divided philosophers into two schools. On one hand are the naturalists, empiricists, and positivists. They accept the Verification Principle. On the other hand are the realists and the transcendentalists, who accept the Idiosyncrasy Platitude. The former maintain such statements as “A cherry is nothing but sensations and possibilities of more,” “A mind is nothing but a pattern of behavior,” and “There are no such things as numbers, only numerals.” The latter argue that every statement has its own sort of meaning, and “everything is what it is and not another thing.” Examples can be found in “Ethical propositions involve value predicates and are ultimate,” “Mathematical propositions are necessary synthetic propositions—an ultimate sort of proposition,” and “Statements about nations are not to be reduced to statements about individuals; they are about a certain sort of concrete universal.”

Wisdom’s contention with regard to both of these principles is that a person should examine what he or she means when saying that either of them is true. To say this is to suppose that the principles in question can be confirmed or disconfirmed. This is not the case: Neither principle is a scientific theory. The issue should, therefore, be formulated in terms of the question whether one should accept the Verification Principle or the Idiosyncrasy Platitude. Now, however, what has the issue become? Can one say that the Verification Principle is a metaphysical theory? Yes, says Wisdom, in a certain sense. It is not so much a metaphysical theory as a recipe for framing metaphysical theories; it is a mnemonic device that tells those who accept it how to proceed in settling certain metaphysical issues. It draws their attention to “the deplorably old-fashioned clothes in which it presents itself,” because it appears in the disguise either of a scientific discovery that removes a popular illusion or of a logical proposition from which deductions can be made. Furthermore, the principle serves to draw the attention of those who reject it to the fact that underneath its disguise it has obvious merits. The principle, therefore, has the characteristics of all metaphysical statements in that it covers up what it really intends to say. The same is true of the Idiosyncrasy Platitude. Whether either of these is called “metaphysical” is of no great importance; the point is that in examining the reasons for or against accepting one of these principles, one is led into the activity that is designed to eliminate metaphysical perplexities and to arrive at that clarification of structure which is the goal of philosophy.

Philosophy in Relation to Psychoanalysis

Finally, Wisdom attempts to show in what sense philosophical difficulties are like psychopathic difficulties. Wittgenstein said that he held no opinions in philosophy but tried to remove “a feeling of puzzlement, to cure a sort of mental cramp” associated with philosophical problems. Wisdom gives an example in which an individual wrestles with the problem of whether he can or cannot know what other creatures are thinking about. He points out that such an individual, first skeptical about the minds of other people, is led inevitably into skepticism about his senses, and finally into a skepticism about everything. This is obviously an absurd position, however, and he develops a stress that is quite analogous to that of the businessperson who is trying to meet financial obligations and becomes neurotic as a result. In what respects are these stresses alike, and in what respect is the cure that the philosopher might administer to the puzzled thinker like the cure that the psychoanalyst might administer to the neurotic businessperson?

Philosophy has never been a purely psychogenic disorder, and it is not ordinarily considered to be a therapy. When philosophers proceed by trying to show “not new things but old things anew,” however, they are adopting procedures much like those of the psychoanalyst. Philosophical discussion aims to bring out latent opposing forces, and not to teach what is behind closed doors or whether 235 times 6 equals 1,410. Philosophy often shows that behind the latent linguistic sources of confusion there are much more deeply hidden nonlinguistic forces, and that a purely linguistic treatment of philosophy therefore cannot be adequate. Philosophy also shows that the nonlinguistic sources are the same as those that trouble people elsewhere in their lives and therefore that the philosophical riddles are the true “riddles of the Sphinx.”

Philosophy is concerned with what is paradoxical and unconventional. Such matters are not settled by experiment and observation. Many philosophers have said that questions that cannot be settled by experiment and observation are questions merely of words. In saying this, they are speaking wildly; however, so are those “scientists, philosophers, or poets who say one cannot stir a flower without troubling of a star. What they say is mad but there’s method in it.”

Principal Ideas Advanced

•Philosophical questions are verbal in the sense that they turn on unconventional uses of language, but they are not merely verbal because, in virtue of their oddity, in the process of justifying their use, one’s attention is called to matters obscured by conventional language.

•Metaphysical paradoxes and platitudes function as penetrating suggestions as to how language might be used to reveal what is hidden by the actual use of language.

•In philosophical analysis, penumbral facts (matters to which certain conventional sentences call attention) are compared to nonpenumbral facts (matters to which the penumbral are presumably reducible) to determine whether the switch from one kind of statement to another is advisable and illuminating.

•The goal of philosophy is the clarification of the structure of facts.

•Philosophers do not uncover new facts, but they show old facts in a new way.

Bibliography

Bamborough, Renford, ed. Wisdom: Twelve Essays. Oxford, England: Blackwell, 1974. Contains twelve appreciative essays about Wisdom’s philosophy by his friends and former students, along with a bibliography of Wisdom’s writings. The essays by D.A.T. Gasking, Judith Thomson, and Keith Gunderson are especially helpful.

Broad, C. D. “The Local Historical Background of Contemporary Cambridge Philosophy.” In British Philosophy in the Midcentury, edited by C. A. Mace. London: Allen and Unwin, 1957. This article contains Broad’s reminiscences about the philosophical scene at Cambridge over much of the time when Wisdom was there. Broad makes scant mention of Wisdom, probably because they had little in common philosophically.

Gasking, D. A. T. “The Philosophy of John Wisdom, I and II.” Australasian Journal of Philosophy (1954). A sympathetic account of Wisdom’s way of doing philosophy.

Hacker, P. M. S. Wittgenstein’s Place in Twentieth-Century Analytic Philosophy. Oxford, England: Blackwell, 1996. A careful and readable account of Wittgenstein’s philosophy during his earlier and later periods. The book does not directly speak of Wisdom but sheds light indirectly on him.

Passmore, John. A Hundred Years of Philosophy. London: Gerald Duckworth, 1957. A broad survey of philosophy in the English-speaking world from the middle of the nineteenth to the middle of the twentieth century. See pages 367-368 and 434-438 for mention of Wisdom and his role in philosophical developments.

Urmson, J. O. Philosophical Analysis. Oxford, England: Clarendon Press, 1956. A short and incisive critical account of leading movements in analytic philosophy. Pages 76-85 and 169-182 pertain to Wisdom’s earlier and later periods of work. Urmson recognizes Wisdom as an independent thinker and not merely an expositor of Wittgenstein.

Wittgenstein, Ludwig. The Blue and Brown Books. New York: Harper and Row, 1958. This volume is based on notes taken by students who attended Wittgenstein’s lectures during the 1930’s. The material was circulated privately in typescript for many years and was published only after Wittgenstein’s death. It provides a view of what may have been the content of the lectures by Wittgenstein that Wisdom attended.

Wittgenstein, Ludwig. Philosophical Investigations. New York: Macmillan, 1953. Published soon after Wittgenstein’s death, this is the most polished and impressive of his writings. It contains the authoritative formulation of his later views concerning the philosophy of mind and the nature of philosophy, matters that were of central concern to Wisdom.