Wittgenstein's Form of Life reveals the intricate relationship between language and life throughout Ludwig Wittgenstein's work. Drawing on the entire corpus of his writings, David Kishik offers a synoptic view of Wittgenstein's evolving thought by considering the notion of form of life as its vanishing center. The book takes its cue from the idea that 'to imagine a language means to imagine a form of life', in order to present the first holistic account of Wittgenstein's philosophy in the spirit of a new wave of interpretations, pioneered by Stanley Cavell, Cora Diamond and James Conant. It is also an enticing contribution to the rising discourse revolving around the subject of life, led by the recent work of Giorgio Agamben. Standing on the threshold between the Analytic and the Continental philosophical traditions, Kishik shows how Wittgenstein's philosophy of language points toward a new philosophy of life, thereby making a unique contribution to our ethical and political thought.

Ludwig Wittgenstein’s writings inspired contemporary philosophical thinking and advanced many issues that had been addressed by traditional philosophy. The questions raised by the Viennese philosopher initiated debates on a reconsideration of philosophical terminology. This is especially true for a term that has generated at least three significant controversies since its creation and will probably generate more disputes in the following years. It is the expression “form(s) of life” which translates into German as “Lebensform(en)” and “Form des Lebens”. The present volume contains contributions on forms of life, language games and the influence of Wittgenstein’s philosophy on other scholears.

This volume deals with the connection between thinking-and-speaking and our form(s) of life. All contributions engage with Wittgenstein’s approach to this topic. As a whole, the volume takes a stance against both biological and ethnological interpretations of the notion "form of life" and seeks to promote a broadly logico-linguistic understanding instead. The structure of this book is threefold. Part one focuses on lines of thinking that lead from Wittgenstein’s earlier thought to the concept of form of life in his later work. Contributions to part two examine the concrete philosophical function of this notion as well as the ways in which it differs from cognate concepts. Contributions to part three put Wittgenstein’s notion of form of life in perspective by relating it to phenomenology, ordinary language philosophy and problems in contemporary analytic philosophy.

Far from overthrowing or stepping outside that tradition, Wittgenstein builds on it, draws from it, and contributes brilliantly to the fruition of certain elements in it. In This Complicated Form of Life, Garver analyzes from several angles Wittgenstein's relationship to Kant, and to what Finch has called Wittgenstein's completion of Kant's revolt against the Cartesian hegemony of epistemology in philosophy.

Proceedings of a conference held May 22-23, 2009 at the New University of Lisbon.

This book brings together for the first time two philosophers from different traditions and different centuries. While Wittgenstein was a focal point of 20th century analytic philosophy, it was Hegel’s philosophy that brought the essential discourses of the 19th century together and developed into the continental tradition in 20th century. This now-outdated conflict took for granted Hegel’s and Wittgenstein’s opposing positions and is being replaced by a continuous progression and differentiation of several authors, schools, and philosophical traditions. The development is already evident in the tendency to identify a progression from a ‘Kantian’ to a ‘Hegelian phase’ of analytical philosophy as well as in the extension of right and left Hegelian approaches by modern and postmodern concepts. Assessing the difference between Wittgenstein and Hegel can outline intersections of contemporary thinking.

If we read Ludwig Wittgenstein’s works and take his scientific formation in mathematical logic into account, it comes as a surprise that he ever developed a particular interest in anthropological questions. The following questions immediately arise: What role does anthropology play in Wittgenstein’s work? How do problems concerning mankind as a whole relate to his philosophy? How does his approach relate to philosophical anthropology? How does he view classical issues about Man’s affairs and actions? The aim of this book is to investigate the anthropological questions that Wittgenstein raised in his works. The answers to the questions raised in this introduction may be found on the intersection between forms of life and radical translation from another culture into ours. The book presents an extensive analysis of anthropological issues with emphasis on language and social elements.

Cursory allusions to the relation between Kierkegaard and Wittgenstein are common in philosophical literature, but there has been little in the way of serious and comprehensive commentary on the relationship of their ideas. Genia Sch?nbaumsfeld closes this gap and offers new readings of Kierkegaard's and Wittgenstein's conceptions of philosophy and religious belief. Chapter one documents Kierkegaard's influence on Wittgenstein, while chapters two and three provide trenchant criticisms of two prominent attempts to compare the two thinkers, those by D. Z. Phillips and James Conant. In chapter four, Sch?nbaumsfeld develops Kierkegaard's and Wittgenstein's concerted criticisms of certain standard conceptions of religious belief, and defends their own positive conception against the common charges of 'irrationalism' and 'fideism'. As well as contributing to contemporary debate about how to read Kierkegaard's and Wittgenstein's work, A Confusion of the Spheres addresses issues which not only concern scholars of Wittgenstein and Kierkegaard, but anyone interested in the philosophy of religion, or the ethical aspects of philosophical practice as such.

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Are science and religion in accord or are they diametrically opposed to each other? The common perspectives-for or against religion-are based on the same question, “Do religion and science fit together or not?” These arguments are usually stuck within a preconceived notion of realism which assumes that there is a 'true reality' that is independent of us and is that which we discover. However, this context confuses our understanding of both science and religion. The core concern is not the relation between science and religion, it is realism in science and religion. Wittgenstein's philosophy and developments in quantum theory can help us to untie the knots in our preconceived realism and, as Wittgenstein would say, show the fly out of the bottle. This point of view changes the discussion from science and religion competing for the discovery of the 'true reality' external to us (realism), and from claiming that reality is simply whatever we pragmatically think it is (nonrealism), to realizing the nature and interdependence of reality, language, and information in science and religion.