Why were Witty's students so religious?

quora.com/Why-were-so-many-of-Wittgensteins-students-religious

I saw this question on quora

why were many of Witty's students religious, why did Witty have alot of quasi christian elements in his work

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iep.utm.edu/wittgens/#H3
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really makes u thinking

Witty wasn't a christian though

He read Tolstoy's Gospel in Brief over and over again during WW1, fighting back suicide. Dostoevsky as well. basically underwent a born-again type experience.

Same happened to me, I was going through depression and then I read The Brothers Karamazov. Basically saved my life

The Zosima chapters?

Exact opposite here. I really disliked the religious themes. Otherwise it was an enjoyable read.

Mostly grew past my depression by riding my bike hard, lifting weights, and reading books without any religious themes.

Keep in mind I was seventeen when I read it.

The entire book is religious. Just a generic crime story without it.

You should really reread it if you're more open to such things now

I liked the way it was written. I liked the feelings it evoked. I liked the language and I liked the dialogue. The only thing I didn't like was the religious themes.

I still don't like them, but religious themes don't ruin a book for me. I do feel they detract a bit from the tension, and when you don't play up the mythos of the religion it is much less interesting, but it won't stop me from reading a well written book.

I won't read it again for a long time. I have too large of a back log for a book of that size. Hell, I'm only a third of the way through Jerusalem (moore plays up the mythos of religion in a way that I adore). Can't handle another book large enough to be used as a murder weapon right now.

>implying w's philosophy was an influence on them

please. witty was just another member of the band, not its leader. his 'classes' were just random monologues. they were in touch with w as a person, not as a teacher. and he was a very particular person.

>iep.utm.edu/wittgens/#H3

>Wittgenstein had a lifelong interest in religion and claimed to see every problem from a religious point of view, but never committed himself to any formal religion. His various remarks on ethics also suggest a particular point of view, and Wittgenstein often spoke of ethics and religion together. This point of view or attitude can be seen in the four main themes that run through Wittgenstein's writings on ethics and religion: goodness, value or meaning are not to be found in the world; living the right way involves acceptance of or agreement with the world, or life, or God's will, or fate; one who lives this way will see the world as a miracle; there is no answer to the problem of life--the solution is the disappearance of the problem.

>6.41 The sense of the world must lie outside the world. In the world everything is as it is, and everything happens as it does happen: in it no value exists -- and if it did exist, it would have no value. If there is any value that does have value, it must lie outside the whole sphere of what happens and is the case… . It must lie outside the world.

>6.4313 The solution of the riddle of life in space and time lies outside space and time. (It is certainly not the solution of any problems of natural science that is required).

>6.432 How things are in the world is a matter of complete indifference for what is higher. God does not reveal himself in the world.

Nabeel Qureshi's answer in that forum is p spot on:

>According to W, If you take religious statements (e.g. about the Last Judgement, God watching you, etc.) literally, as empirical statements, then they are clearly absurd.

>Most philosophers just stop there. They are happy to prove that religious beliefs/statements are absurd, and leave it at that.

>Wittgenstein asks - what if the statements aren't straightforward empirical/rational claims, but serve completely different purposes? i.e. for someone who believes in the Last Judgement, the literal belief is the least important bit - more important is the role that belief plays in his life, as a way to behave well towards people, be kind, etc.

Very much like Kant before him, Wittgenstein reopens a space for a practical philosophy that is not vulnerable to the skeptic's or reductionist's or naturalist's assaults. What Wittgenstein himself "really believed" is hard to pin down, but he did start taking communion much later in his life.

>>According to W, If you take religious statements (e.g. about the Last Judgement, God watching you, etc.) literally, as empirical statements, then they are clearly absurd.

No practicing Christian would consent to that conclusion.

Not Catholics at least.
But that is a completely Kierkegaardian position to take which isn't surprising considering what Wittgensteins opinion of soren was.

Did Witty like Kierkegaard?

>Kierkegaard was a true saint

t. Wittgenstein

Yes, that was absolutely wonderful. Made me love life once more.

I was 16 when I first read it. I was suicidal at the time, I started getting better after reading it. I feel really better now, 5 years later. I don't have a really good life, no friends, I feel miserable most of the time , but I "love life on spite of logic".

Did you have depression when you read it?

you can have these third person descriptions and they may be accurate, and some are in this thread. but to really understand and go through it you probably need to take wittgenstein seriously in pronouncements such as bounding the world with language.

the observation here is that w's satisfied only with a total theory that serves as structures in an understanding about the limits of life. he was not anti-metaphysics but thought that inadequate expression cheapened the mystical experience of understanding such things.

a bit of a mess because im in ahurry

Watch Malick's films the later stuff is all Zosima

I only watched The Thin Red Line, I was told that his other movies were really good too. I think I'll watch The Tree of Life tomorrow

was trying to say grand philosophical visions may induce certain flights of fancy about the world, a wonderment. direction of causality not certain

He definitely was, he just struggled to reconcile it with his autism.

Yeah. The book helped a bit but what really helped was losing a bunch of weight by lifting heavy and bicycling hard almost every day. Every time I stop doing that I'll get depressed again by life.

Endorphins, when hard won, work better for me than philosophy. Well, no, you need both. Definitely need both.

Still a great book to give to a depressed teenager, even if I didn't like the religious themes.

It's the same feeling a dog gets when it learns it can juggle a balloon or a baby being taught to play peekaboo.

A novel concept a "flight of fancy" a demand for novel stimulus

Feels good man

Witty loved Kierkegaard and also took some stuffz from Augustine etc.

No.
>Mystical explanations are thought to be deep; the truth is that they are not even shallow.

This world. Not after-beyond (meta) the world. Deep&Edgy and Nietzsche. Not onionring and Kant/or Kierkegaard. Praise power.

Ouch. Eagerly awaiting onionwrong response.

i think a lot of these responses miss the point

LW's philosophy is necessarily and fundamentally religious.

>6.372
>So people stop short at natural laws as at something unassailable, as did the ancients with God and Fate

>And they are both right and wrong. But the ancients were clearer, in so far as they recognized one clear terminus, whereas the modern system makes it appear as though everything were explained.

for LW, God is literally "what remains" or "how things are"

>when I prompted Wittgenstein about him reportedly having a 'mystic streak' he snorted and said 'like I have a yellow streak'.

t. G.E.M. Anscombe

I think you're missing the point, axshoeallie.

i wasnt trying to be rude, only suggesting that a lot of what is known as LW's "religiousness" is owed to his defn of god

Have I gone back in time? Is this 2011? Is there still time to win Rose's heart and call Brownbear a massive faggot?

Was witty actually witty though? I heard that he took a very long time to reply to questions and even when speaking in conversation would be so slow. Now Voltaire, that's a man who seems witty

Wittgenstein himself was strangely religious and ascribed to a certain Christian mysticism or gnostic attitude.

For all the logical positivism of his early days, his journals are full of him pleading with God and castigating himself for his sins.

I've had various suicide attempts and have been depressed and on antidepressants for years. It made you love life again? A book making someone love life again sounds absurd to me. I find religion interesting, but I'm a terminal agnostic. So if the book made you feel better because it promotes an afterlife or something, then i doubt I'd find it enjoyable

...

What are you trying to articulate with your post?

that you wear a funny hat