Talking is Lying: On One Suspicious Metaphor
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Vojtěch Kolman
Abstract
“Talking is lying,” says Nietzsche. “But in saying this,” retorts Carnap, “are you lying or telling the truth?”-“The latter,” intercedes Hegel, “because in lying the language turns out to be more truthful.”-“This is scandalous! A lie is not true simply by definition,” exclaims Russell, only to be interrupted by Oscar Wilde: “But what is a fine lie? Simply that which is its own evidence.” This fictitious dialogue demarcates both the range of my chapter, which covers some philosophical opinions on language as the bearer of truth and falsity, as well as my chapter’s actual subject, which is language’s metaphorical nature. That “talking is lying” is a metaphor, i. e. something devised as transparently untrue in order to achieve some deeper understanding. And this amounts to seeing the metaphor as an inherent quality of language to distort reality in a way which becomes its own evidence.
Abstract
“Talking is lying,” says Nietzsche. “But in saying this,” retorts Carnap, “are you lying or telling the truth?”-“The latter,” intercedes Hegel, “because in lying the language turns out to be more truthful.”-“This is scandalous! A lie is not true simply by definition,” exclaims Russell, only to be interrupted by Oscar Wilde: “But what is a fine lie? Simply that which is its own evidence.” This fictitious dialogue demarcates both the range of my chapter, which covers some philosophical opinions on language as the bearer of truth and falsity, as well as my chapter’s actual subject, which is language’s metaphorical nature. That “talking is lying” is a metaphor, i. e. something devised as transparently untrue in order to achieve some deeper understanding. And this amounts to seeing the metaphor as an inherent quality of language to distort reality in a way which becomes its own evidence.
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Acknowledgements V
- Table of Contents VII
- List of Abbreviations of Wittgenstein’s Works IX
- Notes on Authors XI
- Introduction: Wittgenstein and Classical German Philosophy – Logic, Language, Life 1
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I Logic
- Differences in Form, Identities in Content – Wittgenstein and Hegel on Two Complementary Aspects of Meaning 13
- What Might Hegel and Wittgenstein Have Seen in Goethe’s Colour Theory? 35
- Shining and Showing 53
- Two Faces of Contradiction 81
- Infinity as the Form of the Finite: Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Remarks, XII and the Notion of the Infinite in the Critique of Pure Reason 101
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II Language
- Talking is Lying: On One Suspicious Metaphor 125
- Rhetoric, Negativity, and Philosophy of Language – Hegel’s Sophists as Early Wittgensteinians 137
- Reflections on Rule-Following 147
- Wittgenstein’s Übersichtliche Darstellung and Hegel’s Speculative Philosophy 167
- Wittgenstein and Schlegel on Forms of Life: Talking To or Past Each Other 183
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III Life
- Hegel, the Pragmatic Turn, and the Later Wittgenstein 201
- Following the Rule Without Interpreting It? – Gadamarian and Kantian Revision of Brandom’s Solution to the Wittgensteinian Problem 213
- Following a Rule Blindly: Hegel and Wittgenstein on the Immediacy of Habit 225
- Wittgenstein and Critical Theory – From ‘Sub Specie Aeterni’ to the ‘Entanglement in Our Rules’ – Wittgenstein, Adorno, Marx 255
- Wittgenstein and Hegel on Art and the Everyday 277
- Subject Index 297
- Person Index 307
Chapters in this book
- Frontmatter I
- Acknowledgements V
- Table of Contents VII
- List of Abbreviations of Wittgenstein’s Works IX
- Notes on Authors XI
- Introduction: Wittgenstein and Classical German Philosophy – Logic, Language, Life 1
-
I Logic
- Differences in Form, Identities in Content – Wittgenstein and Hegel on Two Complementary Aspects of Meaning 13
- What Might Hegel and Wittgenstein Have Seen in Goethe’s Colour Theory? 35
- Shining and Showing 53
- Two Faces of Contradiction 81
- Infinity as the Form of the Finite: Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Remarks, XII and the Notion of the Infinite in the Critique of Pure Reason 101
-
II Language
- Talking is Lying: On One Suspicious Metaphor 125
- Rhetoric, Negativity, and Philosophy of Language – Hegel’s Sophists as Early Wittgensteinians 137
- Reflections on Rule-Following 147
- Wittgenstein’s Übersichtliche Darstellung and Hegel’s Speculative Philosophy 167
- Wittgenstein and Schlegel on Forms of Life: Talking To or Past Each Other 183
-
III Life
- Hegel, the Pragmatic Turn, and the Later Wittgenstein 201
- Following the Rule Without Interpreting It? – Gadamarian and Kantian Revision of Brandom’s Solution to the Wittgensteinian Problem 213
- Following a Rule Blindly: Hegel and Wittgenstein on the Immediacy of Habit 225
- Wittgenstein and Critical Theory – From ‘Sub Specie Aeterni’ to the ‘Entanglement in Our Rules’ – Wittgenstein, Adorno, Marx 255
- Wittgenstein and Hegel on Art and the Everyday 277
- Subject Index 297
- Person Index 307
