What Makes Life a Lie? Love, Truth and the Question of Context
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Camilla Kronqvist
Abstract
Wittgenstein suggested that considering the context in which a word or sentence is used may help show the limitations of some ways of setting up a philosophical problem. In this article, I explore the role this suggestion may have in moral (philosophical) reflection, through a consideration of a literary example taken from Jeanette Winterson’s novel, Written on the Body (2001). Using the example to elucidate ways of speaking in love that seem to embody an important truth and ways of acting and thinking that appear to be a denial of that truth, I discuss and attempt to show how different ways of attending to context may reveal the moral dimensions of this language use. I also consider one point at which attention to context seems to come to a halt and when acknowledging what is ethically significant seems to demand something different from us.
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© 2020 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Artikel in diesem Heft
- 10.1515/sats-2020-frontmatter2
- Editorial
- Contextual Ethics – Developing Conceptual and Theoretical Approaches
- Invited Paper
- Against Ethical Exceptionalism – Through Critical Reflection on the History of Use of the Terms ‘Ethics’ and ‘Morals’ in Philosophy
- Articles
- What Makes Life a Lie? Love, Truth and the Question of Context
- Ethical Concepts ‘in Search of a Meaning’: G.H. von Wright’s Broad Framework for (Contextual) Ethics
- Contextual Ethics: Taking the Lead from Wittgenstein and Løgstrup on Ethical Meaning and Normativity
- How to Work with Context in Moral Philosophy?
- Moral Context, Moral Complicity And Ethical Theory
- In Search of the Context of a Question
Artikel in diesem Heft
- 10.1515/sats-2020-frontmatter2
- Editorial
- Contextual Ethics – Developing Conceptual and Theoretical Approaches
- Invited Paper
- Against Ethical Exceptionalism – Through Critical Reflection on the History of Use of the Terms ‘Ethics’ and ‘Morals’ in Philosophy
- Articles
- What Makes Life a Lie? Love, Truth and the Question of Context
- Ethical Concepts ‘in Search of a Meaning’: G.H. von Wright’s Broad Framework for (Contextual) Ethics
- Contextual Ethics: Taking the Lead from Wittgenstein and Løgstrup on Ethical Meaning and Normativity
- How to Work with Context in Moral Philosophy?
- Moral Context, Moral Complicity And Ethical Theory
- In Search of the Context of a Question
