bullet summary: wittgenstein and language games

• wittgenstein once said “is speech essential for religion? i can very well imagine a religion in which there are no doctrines and hence nothing is said.”
• his idea of silence here does not mean he thinks religious statements are meaningless

• he turned away from logical positivist ideas on meaning and focused on use
• “the meaning of any statement is given in the way you use it.”
• an anti-realist theory, the words are subjective and importance lies in clarity and sense
• all non-cognitive because it doesn’t focus on facts
• he says we use language in games
• we cannot externally criticise games
• the rules in each game apply only to that game, and we learn them
• it is meaningless outside the game
• atheists cannot criticise religious believers
• games can be things like winning, losing, football or card games
• or something like builders’ language

• he said we need conceptual clarity
• for wittgenstein there are only games, you cannot get outside and find ‘real meaning’
• we play more games, and we play them better
• they do not reflect reality, but make reality
• “the speaking of language is part of an activity, or a form of life,” 

• in the christian game, ‘god’ is meaningful because it is coherent to christians
• part of the coherence theory of truth
• god is also meaningful to atheists in the sense of lacking. 
• discussion is obvious between atheists and believers because they are playing different games and have different meanings
• a believer could say that she does not believe in the god that richard dawkins rejects, because his god is not what she means by god

• is scripture therefore only meaningful it is original language?
• is its advice only helpful in contemporary context?
• meaning shifts across languages
• you can approach sacred texts in three ways:
  • literalism
  • conservative
  • liberal
• the problems, lack of evidence and unreliability show the need for wittgenstein’s approach
• a critical understanding of context is more important
• there is a sensitivity to intention, form of text and understanding

• d.z. phillips analyses language games cognitively
• he says religion and philosophy are different games
• both have different meanings of ‘god’ so they cannot be the same
• but there are religious philosophers, so surely you can be part of both groups?
• as a reductionist, phillips aims to reduce everything down to the simplest possible explanation
• he argues ‘god exists’ are is expressions of belief
• “Talk about God’s reality cannot be considered as talk about the existence of an object”

• don cupitt argues a non-cognitive approach is needed
• he says a misunderstanding occurs whenever we interpret religious language in ‘realist‘ terms
• talk of God is really just talk of human experiences
• to speak of ‘God’ is to subscribe to a certain set of values and a certain way of seeing the world
• he says we should understand theological language in this non-realist way

• aquinas‘ idea of analogy is based on our limited understanding and language
• both scholars want conceptual clarity and focus on use
• herbert mccabe said there is a difference of assumption
• aquinas assumes language is a given and we use language to express a thought
• whereas for wittgenstein we play different games to create different thoughts
• aquinas writes as a philosophical theologian and develops analogy doctrines on dealing with talking about god
• ‘how can we use our language to find some way of speaking significantly about god’
• wittgenstein barely considered god.
• both do focus on use over meaning.

• a big objection is that languages games are circular
• where do we find the meaning of a word? the game where it has meaning
• where does the game get its meaning? the words that make it up
• there needs to be an external link to make sense.

• there is an issue of choosing between games
• if science and theology are different games, how can they have a discourse?
• which game is more important when choosing between two?
• if all games have equal status, how do we treat language games itself?
• is the language games language game just a game, and therefore has no legitimacy?

• there is also a question of truth here
• the truth of what people believe matters
• ‘god’ is not simply a word with meaning for the faith community
• a central part of faith is that he may not exist
• faith is needed to say that he does even if he might not.

• when applied to religion is fails to understand the claims as universal truths, god would be in every game which wittgenstein says does not work
• unfairly rules out god’s existence
• doesn’t allow for overlap or cross-linking in groups
• doesn’t allow for discourse between groups even though we know it happens