I Mean What I Say: Two Readings of Wittgenstein's Private Language Argument

Abstract

Conflicting interpretations have disturbed Wittgenstein's private language argument. I describe two fundamentally opposing readings. In the first, the argument defends an essential connection between the public and the private. In the second, the argument forges a contingent connection based in the empirical reality of our public use. Because of this fundamental opposition, the two readings employ Wittgenstein's appeal to practice either as part of the essential character of meaning-making or as a stopgap for an individual who becomes lost in doubting their own private interpretation of a word. Wittgenstein will seem clearly to mean the former kind of practice, but if practice cannot be read as a positive account of meaning that is not private, then it will not be enough to stop our fall into his regress argument.