Ludwig Wittgenstein - Philosopher Quotes

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A philosopher who is not taking part in discussions is like a boxer who never goes into the ring.

Ludwig Wittgenstein
The philosopher is not a citizen of any community of ideas, that is what makes him a philosopher.

Ludwig Wittgenstein
Philosophers often behave like little children who scribble some marks on a piece of paper at random and then ask the grown-up "What's that?" — It happened like this: the grown-up had drawn pictures for the child several times and said "this is a man," "this is a house," etc. And then the child makes some marks too and asks: what's this then?

Ludwig Wittgenstein
Philosophers are often like little children, who first scribble random lines on a piece of paper with their pencils, and now ask an adult "What is that?"

Ludwig Wittgenstein
The idea that in order to get clear about the meaning of a general term one had to find the common element in all its applications has shackled philosophical investigation; for it has not only led to no result, but also made the philosopher dismiss as irrelevant the concrete cases, which alone could have helped him understand the usage of the general term.

Ludwig Wittgenstein
The philosopher's treatment of a question is like the treatment of an illness.

Ludwig Wittgenstein
I am sitting with a philosopher in the garden; he says again and again "I know that that's a tree", pointing to a tree that is near us. Someone else arrives and hears this, and I tell them: "This fellow isn't insane. We are only doing philosophy."

Ludwig Wittgenstein
It is one of the chief skills of the philosopher not to occupy himself with questions which do not concern him.

Ludwig Wittgenstein
It's only by thinking even more crazily than philosophers do that you can solve their problems.

Ludwig Wittgenstein
Is it just I who cannot found a school, or can a philosopher never do so?

Ludwig Wittgenstein
I read: "philosophers are no nearer to the meaning of 'Reality' than Plato got,...". What a strange situation. How extraordinary that Plato could have got even as far as he did! Or that we could not get any further! Was it because Plato was so extremely clever?

Ludwig Wittgenstein
One can defend common sense against the attacks of philosophers only by solving their puzzles, i.e., by curing them of the temptation to attack common sense....

Ludwig Wittgenstein
I believe it might interest a philosopher, one who can think himself, to read my notes. For even if I have hit the mark only rarely, he would recognize what targets I had been ceaselessly aiming at.

Ludwig Wittgenstein
This is how philosophers should salute each other: 'Take your time.

Ludwig Wittgenstein
One of the most difficult of the philosopher's tasks is to find out where the shoe pinches.

Ludwig Wittgenstein
The philosopher strives to find the liberating word, that is, the word that finally permits us to grasp what up to now has intangibly weighed down upon our consciousness.

Ludwig Wittgenstein