Back from the South.

So, I'm back from my trip to Memphis and the side excursion to Graceland. The whole trip was a big success, especially the Elvis part. I'm taking a few days off from work right now, and that hasn't been very successful at ALL -- I keep trying to get stuff done! Granted, there are a lot of little things that I need to finish up, and it would be great for me to get them off of my list of things to do, but it's been very hard for me to sit down and watch a movie or take a walk. So, I'm going to make myself relax at Starbucks this morning, blog about Graceland and write some movie reviews while there. Here's a picture of the wild excitement at Graceland to tempt you to return to this site later today:



Warning: I may not post about Wittgenstein. Or actually, maybe I'll post about him now. Since my goal is to learn a few things about him, I'll limit myself to writing yea but a few things. And then I'm going to research Tennessee Williams.

So here's a few things about Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889 - 1951):
Like me, he lived in a town called Cambridge, though his was in England. Unlike me, he studied mathematics and philosophy in Cambridge, and then entered the Austrian army during WWI. Also unlike me, he was the heir to much wealth. He gave it all away post war and wrote a bunch of long, heavy philosophical treatises which weren't published until his death.
Here's what he wrote:

Notebooks, 1914-1916
Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
Blue and Brown Books
Philosophical Investigations
On Certainty
Remarks on Colour

He also wrote "Remarks on the Foundation on Mathematics," but that didn't have a nice icon on Amazon, so I linked "Remarks on Colour" instead.

Last summer, I attempted to read "Philosophical Investigations" and didn't get too far. It piqued my interest in that it was about language (and I'm fascinated by the roots of language), but I found that Wittgenstein was very picky about any thought one might have about language or even any thought that uses language. As far as I can tell, LW was obsessed with the idea that we will always misunderstand one another since language cannot truly represent our feelings and thoughts. Language is a sort of intermediary between me, and say, David Bowie. David can't ever see exactly what's going on in my head while I listen to "Fame."

Anyway, that's about all I have on Wittgenstein. I can't bring myself to read the whole "Philosophical Investigations" right now and then comment upon it, but I found this little internet investigation regarding LW to be interesting. Most interesting were actually the Amazon reader comments. There are some smart people out there, folks!!!