A Study On The Change Of Wittgenstein 's Thought In The Early And Late Periods

Wittgenstein proposed two kinds of distinct ideas respectively, i.e. "Language Picture Theory" and "Language Game Theory". In the early stage, Wittgenstein opposed the way that the traditional metaphysics comprehended the essence of the world from concrete objects. Wittgenstein thought the world was the totality of facts, not of things. The perception of world should be done from the facts instead of the things. Wittgenstein put forward the "Language Picture Theory", which is based on the name reference theory. The language, consisting of the combination of names, can depict the world that consists of the combination of objects. Being in the same structure, language is a picture of the world. The reason why language is able to depict the world is that they have the common logical form. In the early stage, Wittgenstein’s way to understand the world from the logical analysis of the language is based on the essentialism. In the late stage. Wittgenstein rebelled against the tradition and put forward the "Language Game Theory" that considered language as an activity and had no essence like the game. Among the languages, there is only the family resemblance. Language games root in the forms of life, under some certain rules. The consistency of rules is determined by that of the forms of life. The world as some kind of heterogeneous things consists of various forms of lives, and has no essence. In the late stage, Wittgenstein’s thought was anti-essentialism. The criticism of language has been transformed from the logical analysis to the language use. The transition of Wittgenstein’s early and late thoughts has undergone a course from the essentialism to the anti-essentialism.Through analyzing the "essentialism" of Wittgenstein’s early thought and the "anti-essentialism" of the late thought, the essay compares the transition between Wittgenstein’s early and late thoughts. It includes four chapters. The first chapter states the study purpose, significance, literature review, research methodology and innovation. The second chapter makes an analysis of the "Language Picture Theory" from the angle of the essentialism. aiming at highlighting the essentialism tendency of Wittgensteins early thought. The third chapter focuses on the analysis of "Language Game Theory" from the standpoint of the anti-essentialism. which indicates the anti-essentialism reflection of the "Family Resemblance". "RuleFollowing" and "Forms of Life". The fourth chapter makes an analysis of the reason why Wittgenstein’s thoughts have made the transition, from the perspective of internal cause and the external cause. Through the comparison between Wittgenstein’s early and late thoughts, it indicates that Wittgenstein’s thoughts have indeed experienced a transition course from statistic to dynamic, certainty to uncertainty, and explanation to description.