| My main area of concern is Wittgenstein's philosophy of mathematics, primarily as it is expressed in his Remarks On The Foundations of Mathematics (henceforth abbreviated as Remarks). There is considerable controversy regarding the extent to which Wittgenstein understood the mathematical content of the views which he criticizes; among my primary aims will be an attempt to evaluate the degree to which he is faithful to the main theorems with which he deals. A number of approaches to the philosophy of mathematics will emerge in this examination of Wittgenstein's remarks, and I will be concerned to argue that these approaches can be effectively unified within the Wittgensteinian conception of a language-game; indeed, I shall argue that mathematics is most properly viewed as a collection of language-games; related to each other along the now familiar lines of "family resemblance". |
