Derrida Contra Wittgenstein: Crucial Differences

1 Presentation for the Derrida Today Conference June 14, 2024 Panel Title: Derrida in Dialogue Speaker #3: Gregory Desilet Paper Title: Derrida Contra Wittgenstein: Crucial Differences For me, Derrida has always been the most provocative theorist on communication, a process that, according to him, may or may not take place through language due to many intervening variables. And, for me, Wittgenstein occupies a close second on the topic of communication. The views of these two philosophers of language overlap in some respects, but their differences are more interesting, I think, than their similarities. Today I want to share with you three key differences between the two. These are: interpretation, concepts, and demonstrability. All three are intimately connected and relevant to communication. A more extended presentation of these topics can be found in my book, published last year, The Enigma of Meaning: Wittgenstein and Derrida, Language and Life. Beginning with interpretation, Wittgenstein’s approach emerges in Philosophical Investigations when he dwells at length on rules. Every word carries with it implicit rules for its application. And the question arises: How are these rules learned, understood, and reliably followed? But before he gets very far in his investigation, he encounters a troubling question expressed through his interlocutor who asks, “But how can a rule shew me what I have to do at this point?” Whatever I do is, on some interpretation, in accord with the rule” (#198). But here you might well ask: How can just any use of a word be made to accord with the rule? In answer to that question, consider an example. This one comes from rhetoric scholar and a past mentor of mine, John Macksoud. It’s still illustrative even though a bit dated. Macksoud says: You enter my office and I invite you to sit down on a computer. But my office contains nothing you would ordinarily recognize as a computer. I indicate an object and tell you that placing yourself on it will constitute acceptance of my invitation. What? Is a chair a computer? Well, computers must meet certain criteria. Let us specify them. First a computer must compute. My chair does so by being displaced more or less, and differently, at different moments, by your weight. It must have moving parts. In use, the parts of the chair move in relation to each other and to any fixed point. It must provide a readout of the results of its computations. That is what it does in the differences in its configuration and position after use. It must be electrically powered. And so it is: by the electrical charges of the cells within the muscles of your body (2009, 49). This seemingly perverse deviancy in applying the word “computer” to a chair turns out to be a use that may, as Wittgenstein feared, be made consistent, “on some interpretation,” with criteria for use of the word “computer.” Wittgenstein sums up as follows: “This was our paradox: no course of action could be determined by a rule, because every course of action can be made out to accord with the rule” (#201). Saul Kripke finds this claim as 2 compelling as it is astonishing. He says, “Personally, I am inclined to regard it [the rule paradox] as the most radical and original sceptical problem that philosophy has seen to date” (1982). Granting as much, what is to be done? According to Wittgenstein, if interpretation is made to play a role in the question of meaning, the center will not hold. But Wittgenstein sees that we only imagine interpretation plays a crucial role. We imagine some form of mental processing must occur when fitting meanings to words. But he discovers interpretation, as mental processing, is an unnecessary step. Any form of interpretation can only initiate an endless regress of one interpretation after another until reaching the point where, arbitrarily, the last interpretation counts by default as the meaning. He says, for example, “Any interpretation still hangs in the air along with what it interprets, and cannot give it any support. Interpretations by themselves do not determine meaning” (#198). Essentially, in Wittgenstein’s view, meaning arrives before interpretation, thereby undermining a strong role for interpretation in the routine use of language. But then, along comes Derrida. His work everywhere points to an inevitable role for interpretation, even in the routine use of language. Every use of language necessarily involves interpretation since language, in its mode of representation, is reductive, a kind of shorthand compression and translation of experience into a code for purposes of sharing experience through communication. For example, when discussing the work of translation of one language into another, Derrida makes a telling remark when he says, “We will never have, and in fact have never had, to do with some ‘transport’ of pure signifieds from one language to another, or within one and the same language, that the signifying instrument would leave virgin and untouched” (1981, 20). Meanings stimulated through familiar words exchanged between speakers of the same language do not perform as perfect repetition of past uses but instead, in Derrida’s expression, as repetition-with-a-difference. Interpretation as translation between different languages counts as merely a more obvious instance of the interpretation that occurs when speakers of the same language exchange words. Communicators must quickly assess a moving multitude of linguistic and contextual cues. Play in the stimulation of meanings necessitates constant rapid interpretation—what may be called educated guessing—in the reading of messages. In short, on the issue of interpretation, Wittgenstein and Derrida are at odds. Turning now to concepts, suppose, for our purposes here, that every word names a concept. Wittgenstein claims the boundaries of the meanings of concepts do not and need not have sharp boundaries. Among his various defenses of this claim—he offers a simple analogy. He says in The Blue Book, “Many words . . . don’t have a strict meaning. But this is not a defect. To think it is would be like saying that the light of my reading lamp is no real light at all because it has no sharp boundary” (BB, 27). Turning back to Derrida, it appears he agrees with Wittgenstein on concepts lacking sharp boundaries. For example, in his 1977 exchange with John Searle, when discussing iterability—Derrida’s word for the endless reusability of words —he says, “Iterability blurs a priori the dividing line that 3 passes between . . . opposed terms . . . . The line delineating the margin can therefore never be determined rigorously” (1977, 210). But it would be hasty to draw a firm conclusion about Derrida’s view from this statement. A decade later, in his 1988 book Limited Inc, he apparently contradicts this statement when he says, “I confirm it: for me . . . unless a distinction can be made rigorous and precise it isn’t really a distinction” (1988, 126). However, Derrida’s defense of this apparent contradiction is noteworthy. He says for example: “I add a supplementary complication that calls for other concepts . . . another ‘logic,’ . . . [a discourse] that accounts for the impossibility of concluding a ‘general theory.’ This other discourse doubtless takes into account the conditions of this classical and binary logic, but it no longer depends entirely upon it” (1988, 116-117). Iterability adds an important modification to the external separation between classical opposing concepts by initiating an internal split within the two sides of an opposition. Derrida shows every concept and every signified to be structurally divided because it emerges necessarily divided in its very identity. Every word, every concept both is and is not what it is through the interplay between text and context. To visualize this situation, imagine a coin. One side opposes the other. In particular cases one or the other side may temporarily dominate, as when the coin lands on heads or tails, but each side does not exist without the other and each cannot be reduced to the other. Even when only one side shows, the other side is still there. Any attempt to eliminate the two-sided nature of the coin results in the elimination of the entire coin. Its usefulness derives from its two-sidedness. For Derrida, the experience of the blurring of boundaries may be accounted for by way of the division of meaning between two or more different readings generated by the same information. This results from the dynamic interaction and codependence of text and context and the ensuing undecidability establishes the need for interpretation and decision. This complement of differences requires a considerable shift in the understanding of and structure of classical oppositional relations. These complementary opposites factor as equals—but as equals only in the sense that both sides remain essential to the relation. Everything comes at a price, but the price of complementarity need not be understood as an equation where one side offsets or cancels the other. Derrida argues such complementarity characterizes all oppositions from the metaphysical to the physical, transforming them from structures in opposition to structures of differences. So, where are we now? We have seen that the views presented by Wittgenstein and Derrida are the reverse of each other, with Wittgenstein on the side of no interpretation necessary and blurred concept boundaries and Derrida on the side of necessary interpretation and rigorous but flipping concept boundaries. We have also seen that Wittgenstein offers defenses—for both his view of the absence of interpretation and his claim regarding blurred boundaries. However, he fails adequately 4 to address an interesting contradiction arising between his views of interpretation and concepts. One would think—where concept boundaries remain somewhat vague— interpretation in word use would not only be called for but even necessary. Unfortunately, it seems Wittgenstein never addresses this puzzle or brings this tension between interpretation and boundaries into better alignment. Consequently, his view of boundaries weakens his argument against the role of interpretation. In Derrida’s case, we have also seen a possible contradiction in his thinking in the claim that, on the one hand, interpretation remains irreducible and necessary in the use of words and, on the other hand, the distinctions between concepts “can be made rigorous and precise.” Here one would think that—where the boundaries between terms are rigorous and precise—the applications of terms would be sufficiently self-evident to make interpretation mostly unnecessary. But, unlike Wittgenstein, we have seen Derrida offers a persuasive defense of his view of the interpretation/boundary issue. Thus, it would appear at this point that Derrida’s position has an advantage over Wittgenstein’s position, since he brings his views of interpretation and boundaries into stronger alignment than does Wittgenstein and he does so by introducing complementarity into the structure of oppositions and differences. Moving to the third issue, the issue of demonstrability, allows further clarification of the choice between the views of Wittgenstein and Derrida. We have seen Wittgenstein place emphasis on the demonstrability of meaning by shifting the ground of meaning from inner mental contents to the outer operations of use. Emphasis on meaning as use is the most ostensively demonstrable way of tracing the application of rules for purposes of ensuring the greatest transparency of communication. We see this emphasis on demonstrability when Wittgenstein makes statements in Philosophical Investigations such as “What is hidden . . . is of no interest to us” (PI#126) and “An ‘inner process’ stands in need of outward criteria” (PI#580). Derrida’s views do not contradict this emphasis on demonstrability but, for him, transparency of meaning nevertheless fades as a result of the divided identity of signifiers. To be fair, Wittgenstein was fully aware of the split identity issue, as is evident from his extensive treatment of this issue in Part II of Philosophical Investigations. But Wittgenstein treats such identity issues as special cases whereas, for Derrida, the identity issue is structural. As in the case of iterability, split identity necessarily applies to all instances of use. Oddly enough, however, Wittgenstein—likely unintentionally so—betrays his emphasis on demonstrability when advancing his view of interpretation. He does so in the same breath as when he asserts that what is hidden is of no interest for purposes of communication, that everything is open to view, and that the routine use of language requires no interpretation. This entire orientation to the use of language has the effect of positioning meanings as self-evident. And ironically, rendering meanings as self-evident removes any necessity for demonstrating or explaining the uses of terms. When applications of rules are viewed as 5 self-evident, routine use leads to the presumption of transparency. And this leads to a general model of language use where the applications of words need present no occasion for explanation. This becomes nowhere more evident in Wittgenstein’s position than through the eyes of Baker and Hacker and their understanding of Wittgenstein’s introduction of the notion of internal relation. They insist he is claiming that training establishes an internal relation between rules and applications such that to grasp a rule means to be able to apply it correctly. Thus, where an internal relation exists, no interpretation occurs. Wittgenstein may be on the right track when emphasizing preference for the demonstrability of meanings but he goes a bridge too far with his insistence on sidelining the role of interpretation. Ruth Sonderegger gets it exactly right when she says, “[I]t can be shown clearly how Derrida’s attempt to represent speaking and understanding as interpretation constitutes a significant advance beyond Wittgenstein” (1977, 183). By contrast, Baker and Hacker get it exactly wrong with their appeal to internal relations between rules and applications. As Patricia Werhane notes, this “blurs the idea of a rule with its applications so as to invite an identity of the two” which then imposes the consequence that “rule-following is dictated by conventions which themselves cannot be brought into question” (1992, 158-159). This conflation of rules and applications transforms Wittgenstein’s initial emphasis on demonstrability by stripping away any need for demonstration. Acknowledging the inevitability of interpretation in the use of language necessitates a predisposition for demonstration, for explanation, for giving reasons. Derrida is emphatic, not only about interpretation and the value of giving reasons but also on the necessity of being disposed to do so for the sake of communication and community. He says, for example, “The media and academia have the duty to respect . . . the principle of reason and the spirit of Enlightenment . . . which is to say among other things, their public destination, as Kant used to say, their belonging to the public sphere where one is required to give one’s reasons, to justify one’s discourse, to present an argument, and so on” (1992, 427). Now, there are many meanings which, for structural reasons, cannot be demonstrated in the public sphere, cannot be shared, and therefore remain stranded in the private sphere. Such meanings include visions, revelations, intuitions, dreams, and claims to personal gifts for right seeing and true vision about the way things are and how to proceed into the future. But all community, all governments, led by such private vision invariably devolve into autocracies no different from cults. This happens where collective deference to leadership based on private vision renders demonstration not only unnecessary but also structurally impossible, thereby yielding government by fiat. We see this kind of leadership all over the world, and, as we have recently seen, American politics is by no means immune to this kind of leadership. Acquiescing in such leadership is like agreeing to a poker game where the winning hand need not show the cards. 6 The demonstration constituted by giving reasons is necessary for the cooperative activity associated with, to quote Derrida, all “inquiry [attempting to seek] the ‘true,’ . . . [the] presentation of what ‘is,’ [the] exposition of the ‘facts,’ [the] historical narrative, [and the] discussion, evaluation, [and] interpretation, [occurring when] putting all these propositions together thanks to what is called language, communication, information, pedagogy, and so forth” (1992, 427). To say it in a sentence: It is not possible to have healthy community without demonstrability and the demonstration of interpretations in communication. I’m not suggesting Wittgenstein imagines explanations for application of words need never be given or are never called for. But the structure of meaning he proposes invites a disposition toward language whereby communication assumes the veneer of transparent self-evidence such that the rules apply themselves. Instances where explanations are needed count as special cases. For Derrida, users must be prepared at all times to account for their uses of language. Naming has rhetorical consequences for which language users must remain accountable. In sum, language is our primary means for shaping and managing community. And in order to achieve serviceable communication we owe it to each other always to be predisposed to give explanations, not only for actions but also for choice of words in describing and defining circumstances and situations. I admire Wittgenstein and understand his view of the role of interpretation to be something that, were he alive today, would likely fall under his unremitting critical gaze. Nevertheless, I do believe, as argued today, his approach to language benefits from a Derridean correction. Citations: Derrida, Jacques. (1977). Limited Inc abc . . . Glyph 2: Johns Hopkins Textual Studies. Trans. Samuel Weber. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Vol. 2, 162-254. Derrida, Jacques. (1988). Limited Inc. Evanston: Northwestern University Press. Derrida, Jacques. (1992). Points . . . Interviews, 1974-1994. Ed. Elisabeth Weber. Trans. Peggy Kamuf and Others. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Kripke, Saul. (1982). Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Macksoud, John. (2009). John Macksoud’s Other Illusions. West Lafayette, Indiana: Purdue University Press. Sonderegger, Ruth. (1997). A Crtitique of Pure Meaning: Wittgenstein and Derrida. European Journal of Philosophy. Vol. 5, no. 2, 183-209. 7 Werhane, Patricia H. (1992). Skepticism, Rules, and Private Languages. Humanities Press. Wittgenstein, Ludwig. (1953). Philosophical Investigations. Trans. G. E. M. Anscombe. New York: The Macmillan Company. Wittgenstein, Ludwig. (1958). The Blue and Brown Books. New York: Harper & Row, Publishers. (From dictations to students at Cambridge 1933-1935).