Antropologia, Morfologia e Metafísica em Wittgenstein

Abstract

The object of this dissertation is the philosophical dimension and metaphilosophical dimension of Ludwig Wittgenstein's (1889-1951) Remarks on Frazer’s Golden Bough (1967). The Remarks correspond to a collection of philosophical notes whose general relevance to the whole of Wittgenstein's work can be established: in a more superficial way, as to its philosophical dimension; and in a deeper way, as to its metaphilosophical dimension. As for the philosophical dimension of the Remarks, that is, as regards the object of Wittgenstein's philosophical investigation, the text can be read as a critique of the anthropological method employed by J. G. Frazer (1854-1941) in his masterpiece, namely The Golden Bough (1890-1915). As for Wittgenstein's method of philosophical investigation, the text can be read as an appropriation of the morphological method employed by O. A. G. Spengler (1880-1936) and a self-criticism of the old philosophical method employed by Wittgenstein in his first book of philosophy, namely, the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1921); but above all as an exercise in the employment of a new philosophical method, still in its most elementary condition, which would be improved throughout Wittgenstein's late philosophy, and would be declared by the philosopher himself as his greatest philosophical legacy. Thus, our object concerns not only the philosophical nature of Wittgenstein's critique of Frazer's anthropology but also the metaphilosophical nature of Wittgenstein's appropriation of Spengler's morphology and, above all, self-criticism of his own philosophy. The objective of this dissertation is to investigate the relation of Wittgenstein's critique to Frazer's anthropology and the appropriation of Spengler's morphology with the employment of his new philosophical method and his reflections on the nature of philosophy. In other words, it is a question of showing how the philosophical dimension and the metaphilosophical dimension of the Remarks overlap each other; and how we can apprehend the second from the first. Therefore, this dissertation was divided in two parts: the first, dedicated to the questions external to the text of the Remarks; and the second, dedicated to the internal questions to the text of the Remarks. The first part was divided into two chapters: one on the historical context of the intermediate period of Wittgenstein's philosophy and the purpose that led him to the writing of the Remarks; and another on the problems that occurred in the process of editing and publishing the Remarks from the Wittgenstein’s Nachlass that imply in problems relevant to their exegesis. The second part was also divided into two chapters: one on the philosophical dimension of the Remarks, that is, on Wittgenstein's critique of Frazer's anthropology; and another on the metaphilosophical dimension of the Remarks, that is, on Wittgenstein's appropriation of Spengler's morphology and the formation of a new philosophical method.