I’m trying to understand what Wittgenstein said that was so incredible, could somebody please explain his main idea(s) in a way a 5 year old could understand?
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Sure! Althought I am a bit rusty I will try to explain.
Basically: the root of all (philosophical) problems can be found in language.
You see. Language is nothing more than a tool of communication.
If I tell a story about an old man on a bike, your idea of the old man is different to reality, or how I saw it.
Sure, I could specify a lot of things but you’ll never truly get the same exact picture as I did when experiencing the actual story.
Now, replace the story about the old man with a philosophical idea.
Our language is too limited to accurately communicate ideas the way we want them to, in most cases. That’s why people often disagree. Because of tiny contextual misunderstanding which language is at fault for.
So in a nutshell: Language is our only tool of communication and it is and will always be too limited.
Also. I am not sure but Wittgenstein later completely disagreed with everything he said. Not sure, though, about what exactly
EDIT: formatting
Fun fact: Wittgenstein went to elementary school with Adolf Hitler. (No evidence that they knew each other)
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