Work Classification Layer
Compare Works
Pick two or more works to set their attribute fingerprints, dimension-by-dimension passages, and shared school embodiments side by side. Especially useful for author-stage comparisons (Wittgenstein early vs late) and for setting a single tradition's foundational texts against each other.
Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language
There is no fact of the matter about what a rule "requires" — the meaning skeptic's challenge is the real heart of Wittgenstein's later philosophy
Attribute Fingerprint
Rows where works disagree are highlighted in gold. The full ontology grid is shown.
| Attribute | Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language (Mature (Kripke's second major book after Naming and Necessity, 1980)) |
|---|---|
| Time · Extent | Infinite |
| Time · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Time · Grain | Continuous |
| Time · Freedom | Non-Deterministic |
| Time · Traversability | Linear |
| Time · Dimensionality | One |
| Time · Direction | Uni-directional |
| Space · Extent | Infinite |
| Space · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Space · Curvature | Flat |
| Space · Dimensionality | Three |
| Space · Locality | Local |
| Matter · Extent | Infinite |
| Matter · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Matter · Conservation | Conserved |
| Matter · Dimensionality | Three |
| Matter · Locality | Local |
| Observer · Time Instance | Single |
| Observer · Space Instance | Single |
| Observer · Knowledge Extent | Partial |
| Observer · Knowledge Retainment | Total |
| Observer · Physicality | Embodied |
| Observer · Agency | Active |
| Observer · Number | Plural |
| Observer · Metaphysical Agency | None |
| Observer · Moral Authority | Reason |
| Observer · Theological Method | — |
| Energy · Extent | Infinite |
| Energy · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Energy · Conservation | Conserved |
| Energy · Dispersibility | Irreversible |
| Information · Ontological Status | Relational |
| Information · Cosmic Conservation | Conserved |
| Information · Personal Conservation | Non-conserved |
| Information · Granularity | Discrete |
Dimension-by-Dimension Evidence
What each work's passages reveal about its stance on each of the six dimensions.
Time
Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language
The temporal sequence of finite past computations — necessarily finite, never sufficient to determine an infinite extension.
Space
Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language
The community as the social space within which meaning-attribution becomes possible.
Matter
Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language
Embodied finite agents whose physical computations cannot, on Kripke's reading, determine the meaning they instantiate.
Observer
Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language
The individual rule-follower and the community of co-followers — meaning is a relation between them, not an internal state of either.
Energy
Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language
The cognitive energies of computation; the social energies of community correction and affirmation.
Information
Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language
The decisive dimension: there is no fact-of-the-matter information that distinguishes addition from quaddition for any finite computer — meaning is community-constituted, not individually determined.
Internal Tensions
Where each work's argument pulls against itself.
Whether Kripke's "Kripkenstein" is faithful to the historical Wittgenstein is contested: McDowell, Diamond, and Conant argue for a quietist reading on which there is no genuine skeptical paradox; Wright, Boghossian, and Soames take Kripke seriously as exposition. The "skeptical solution" is itself controversial — community use seems just to push the problem back one level, since communities too have only finite past behaviour. Davidson, Pettit, and Brandom all proposed alternative responses to the rule-following considerations that take Kripke's problem seriously while resisting his solution.