The Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus ends on a single sentence.
Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muß man schweigen.
Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent. (Proposition 7. German quotations throughout; Japanese and English are L/LAB working translations.)
It may be the most-quoted line in twentieth-century philosophy. But it is not a poetic sign-off or a taste for mystery. Once you grant the picture theory — “a proposition with sense is a picture of a fact” — this follows as a matter of logic. This piece traces where the line is drawn.
1. Three regions — with sense, without sense, nonsensical
There are three kinds of proposition. A proposition with sense (sinnvoll) pictures a fact — its truth is settled against reality. A proposition without sense (sinnlos) is a tautology or a contradiction: “it is raining or it is not” says nothing. Yet this is the scaffolding of logic and is “not nonsensical (nicht unsinnig)” (4.4611). The problem is the third kind, the nonsensical (unsinnig): “the good is an object,” “the world has a meaning” — sentence-shaped, but picturing no fact and not logic either. On Wittgenstein’s account, many traditional philosophical propositions land here. “Most of the propositions and questions of philosophy are not false but nonsensical” (4.003).
2. “The limits of my language mean the limits of my world”
Die Grenzen meiner Sprache bedeuten die Grenzen meiner Welt.
The limits of my language mean the limits of my world. (5.6)
The point is that this limit cannot be drawn from both sides. “Logic fills the world; the limits of the world are also its limits” (5.61). So “in logic we cannot say: this and that exist in the world, that does not.” To point past the boundary at something would already be to think past it. Wittgenstein’s conclusion: “what we cannot think, we cannot think; so we cannot say what we cannot think” (5.61). The limit can only be drawn from inside.
3. Saying vs showing
So what becomes of the boundary itself, and of what lies beyond it? It does not vanish. It shows itself (sich zeigen).
Was gezeigt werden kann, kann nicht gesagt werden.
What can be shown cannot be said. (4.1212)
Logical form mirrors itself in a proposition, but no proposition can state it (previous piece). The same structure recurs above logic.
Es gibt allerdings Unaussprechliches. Dies zeigt sich, es ist das Mystische.
There is indeed the inexpressible. It shows itself; it is the mystical. (6.522)
“Mystical” here is not the supernatural. “Not how the world is, but that it is — that is the mystical” (6.44). The totality of facts can be said. That there is a totality of facts is not itself a fact and cannot be said — only shown.
4. Ethics and value lie “outside the world”
Der Sinn der Welt muß außerhalb ihrer liegen.
The sense of the world must lie outside the world. (6.41)
Inside the world “everything is as it is and happens as it happens; in it there is no value” (6.41). If there is value, it lies outside the run of facts. Hence “it is clear that ethics cannot be put into words. Ethics is transcendental” (6.421). This is not a denial of ethics. It is the claim that ethics is not something you state in propositions but something shown in how a life is lived. “Ethics and aesthetics are one” (6.421).
5. Throwing away the ladder
But here the Tractatus turns its edge on itself. “A proposition is a picture”; “ethics is transcendental” — these sentences are not pictures of facts, nor logic. Which means the sentences of this book are themselves unsinnig. Wittgenstein does not flinch.
Er muß sozusagen die Leiter wegwerfen, nachdem er auf ihr hinaufgestiegen ist.
He must, so to speak, throw away the ladder after he has climbed it. (6.54)
Anyone who has understood my propositions “recognises them in the end as nonsensical,” and “when he has climbed out through them — on them — over them,” he “sees the world rightly” (6.54). How to read this passage is disputed. On the traditional reading, the Tractatus is gesturing at “truths that cannot be said but are.” On the recent “resolute reading,” there are no such truths; nonsense is plainly nonsense, and the book’s aim is to bring you to see that for yourself. Either way, the book erases itself.
6. Silence, then a fresh start
The “silence” of proposition 7 is not an order to “shut up about ethics.” It is a boundary: these are not matters for propositions. Value and the sense of life are not argued but shown — they lie outside the limit of the sayable.
What is striking is that the late Wittgenstein goes back into precisely this region of silence. The things the Tractatus set aside as “not pictures, so not sayable” — the workings of “meaning,” “understanding,” “following a rule,” “pain” — the Investigations takes up again head-on. Only now it does not analyse them as pictures; it describes how they are used within language-games. Part of “the inexpressible,” it turns out, could be spoken of once the question was posed differently.
In sum
| The Tractatus position | proposition | |
|---|---|---|
| Sayable | propositions that picture facts (= natural science) | 4.11, 6.53 |
| Without sense but not nonsense | tautology and contradiction (the scaffolding of logic) | 4.461, 4.4611 |
| Nonsensical | pseudo-propositions past the limit of the sayable (much of philosophy) | 4.003 |
| Only shown | logical form, ethics, value, that the world is | 4.1212, 6.421, 6.522 |
| The book itself | a ladder — throw it away once you have understood | 6.54 |
| Close | of what one cannot speak, one must be silent | 7 |
Connections
- “The limit can only be drawn from inside” is a linguistic version of Kantian critique — drawing the limits of reason with reason, the limits of language with language.
- “Value is outside the facts” is one starting point of the fact–norm split in modern meta-ethics.
- The saying/showing distinction is carried forward, transformed, into later philosophy of language (presupposition, implicature, performativity).
The Wittgenstein feature: overview / the picture theory / this essay / language-games / family resemblance / following a rule.
