The standard meter.

In PI 50 Wittgenstein writes:

One would, however, like to say: existence cannot be attributed to an element, for if it did not exist, one could not even name it and so one could say nothing at all of it. — But let us consider an analogous case.  There is one thing of which one can say neither that it is one meter long, nor that it is not one meter long, and that is the standard meter in Paris. — But this is, of course, not to ascribe any extraordinary property to it, but only to mark its peculiar role in the language-game of measuring with a meter-rule.

The passage comes under criticism in Kripke’s Naming and Necessity.  Kripke insists that it makes perfect sense to say of the standard meter that it is a meter.  He says that the standard is used as a way to pick out an abstract entity, a certain length, and that it is an accidental property of the standard that it has this particular length.  It makes sense both to say, according to Kripke, that the standard meter is one meter and also that it might not have been.

Wittgenstein’s defenders will at this point balk at Kripke’s contention.  They will point out that the language-game of “picking out lengths” is different from the language game of “measuring with a meter rule” and that Wittgenstein is correct that it is absurd to speak of using a standard to measure itself.  However, this places too much emphasis on the closing words of the passage quoted above.  After all, Wittgenstein has brought up the langauge game of measuring with a meter rule to ellucidate what may be meant by saying that the standard meter cannot be said to be (or not be) a meter long.  On one reading of this passage the point of mentioning the language-game of measuring with a meter is an explanation of a claim about what cannot be said.  Kripke, it may be insisted, has shown us another way to make sense of the claim that the standard meter is one meter.  Kripke may be taken then as correctly pointing out that, in direct contradiction with Wittgenstein’s contention that it cannot, it can be said that the standard meter is one meter, by connection not with the language-game of measuring with a meter but rather with the language-game of picking out lengths.

There is more to be said, however.  First, there is an interpretive question about the shifting voices in the PI.  Without settling on which voice is authoritative, consider the following reformulation:

Voice A: One would, however, like to say: existence cannot be attributed to an element, for if it did not exist, one could not even name it and so one could say nothing at all of it.

Voice B: But let us consider an analogous case.  There is one thing of which one can say neither that it is one meter long, nor that it is not one meter long, and that is the standard meter in Paris.

Voice A: But this is, of course, not to ascribe any extraordinary property to it, but only to mark its peculiar role in the language-game of measuring with a meter-rule.

An interpreter may hold that Voice A is extending remarks made regarding “elements” in previous passages.  Voice B is giving an objection, claiming that the line of reasoning leads to an absurd conclusion that the standard meter is not a meter.  Voice A is responding to the objection by singling out one sense in which the standard meter cannot be said to be a meter: viz., in connection with the language game of measuring with a meter-rule.  This leaves open the possibility of other senses in which the standard meter may be said to be a meter.  In particular, Voice A’s insistence that the point made by Voice B is not to attribute some bizarre property to the standard meter, such as the property of not-having-a-metric-length, may now be read as leaving open precisely the possibility Kripke pursues.

Still, I think that there must be more to say.  For one, I am ever anxious about interpretation and therefor feel almost certain that my tentative suggestion above must be incorrect.  I’m anxious that I do not have the passage in proper context with respect to the discussion of elements in preceding passages.  That is, Kripke’s contention aside, I’m just not all that clear on what the point of the example is in its original textual context.  Furthermore, Kripke’s approach is to construe the use of the standard meter as part of a naming ceremony for an abstract entity.  Doesn’t this run directly contrary to a central theme of the PI, opposition to the identification of naming and meaning?

Tags: Kripke, PI 50