2.07.2002

I really do intend to get back to the text of the Investigations, but humor me long enough to pursue this question about functional & dysfunctional violations of Types. To begin: distinct language games can occupy different Types. That is, we can easily imagine a language game X about which one or more language games, X' & X'', exist; it is also possible to imagine that any of these language games contain other language games or overlap with them in various combinations. Where does that leave us? I want to suggest that it leaves us having to negotiate moves between one language game & another more or less seamlessly &--this is important--with a certain awareness. Perhaps there is a language game "about" negotiating between language games. Okay, I'll stop before I tie myself in another knot--I've got to go to class now & teach an easy text: Darwin's Origin. Afterthought a couple of days later: This ability to negotiate with awareness between l-games without letting ourselves get tied up in meta-thoughts or entangled in infinite regressions of meaning--this is one definition of competence in a language, also one definition of sanity.

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