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Revisiting W ittgenstein on Family Resemblance and Colour(s)
Author(s) -
Ma Lin,
Brakel Jaap
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
philosophical investigations
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.172
H-Index - 14
eISSN - 1467-9205
pISSN - 0190-0536
DOI - 10.1111/phin.12109
Subject(s) - family resemblance , phrase , range (aeronautics) , linguistics , philosophy , composite material , materials science
We argue that all general concepts are family resemblance concepts. These include concepts introduced by ostension, such as colour(s). Concepts of colour and of each of the specific colours are family resemblance concepts because similarities concerning an open‐ended range of colour or of appearance features crop up and disappear. After discussing the notion of “same colour” and W ittgenstein's use of the phrase “our colours”, we suggest family resemblance concepts in one tradition can often be extended to family resemblance concepts in another tradition, illustrated by W ittgenstein's use of the words Spiel and “game”.