Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Contributors
- Reading Wittgenstein (on) Reading: An Introduction
- 1 Eggshells or Nourishing Yolk? A Portrait of Wittgenstein as a Weiningerian
- 2 Weininger and the Two Wittgensteins
- 3 Sex and Solipsism: Weininger's On Last Things
- 4 Wittgenstein and Weininger: Time, Life, World
- 5 Uncanny Differences: Wittgenstein and Weininger as Doppelgänger
- 6 Weininger and Wittgenstein on “Animal Psychology”
- References
6 - Weininger and Wittgenstein on “Animal Psychology”
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 11 December 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Contributors
- Reading Wittgenstein (on) Reading: An Introduction
- 1 Eggshells or Nourishing Yolk? A Portrait of Wittgenstein as a Weiningerian
- 2 Weininger and the Two Wittgensteins
- 3 Sex and Solipsism: Weininger's On Last Things
- 4 Wittgenstein and Weininger: Time, Life, World
- 5 Uncanny Differences: Wittgenstein and Weininger as Doppelgänger
- 6 Weininger and Wittgenstein on “Animal Psychology”
- References
Summary
Introduction
In November 1916, when Wittgenstein was serving in the Austro-Hungarian army, his oldest sister, Hermine, wrote to him that “I have taken your Weininger with me and am very happy with this book; it replaces you for me, a little.” It is not clear which Weininger book Hermine was referring to, but in another letter to her brother, written in 1931, she playfully refers to On Last Things: “I believe Weininger maintained that milk is the only innocent food, because it destroys no seed …” The passage in question is part of the collection of aphorisms that makes up the second chapter of that book:
The vegetarians are just as wrong as their opponents. Anyone who does not wish to contribute to the killing of living things may only drink milk, for anyone who eats fruit or eggs still kills embryos. That is perhaps why milk is the healthiest food, because it is the most ethical.
At first sight, one might take the point of Weininger's aphorism to be to make fun of those whose logical consistency drives them to take up positions that cannot, in practice, be maintained. However, his rejection of both sides in this dispute closely parallels his own substantive ethical outlook, which also sets an impossibly high standard by which to judge human action. For Weininger maintains that to live a virtuous life one must not only rejectimmorality but also conventional mores, devoting oneself wholeheartedly to a life of celibacy and extreme self-denial.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Wittgenstein Reads Weininger , pp. 169 - 197Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2004