Philosophical Investigations §123: Waismann, Baker, Read and the Freedom View

In this paper, I order the thinking of Friedrich Waismann, Gordon Baker, and Rupert Read into what I call the Freedom View (FV). I justify this labelling by demonstrating their inter-influence and evolving articulation of a shared framework that conceives the problems, aims, and method of (Wittgenstein’s) philosophy to be defined by freedom. The Freedom View is one of the most consequential, yet frequently misunderstood, explications of the therapeutic aspects of Wittgenstein’s later work. This interpretative labour enables an informed assessment of the merit of such a view. While the FV offers a coherent and provocative reading of Wittgenstein’s philosophy, I argue, drawing on Heidegger’s criticisms of Kant’s conception of orientation, that it ultimately fails to capture the sense of ordinary orientation invoked by Wittgenstein in §123: “A philosophical problem has the form: ‘I don’t know my way about’”. As such, the FV is partial and incomplete, unable to recognise a significant dimension to Wittgenstein’s thought.