21 April 1998, 924 words
The publication of the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus in 1921 caused a philosophical revolution. The reason you might not know this is because philosophers are always revolting. (After all, if you can't be handsome, you might as well be intellectual. This is the fundamental tenet of every philosophical endeavour.)
The author of the Tractatus, Ludwig Wittgenstein, wrote that his propositions are senseless but, considering that thousands of articles and books have been written about his 75-page tract, it is clear that Wittgenstein failed in his task of convincing philosophers of this. Wittgenstein, however, laboured under a major disadvantage: to wit, he was not a Trini. I, being one, am confident that I can succeed where he failed.
The following extracts from my Tractatus Logico-Trinidadianicus deal with logic, ethics, beauty, religion, politics and women - and all this in less than 1,000 words. Who says you don't get value for your 50 cents when you buy the Independent?
Overview.
1. The world is all the case. Trinidad is a case by itself.
2. What is the case - a fact - is the existence of the state of affairs. The fact of the case is the Trinidadian men are always having affairs.
3. A logical picture of facts is a thought. Fact is, thought in Trinidad is hardly ever logical.
4. A thought is a proposition with a sense. But a man who thinks about a proposition has already committed adultery in his heart, saith the Lord. (Ergo, thinking can be fun.)
5. A proposition is a truth-function of elementary propositions. But, when making a proposition to a beautiful woman, it is even more effective to lie.
6. A general form of a proposition is: [p,E, N(E)]. However, if instead we take p to be a proposition, W to be a wine, N to be negation, and M to be the rational mind, we get [p,W, N(M)], thus proving the validity of both free will and free up.
7. What we cannot speak about, we must pass over in silence. However, there is absolutely nothing which a Trini cannot speak about.
2.174. - A picture cannot place itself outside its representational form: it doesn't need to. Thus, the Sunday Punch is the Caribbean's best-selling newspaper.
4.01. - A proposition is a picture of reality. However, women who belong to middle-class religious organizations reject this idea, never having been propositioned.
4.03. - A proposition must use old expressions to communicate a new sense. In Trinidad, propositions entail using an old profession to communicate a lewd sense.
4.002. Language disguises thought i.e. when a Trini man says to an attractive woman, "You are very intelligent" he means, "You are very intelligent in those shorts and halter top."
4.1212. - What can be shown, cannot be said and, in any case, men don't care to chat while being shown.
4.116. - Everything that can be thought about can be thought clearly. Everything that can be put into words can be put clearly. But not if you're Lloyd Best.
4.462. - Tautologies and contradictions are not pictures of reality, they are how politicians talk.
5.6. The limits of my language mean the limits of my world, because after the Equal Opportunities Bill is passed, practising freedom of speech may get you thrown in a jail cell for badtalking politicians.
5.43. - All the propositions of logic say the same thing, to wit nothing. This makes Patrick Manning a first-class logician.
5.1361. We cannot infer the events of the future from those of the present. Yet the National Lotteries Board and Yesenia Adams make good money because Trinis believe they can do exactly this.
5.1362. - The freedom of the will consists in the impossibility of knowing actions that still lie in the future. Therefore, since Trinis always say, "I know that woulda happen!" after it happens, we would be better off without this clairvoyance.
5.4731. - Language itself prevents every logical mistake. The eloquence of Basdeo Panday thus proves that all his mistakes are illogical ones.
5.47321. - Occam's maxim ("Do not multiply hypotheses unnecessarily") is that unnecessary units in a sign-language mean nothing. Vincent Lasse and Rupert Griffith illustrate Occam's maxim perfectly.
5.61. - Logic pervades the world: the limits of the world are also its limits. Therefore the world ends at the entrance to Parliament.
5.634. - There is no a priori order of things. This is why the lines at KFC are always so long on Friday evenings.
6.32. - The law of causality is not a law but the form of a law, but the form of Darlene Beddoe (the girl in the Kerrygold commercial) would cause any heterosexual Trini man to break the law.
6.421. - It is clear that ethics cannot be put into words. However, our priests, pundits and imams do this all the time, believing that saying something often enough will make it so. In this, they are logically identical to politicians.
6.4311. - Eternal life belongs to those who live in the present. However, it makes sense to believe in an Afterlife since, even if you're wrong, you'll never know you were wrong.
6.5. - If a question can be framed at all, it is also possible to answer it. However, if you're Agriculture Minister Reeza Mohammed, the answer may not be a truthful one.
6.54. - My propositions are elucidatory in this way: she who understands them finally recognizes them as senseless. By then, however, I will hopefully have gotten sex.
Copyright ©1998 Kevin Baldeosingh