FROM WITTGENSTEIN'S POSSESSION

MOORE, G.E.

The Nature of Judgment. [Off-printed from MIND: A Quarterly Review of Psychology and Philosophy. Vol. VIII., N.S., No. 30.].

(April, 1899). 8vo. Unbound. A fine copy. 18 pp.

The very rare first edition, off-print, - from the library of Wittgenstein (not stated anywhere in the copy, but the copy comes from the descendents of Hänsel, who verify the provenance) - of one of Moore's main and most widely read papers, in which he discusses "meaning", analyzes truth and falsity, and departs from the generally accepted ideas of Bradley as well as from the essence of idealistic philosophy.

Off-prints of the present work are of great scarcity, and the present copy has been in the possession of Ludwig Wittgenstein, who was probably given the copy by Moore himself. Wittgenstein handed over some of his belongings, including a number of his books, to his life-long friend Ludwig Hänsel. Among these belongings was the present copy of Moore's influential work.

Wittgenstein did not have many close friends, but the closest- together with Rudolph Koder- was Luwig Hänsel, who was a high-school teacher of German and literature. Hänsel and Wittgenstein, who befriended each other in 1918 while being war prisoners in Monte Casino, also remained close friends throughout their lives.

George Edward Moore (1873-1958) is one of the most influential of twentieth century philosophers, and his contributions to analytic philosophy can be compared to only those of Russell, Wittgenstein and Frege, with whom he founded this philosophical discipline. His impact on Anglo-American philosophy in the 20th century must be said to be nearly unsurpassed.

The present paper constitutes one of Moore's earliest departures from idealistic philosophy and one of his his first severe criticisms of internal relations. He discusses the concepts of true and false and thereby also considers idealism in both Kantian and Bredleyan form, departing decisively from this philosophical direction. "An important early context in which he elaborates it is his discussion of meaning in his famous paper 'The Nature of Judgement' (1899), which comes largely from his 1898 Dissertation. Moore begins here by attributing to Bradley a quasi-empiricist view of meaning as abstracted from the total content of judgement..." (SEP).

Order-nr.: 41461