AbstractAbstractI intend to argue in this paper that through the analysis of the idea of negation, the commonly held difference between L. Wittgenstein and K. Popper concerning the nature of empirical statements would dissolve. This argument proceeds from examining the idea of negation first exposed rather extensively in Wittgenstein¡¦s Tractatus, and then Popper¡¦s reasonableness of criticizing it by taking into account his idea of falsification developed in Logic of Scientific Discovery. However, when we come to extend the idea of negation by looking at the contents of Philosophical Investigations, we will see that once the idea of negation applied to the realm of theory (the idea proposed by P. Feyerabend), the difference between Wittgenstein and Popper would not as obvious as people would think. They both refer to ideas originally derived from the logical concept of negation and their ideas are similar in the sense that the idea of negation has to be considered within the realm of concerned theories. The idea of ¡§theoretical impregnation¡¨ proposed by Popper would be in this sense comparable to the idea of ¡§language games¡¨ of Wittgenstein. At the end of this point, I want to further stress that the discrepancy of emphasis in divergent fields (methodology for Popper, whereas theory of meaning for Wittgenstein) causes the apparent difference. . |