Wittgenstein’s regress-of-rules argument shows that the intellectualist assumption that all non-arbitrary linguistic behavior must be rulelike leads to an infinite regress of rules for applying rules, making a complete rule-based theory of what speakers in fact do unintelligible and indicating that interpretation and contextual understanding cannot be eliminated.

By Hubert L. Dreyfus, from What Computers Can't Do

Key Arguments

  • Dreyfus notes that Wittgenstein 'assumes, like the intellectualist philosophers he is criticizing, that all nonarbitrary behavior must be rulelike, and then reduces this assumption to absurdity by asking for the rules which we use in applying the rules, and so forth.'
  • This dialectical strategy is not merely about our feeling of indefinitely being able to 'break the rules and still be understood'—a phenomenological point that might be mistaken—but about 'whether a complete understanding of behavior in terms of rules is intelligible.'
  • Wittgenstein’s position is summarized as 'arguing, as Aristotle argued against Plato, that there must always be a place for interpretation,' which rules alone cannot fill.
  • The issue, Dreyfus emphasizes, is 'not, as Turing seemed to think, merely a question of whether there are rules governing what we should do, which can legitimately be ignored. It is a question of whether there can be rules even describing what speakers in fact do.'
  • A truly complete rule theory of speaker abilities would have to include not just grammatical and semantic rules but further rules 'for recognizing the situation, the intentions of the speakers, and so forth.'
  • However, 'if the theory then requires further rules in order to explain how these rules are applied, as the pure intellectualist viewpoint would suggest, we are in an infinite regress.'
  • Since humans plainly succeed in using language, this regress shows that their successful practice cannot be fully captured by a hierarchy of explicit rules for rule application; and if AI is to be possible, 'it must also not be a problem for machines,' which are supposed to operate via such rules.

Source Quotes

One must show that the theoretical claim is untenable on its own terms: that the skill which enables a native speaker to speak cannot be completely formalized; that the epistemological assumption is not only implausible but leads to contradictions. Wittgenstein was perhaps the first philosopher since Pascal to note: "In general we don't use language according to strict rulesit hasn't been taught us by means of strict rules either." 20 But Wittgenstein did not base his argument against the claim that language was a calculus solely on a phenomenological description of the nonrulelike use of language. His strongest argument is a dialecticai one, based on a regress of rules.
20 But Wittgenstein did not base his argument against the claim that language was a calculus solely on a phenomenological description of the nonrulelike use of language. His strongest argument is a dialecticai one, based on a regress of rules. He assumes, like the intellectualist philosophers he is criticizing, that all nonarbitrary behavior must be rulelike, and then reduces this assumption to absurdity by asking for the rules which we use in applying the rules, and so forth.
His strongest argument is a dialecticai one, based on a regress of rules. He assumes, like the intellectualist philosophers he is criticizing, that all nonarbitrary behavior must be rulelike, and then reduces this assumption to absurdity by asking for the rules which we use in applying the rules, and so forth. Here it is no longer a question of always being able to break the rules and still be understood.
And this is not, as Turing seemed to think, merely a question of whether there are rules governing what we should do, which can legitimately be ignored. It is a question of whether there can be rules even describing what speakers in fact do. To have a complete theory of what speakers are able to do, one must not only have grammatical and semantic rules but further rules which would enable a person or a machine to recognize the context in which the rules must be applied.
Thus there must be rules for recognizing the situation, the intentions of the speakers, and so forth. But if the theory then requires further rules in order to explain how these rules are applied, as the pure intellectualist viewpoint would suggest, we are in an infinite regress. Since we do manage to use language, this regress cannot be a problem for human beings.

Key Concepts

  • Wittgenstein was perhaps the first philosopher since Pascal to note: "In general we don't use language according to strict rulesit hasn't been taught us by means of strict rules either." 20
  • His strongest argument is a dialecticai one, based on a regress of rules.
  • He assumes, like the intellectualist philosophers he is criticizing, that all nonarbitrary behavior must be rulelike, and then reduces this assumption to absurdity by asking for the rules which we use in applying the rules, and so forth.
  • It is a question of whether there can be rules even describing what speakers in fact do.
  • if the theory then requires further rules in order to explain how these rules are applied, as the pure intellectualist viewpoint would suggest, we are in an infinite regress.

Context

Middle of the passage, where Dreyfus invokes Wittgenstein (and Aristotle against Plato) to mount an internal critique of the epistemological assumption by showing that a total rule‑theory of linguistic practice collapses into an infinite regress.