Wittgenstein's Earlier and Later Philosophy

Throughout his life, Wittgenstein is known to have developed two philosophical theories, each of which has its own innovations. These two theories have a common denominator in the sense that they both deal with the philophical view of language. This article presents a relatively comprehensive account of these two sorts of philosophy in an attempt to trace   the principle trends in Wittgenstein's thought and the main questions in which he was interested. In his early philosophy, Wittgenstein focuses on the relationship between language and the world. He employed what is called the "picture theory of meaning" to derive conclusions about the nature of the world from his observations about the structure of the atomic sentences. Wittgenstein's later philosophy assumes that the task of philosophy is essentially to dissolve the philosophical and metaphysical puzzles which are the result of insufficient attention to the working of language and herein he introduces the idea of "language games" according to which the use of language is of significance and, in a word, the world ultimately determines which language games can be played. To sum up, Wittgenstein's philosophy seeks to mark the boundaries of language and then realize what language can express and what it can not.