推倒摇晃的本质主义——对维特根斯坦“家族相似”理论的再反思

Overturn the Shaky Essentialism——Rethinking Wittgenstein’s“Family Resemblance”Theory

“家族相似”理论是维特根斯坦瓦解本质主义思想桎梏的关键。近年来,国内许多学者站在本质主义的立场上对此进行了批评和反批评。本质主义者的“本质性是相似性的前提”这一观点是不成立的。所谓本质,对不同的人可能会展现出不同的样式,本质主义由其既有的思想框架而导致了剥离式的追问,最终将自己陷入虚无的恐慌。并且,“家族相似”并非不能用于认识事物,若仅将其局限在澄清本质论和意象论这一用法之内,实际上也是一种本质主义的认定,它的用法应是丰富的。最后,“家族相似”的界限是由使用它的语言游戏划出的,它本身并不存在什么界限,它自然地在使用中存在,不会脱离其参考系,更不会导向虚无。

For Wittgenstein,the theory of“family resemblance”is the key to break the shackle of essentialism,which many domestic scholars have criticized and counter-criticized from the standpoint of essentialism in recent years.After analysis,the truth is obvious:the viewpoint of essentialism that“essentiality is the premise of similarity”is not right.Essentiality may show different forms for different people.Because of the existing way of thinking,essentialism is trapped in an endless questioning,which makes its followers fall into the panic of nihilism.Furthermore,“family resemblance”can be used to understand things.The behavior of limiting the usage of“family resemblance”only to the use of clarifying essentialism and idealism is also a kind of essentialism.Instead,the use of“family resemblance”should be richer.What’s more,the boundary of“family resemblance”is given by the game of language.“Family resemblance”does not have any boundaries in itself.It is being naturally in using,and will never be separated from its frame of reference,let alone lead to nihilism.