Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus website
Different pages present the same text in different ways. This one is a dendrogram that tracks and maps your place in the text as you read.
Ludwig Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus is a landmark philosophical text composed of propositions in a tree structure (e.g. 2, 2.1, 2.1.1, etc). This project was made while studying design and philosophy at Parsons School of Design and Lang College. It consists of a website that explores different methods of reading and visualizing the Tractatus’ hierarchy, with more or less practical utility.
The Tractatus is about the logical structure underlying human language. It describes how relations of words resemble reality, and how to distinguish between meaningful and nonsensical statements (as if sentences were mathematical proofs).
Per Kris Sowersby, Signifier was designed with “Bézier curves and sharp vectors determined by machine logic and a Brutalist ethos” — this seemed appropriate for the approach of the Tractatus to language. Aktiv Grotesk is used for the numbering, and also on the deductive logic statements and diagrams sprinkled through the text. Panama is used for the header.
A demonstration of the dendrogram moving from proposition 2 to 2.2 to 2.22
All of the pages can be switched back and forth between the original German and an English translation
This is the nonsense version, with animated text that breaks apart. It emphasizes proposition 6.54, where Wittgenstein tells us that "anyone who understands me eventually recognizes [my propositions] as nonsensical".
This is the Tabs version, which lets you move through the text in progressive layers like a file navigator.
Finally, this is Threads, which imitates online forum replies by indenting progressive sub-propositions.
