The Necessity of the Ethical or Why Murder Must Be Wrong

Abstract

In the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus we find Wittgenstein’s first published
investigation of ethics. Furthermore, together with the “Lecture on Ethics”, this is
the last time he makes any longer investigation into this subject, as the Nachlass
reveals only a few, scattered remarks on ethical matters after 1929. I will argue
that if the ethical sections of the Tractatus are seen in connection to the concept
of showing, they then reveal a coherent and radical alternative to traditional
conceptions of ethics; an alternative which sheds light on the necessity of
ethics.