Description:
<jats:p>The “Context Principle”, as the author understands it in this paper, is the claim that sub-sentential linguistic expressions (roughly speaking, words) have meaning only in the context of complete meaningful sentences. The author reconstructs the version of the Context Principle that Wittgenstein holds in the <jats:italic>Tractatus</jats:italic>, shows that it has intuitive plausibility and can be defended against alleged counterexamples, and develops an argument for its truth that can be found in the <jats:italic>Tractatus</jats:italic>. In short, the author argues that the “fit” between the meanings of sentences and the meanings of the expressions they contain can only be adequately explained if one acknowledges that for a sub-sentential expression to have meaning <jats:italic>is</jats:italic> for it to make a contribution to the meaning of a sentence.</jats:p>