Wittgenstein : Concepts or Conceptions ?

I WANT TO MAKE A DISTINCTION BETWEEN CONCEPTS (BEGRIFFE) AND CONCEPTIONS (Auflassungen), and a related distinction between descriptions (Beschreibungen) and pictures (Bilder). I will then try to put this material to work in clarifying an important dimension in Wittgenstein's Philosophical Invest&ations: the difference between conceptual analyses and overviews ( Ubersichten or Uberblicken) [compare F*16]. These distinctions have been hidden from view by the widespread preconception that Wittgenstein is always in the business of giving clarifications of the meaning of words that are allegedly grounded in detailed descriptions of their everyday use in ordinary discourse and that his philosophical investigations have a substantial degree of overlap with Carnap's program of constructing logical syntax and with Ryle7s mapping of logical geography. The distinctions I discuss are both subtle and contestable, but I will try to make a case for their being of decisive importance. Initially I follow the practice indicated in the index to the Philosophical Investigations, which distinguishes a sense of 'picture' that is glossed as 'conception, model7. Wittgenstein seems frequently to take conceptions to be crystallized in what he call 'pictures', and he often uses 'picture' to characterize ideas that seem nonpictorial or even unpicturable.' My modus operandi is more a matter of raising questions than of providing answers. But failing to raise enough questions, or failing to put the question marks deep enough down, is a main weakness of much philosophy. It generates the danger of falsche Fra~estellung.