Ludwig Wittgenstein

Bio: I deal with logic and the nature of representation.
Born: April 26, 1889, Vienna, Austria
Will probably die: April 29, 1951, Cambridge, United Kingdom
Family: Leopoldine Wittgenstein (mother), Karl Wittgenstein (father) | Margaret Wittgenstein (sister), Paul Wittgenstein (brother), Hermine Wittgenstein (sister), Rudolf Wittgenstein (brother), Johannes Wittgenstein (brother), Helene Wittgenstein (sister), Konrad Wittgenstein (brother), Dora Wittgenstein (sister)
Considered by some to be the greatest philosopher of the 20th century.
Interested in: solipsism and in the ethical nature of the relation between the will and the world.
Major Ideas: about nature of representation, the relation between thought, language, and reality, and the limits of thought and representation; that logic and mathematics are analytical.
Rivals that: the meaning of a word is some object that it names – in which case the meaning of a word could be destroyed, stolen or locked away, which is nonsense – and that the meaning of a word is some psychological feeling – in which case each user of a word could mean something different by it, having a different feeling, and communication would be difficult, if not impossible.
Main Thoughts: the more we return words to their home, seeing them in terms of the ordinary language contexts that they work in, the easier it becomes to untie the knots in language and understand what is really being said.
Contribution to philosophy: has contributed in the philosophical areas of language, logic and metaphysics, but also ethics, the way that we should live in the world. His personal "mission" is to resolve a certain problem by clearing misunderstandings away.