A Private Language Argument to elucidate the relation between mind and language

I will defend the claim that we need to differentiate between thinking and reasoning in order to
make progress in understanding the intricate relation between language and mind. The
distinction between thinking and reasoning will allow us to apply a structural equivalent of
Ludwig Wittgenstein’s Private Language Argument to the domain of mind and language. This
argumentative strategy enables us to show that and how a certain subcategory of cognitive
processes, namely reasoning, is constitutively dependent on language. The final outcome and
claim of this paper can be summarized as follows: We can think without language, but we
cannot reason without language. While this still leaves several questions about the relation
between mind and language unanswered, I hold that the insights defended in this paper provide
the basis and proper framework for further investigation about the relationship between
language and the mind.