German government[3] and U.S. sources[4] date the photograph to 1901, slightly after Hitler's arrival at the school, but two years prior to Wittgenstein's enrollment.

Wittgenstein wanted to emigrate to Russia, first in the twenties, as he wrote in a letter to Paul Engelmann, and again in the thirties, either to work as a labourer or as a philosophy lecturer.

Cornish argues that given the nature of the Soviet regime, the possibility that a non-Marxist philosopher (or even one over whom the government could exert no ideological control) would be offered such a post, is unlikely in the extreme.

Cornish tries to tie this to Wittgenstein's arguments against the idea of "mental privacy" and in conclusion says "I have attempted to locate the source of the Holocaust in a perversion of early Aryan religious doctrines about the ultimate nature of man".

Cornish also suggests that Hitler's oratorical powers in addressing the group mind of crowds and Wittgenstein's philosophy of language and denial of mental privacy, are the practical and theoretical consequences of this doctrine.

British professor Laurence Goldstein, in his Clear and Queer Thinking: Wittgenstein's Development and His Relevance to Modern Thought (1999), called Cornish's book important, writing: "For one thing, at the K.u.k.

"[6] Reviewing Goldstein's own book, Mary McGinn called it a sloppy and irresponsible argument: "[O]ne is amazed at the sheer looseness of thought that allows him to assert that 'at certain points in Mein Kampf where Hitler seems to be raging against Jews in general it is the individual young Ludwig Wittgenstein whom he has in mind', and to suggest that Wittgenstein 'may have inspired … (the) hatred of Jews which led, ultimately, to the Holocaust'.

He wrote, "Cornish correctly identifies 'the twist of the investigation' as the thesis that 'Nazi metaphysics, as discernible in Hitler's writings... is nothing but Wittgenstein's theory of the mind modified so as to exclude the race of its inventor'.

But he then offers 'a thought that might occur to a Hasidic Jew, and that is more fittingly a matter for Jewish, as opposed to gentile, reflection: the very engine that drove Hitler's acquisition of the magical powers that made his ascent and the Holocaust possible was the Wittgenstein Covenant violation'.

"[10] In the same journal, Roz Kaveney calls it "a stupid and dishonest book", and says "[Cornish's] intention is to claim Wittgenstein for his own brand of contemplative mysticism, which he defines as the great insight that IndoEuropeans (or, as he unregenerately terms them, Aryans) brought to Hinduism and Buddhism.

"[11] Antony Flew offers a mixed review: "Mr Cornish contends that the reason why the government of the USSR treated Wittgenstein with such peculiar generosity was that he had been the recruiter of all the Cambridge spies.

"[13] In Philosophy Now, John Mann argues that the contentions that so riled up the book's many critics were simply a clever ruse by Cornish designed to attract more readers.