Online research in philosophy

On the standard interpretation Rudolf Carnap's Der logische Aufbau der Welt amounts to a highly derivative work-a rigorous thinking through of Russell's External World program. An examination of the aims and methods of logical analysis reveals significant differences between the epistemologies of Russell and Carnap, however. It is argued that Russell's reliance on acquaintance makes logical analysis subservient to empiricist epistemic concerns while Carnap is determined to carry out a broadly Kantian program of guaranteeing the objectivity of science through the application of formal logic.

In A Parting of the Ways Michael Friedman proposed to conceive the contemporary divide between analytic philosophy (AP) and continental philosophy (CP) as the outcome of the bifurcation between the Neokantians of Heidelbarg and Marburg. According to Friedman, Carnap can be characterized as the executor of the Marburg school, while Heidegger is to be considered as the heir of the Southwest Neokantianism. In this paper it is argued that Carnap was much closer to the Southwest Neokantianism than usually recognized. To some extent, Carnap’s project in the Aufbau may be described as an attempt to modernize the Neokantian approach of the Southwest school with the help of modern relational logic. This entails that Carnap cannot be lined so easily with the Marburg school as Friedman assumes.

This paper concerns the issue of whether the so-called left wing of the Vienna Circle (Carnap, Neurath, Frank) can be understood as having provided the blueprint for a bipartite metatheory with a formal-logical part (the “logic of science”) supporting and being supported by a naturalistic-empirical part (the “behavioristics of science”). A claim to this effect was recently met by a counterclaim that there was indeed an attempt made to broaden Carnap’s formalist conception of philosophy by the pragmatist Morris, but that this initiative failed and that Carnap showed no interest in it. To defend the original claim this paper provides an analysis of Carnap and Morris on the subject matter of pragmatics in order to show that and how Carnap adopted Morris’s proposals in so far as they agreed with bipartite metatheory conception.

The Logical Reconstruction of the World (Aufbau) is oneof the major works of Rudolf Carnap in which he attempts to put an end to some of the traditional disputes in epistemology by using what he calls 'construction theory'. According to this theory, one or more constructional systems can be designed in which all the scientific and pre-scientific objects are logically made out of a limited number of basic elements. Carnap introduces some options for the basis of this system and chooses the domain of the autopsychological, i.e., the domain of private elementary experiences, among them and tries to construct all the concepts out of them. This phenomenalistic reduction sometimes is seen as embracing a Cartesian dualism of mind and body or even a mentalistic monism. However, in this paper, I shall try to show that the traditional dualist-monist debates are among those disputes that the construction theory aims to get rid of. I will show that Carnap's position on the mind-body problem is really close to what Davidson later termed as 'Anomalous Monism' and that this is why Carnap fails to complete his logical construction at a crucial step. Whenever possible, logical constructions are to be substituted for inferred entities.

This book is a major contribution to the history of analytic philosophy in general and of logical positivism in particular. It provides the first detailed and comprehensive study of Rudolf Carnap, one of the most influential figures in twentieth-century philosophy. The focus of the book is Carnap's first major work: Der logische Aufbau der Welt (The Logical Structure of the World). It reveals tensions within the context of German epistemology and philosophy of science in the early twentieth century. Alan Richardson argues that Carnap's move to philosophy of science in the 1930s was largely an attempt to dissolve the tension in his early epistemology. This book fills a significant gap in the literature on the history of twentieth-century philosophy. It will be of particular importance to historians of analytic philosophy, philosophers of science, and historians of science.

Rudolf Carnap’s Der logische Aufbau der Welt ( The Logical Structure of the World ) is generally conceived of as being the failed manifesto of logical positivism. In this paper we will consider the following question: How much of the Aufbau can actually be saved? We will argue that there is an adaptation of the old system which satisfies many of the demands of the original programme. In order to defend this thesis, we have to show how a new ‘ Aufbau -like’ programme may solve or circumvent the problems that affected the original Aufbau project. In particular, we are going to focus on how a new system may address the well-known difficulties in Carnap’s Aufbau concerning abstraction, dimensionality, and theoretical terms.

The first part of the article deals with the theories of probability and induction put forward by Hans Reichenbach and Rudolf Carnap. It will be argued that, despite fundamental differences, Carnap's and Reichenbach's views on probability are closely linked with the problem of meaning generated by logical empiricism, and are characterized by the logico-semantical approach typical of this philosophical current. Moreover, their notions of probability are both meant to combine a logical and an empirical element. Of these, Carnap over the years put more and more emphasis on the logical aspect, while for Reichenbach the empirical aspect has always been predominant. Seen in this light, Carnap's and Reichenbach's theories of probability can be taken to represent the Viennese and Berlinese mainstreams of the common logical empiricist approach. The second part of the article contrasts the position of these authors with that of the Bruno de Finetti, who is the main representative of the subjective interpretation of probability. Though the latter is sometimes associated with the position taken by Carnap in his late writings, it will be argued that the two are in many ways irreconcilable.

"Homage to Rudolph Carnap."--Hempel, C. G. Rudolf Carnap, logical empiricist.--Wedberg, A. How Carnap built the world in 1928.--Eberle, R. A construction of quality classes improved upon the Aufbau.--Carnap, R. Observation language and theoretical language.--Kaplan, D. Significance and analyticity: a comment of some recent proposals of Carnap.--Wójcicki, R. The factual content of empirical theories.--Williams, P. M. On the conservative extensions of semantical systems: a contribution to the problem of analyticity.--Winnie, J. A. Theoretical analyticity.--Wedberg, A. Decision and belief in science.--Bohnert, H. G. Carnap's logicism.--Hintikka, J. Carnap's heritage in logical semantics.--Partee, B. H. The semantics of belief-sentences.--Kasher, A. Pragmatic representations and language-games.--Carnap, R. Notes on probability and induction.--Jeffrey, R. C. Carnap's inductive logic.--Hilpinen, R. Carnap's new system of inductive logic.--Kuipers, T. A. F. A generalization of Carnap's inductive logic. Essler, W. K. Hintikka versus Carnap.--Hintikka, J. Carnap and Essler versus inductive generalization.--Shimony, A. Carnap on entropy, introduction to "Two essays on entropy" by Rudolf Carnap.

In the light of two unpublished letters from Carnap to Kuhn, this essay examines the relationship between Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions and Carnap's philosophical views. Contrary to the common wisdom that Kuhn's book refuted logical empiricism, it argues that Carnap's views of revolutionary scientific change are rather similar to those detailed by Kuhn. This serves both to explain Carnap's appreciation of The Structure of Scientific Revolutions and to suggest that logical empiricism, insofar as that program rested on Carnap's shoulders, was not substantially upstaged by Kuhn's book.

Value judgments are meaningless. This thesis was one of the notorious tenets of Carnap’s mature logical empiricism. Less well known is the fact that in the Aufbau values were considered as philosophically respectable entities that could be constituted from value experiences. About 1930, however, values and value judgments were banished to the realm of meaningless metaphysics, and Carnap came to endorse a strict emotivism. The aim of this paper is to shed light on the question why Carnap abandoned his originally positive attitude concerning values. It is argued that his non-cognitivist attitude was the symptom of a deep-rooted and never properly dissolved tension between conflicting inclinations towards Neokantianism and Lebensphilosophie. In America Carnap’s non-cognitivism became a major obstacle for a closer collaboration between logical empiricists and American pragmatists. Carnap’s persisting adherence to the dualism of practical life and theoretical science was the ultimate reason why he could not accept Morris’s and Kaplan’s pragmatist theses that cognitivism might well be compatible with a logical and empiricist scientific philosophy.