Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-g7gxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-10-31T23:38:45.818Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Carnap's Sprachanschauung Circa 1932

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 February 2022

J. Alberto Coffa*
Affiliation:
Indiana University

Extract

Around 1932 Carnap's philosophical development reached a point of equilibrium from which he would no longer depart significantly. The basic items of the conception of knowledge which he came to endorse at that time were three: a variety of reductionistic empiricism which he had illustrated in the Aufbau; a rejection of standard correspondence theories of truth (together with what looked like an endorsement of coherentism); and a syntactical understanding of the nature of philosophical activities. To many philosophers, even those whom Carnap considered his teachers or his allies, this set of views seemed absurd and incoherent. Russell saw in them a neo-neo-Platonism, inspired by a superstitious awe of language ([27], pp. 21, 141;, Schlick saw in them the irony of extreme rationalism stemming from extreme empiricism ([28], p. 69); and some Polish philosophers said they were “too sober” to share Carnap's views ([22], p. 233).

Type
Part IV. Logical Positivism, Its Origins and Critics
Copyright
Copyright © 1977 by the Philosophy of Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

1

I should like to express my gratitude to the Philosophy Department at the University of Pittsburgh for allowing me to consult some of the items in the Carnap Collection, to Prof. Richard Creath of Arizona State University for allowing me to use his invaluable preliminary bibliography of the Carnap Collection, and to Prof. Henk Mulder of the University of Amsterdam for allowing me to consult part of the Schlick-Wittgenstein correspondence in the Schlick Archives (Amsterdam). I am greatly indebted to Profs. Carl G. Hempel and H.Go Bohnert for their most helpful and illuminating comments. Thanks are also due to NSF for generous support.

A word about translations. When I give a reference to a German source, the translation is my own ; when the reference is to both the German source and an English translation, that means that I have followed the English translation except for minor adjustments.

References

[1] Ayer, A.J.The Criterion of Truth.” Analysis 3(1935-6): 2832.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[2] Carnap, R. The Logical Syntax of Language. (trans.) Smeaton, Amethe. London: K. Paul, Trench, Trubner and Company, 1937.Google Scholar
[3] Carnap, R.. “Erwiderung auf die vorstehenden Aufsätze von E. Zilsel und K. Duncker.” Erkenntnis 2(1931): 177188.Google Scholar
[4] Carnap, R.. “Ueberwindung der Metaphysik durch logische Analyse der Sprache.” Erkenntnis 2(1931): 219241.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[5] Carnap, R.. “Die physikalische Sprache als Universalsprache der Wissenschaft.” Erkenntnis 2(1931): 432465.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[6] Carnap, R.. Die Aufgabe der Wissenschaftslogik. (Einheitswissenschaft , Schriften hrsg. von Otto Neurath. in Verbindung mit Rudolf Carnap und Hans Hahn, H. 3). Wien: Verlag Gerold and Company, 1934.Google Scholar
[7] Carnap, R.. Philosophy and Logical Syntax. (Psyche Miniatures. General Series, no. 70). London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner and Company, 1935.Google Scholar
[8] Carnap, R.. “Wahrheit und Bewährung.” Actes du Congres International de Philosophie Scientifique, Sorbonne, Paris, 1935, fasc. 4, (Actualités Scientifiques et Industrielles, 391). Paris: Hermann, 1936. Pages 1823.Google Scholar
[9] Carnap, R.. “Truth and Confirmation.” In Readings in Philosophical Analysis. Edited by Feigl, H., and Sellars, W.. New York: Appleton-Century Crofts, 1949. Pages 119127. (trans, and extension of [8]).Google Scholar
[10] Carnap, R.. “Ueber Protokollsätze.” Erkenntnis 2(1931): 215228.Google Scholar
[11] Carnap, R.. “Ein Gültigkeitskriterium für die Sütze der klassichen Mathematik.” Monatshefte fur Mathematik und Physik 42(1935): 163190.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[12] Carnap, R.. “Intellectual Autobiography.” In The Philosophy of Rudolf Carnap. Edited by Schlipp, P.A.. LaSalle, Ill.: Open Court, 1963. Pages 384.Google Scholar
[13] Carnap, R.. “Von der Erkenntnistheorie zur Wissenschaftslogik.” In Actes du Congrès International de Philosophie Scientifique, Sorbonne, Paris, 1935, fasc.l (Actualites Scientifiques et Industrielles, 338). Paris: Hermann, 1936. Pages 3641.Google Scholar
[14] Carnap, R.. Meaning and Necessity 2nd. ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1956.Google Scholar
[15] Church, A. Introduction to Mathematical Logic Vol. 1. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1956.Google Scholar
[16] Coffa, J.A.Machian Logic.” Communication and Cognition 8(1975): 103129.Google Scholar
[17] Coffa, J.A.. “On the Sources of Conventionalism in 19th Century Geometry.” forthcoming in the Pittsburgh Series in the Philosophy of Science.Google Scholar
[18] Hempel, C.G.On the Logical Positivists’ Theory of Truth.” Analysis 2(1934-35): 4959.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[19] James, W. Pragmatism. New York: Washington Square Press, 1972.Google Scholar
[20] Kokoszyńska, M.Ueber den absoluten Wahrheitsbegriff und einige andere semantische Begriffe.” Erkenntnis 5(1936): 143165.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[21] Kokoszynska, M.. “Syntax, Semantik und Wissenschaftslogik.” In Actes du Congres International de Philosophie Scientifique, Sorbonne, 1935, fasc. 3. (Actualities Scientifiques et Industrielles, 390). Paris: Hermann, 1936. Pages 914.Google Scholar
[22] Lukasiewicz, J. Selected Works. (ed.) Borkowski, L. and (trans.) Wojtasiewicz, O.. Amsterdam: North Holland, 1970.Google Scholar
[23] Neurath, O.Erster Internationaler Kongress für Einheit der Wissenschaft in Paris 1935.” Erkenntnis 5(1936): 375430.Google Scholar
[24] Quine, W.O.Ontological Relativity.” In Ontological Relativity and Other Essays. New York: Columbia University Press, 1969. Pages 2668.Google Scholar
[25] Ramsey, F.P. The Foundations of Mathematics. (ed.) Braithwaite, R.B.. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1931.Google Scholar
[26] Rougier, L.Allocution Finale.” In Actes du Congrès International de Philosophie Scientifique, Sorbonne, 1935, fasc. 8. (Actualites Scientifigues et Industrielles, 395.) Paris: Hermann, 1936. Pages 8891.Google Scholar
[27] Russell, B. An Inquiry into Meaning and Truth. Baltimore: Penguin, 1962.Google Scholar
[28] Schlick, M.Facts and Propositions.” Analysis 2(1934-35): 6570.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[29] Schlick, M.. “Ueber das Fundament der Erkenntnis.” Erkenntnis 4(1934): 390410.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
[30] Tarski, A. Logic, Semantics, Metamathematics. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1956.Google Scholar
[31] Tarski, A.. “Der Wahrheitsbegriff in den formalisierten Sprachen.” Studia Philosophica 1(1936): 261405. (Ger.tr. by L. Blaustein from Polish original in 1933).Google Scholar
[32] Tarski, A.. “Der Wahrheitsbegriff in den Sprachen der Deduktiven Disziplinen.” (an abstract of [31], Akademie der Wissenschaft in Wien, Mathematisch-Naturwissenschaftliche Klasse, Anzeiger, lxix(1932): 2325.Google Scholar
[33] Wittgenstein, L. Notebooks, 1914-1916. (ed.) vonWright, G.H. and Anscombe, G.E.M.. New York: Harper, 1961.Google Scholar
[34] Wittgenstein, L.. Philosophische Bemerkungen. (ed.) Rhees, Rush. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1964.Google Scholar
[35] Zilsel, E.Bemerkungen zur Wissenschaftslogik.” Erkenntnis 2(1931): 143161.Google Scholar