Who Were The Logical Positivists

Question 1

Who were they (positivists)

Answer 1

• 1920s: Vienna circle (leader; Moritz Schlick)
• > popular in Berlin (Carl hamper) and eng speaking countries too
• socialists of Jewish origin

Question 2

What did they want (positivism)

Answer 2

• took Einsteins physics as Basis of science, not philosophy
• a statement should be probable-> operational definitions
• science is the key to all problems
• agressive approach: collection of scientific statements exhausts all meaningful statements (art etc)

Question 3

Where did the demonstration come from (positivism)

Answer 3

Positivists (Auguste Comte [19th century])
-> 3 stages of development of humanity
1. Religious
2. Metaphysical (visible forces)
3. Positive stage (observation is the only thing)

-> metaphysics stands in the way of science

Question 4

A new logic

Answer 4

• explicit connections which are analytically true
  Logic: true inputs can never leave to false outputs
  BERNARD RUSSELL: language can be cleaned from metaphysics
  A truth about statement depends on the truth of its operants and their connections

Question 5

A new empiricism

Answer 5

• philosophy is not a speculative science
• all cognitively meaningful claims: analytical or empirical
• cognitively meaningful claims: true or false (a statement can be rational despite being false)
• empirically meaningful if it can be proven empirically

Question 6

Radical reconstructivism

Answer 6

• positivists say: scientific theories are issues of language

Question 7

Demarcation challenge

Answer 7

Goal: keep rational in and metaphysical out
- keep what can be true or false
- classical empiricists
- H. A. Air: statement is verifiable if we can come to observations with it