Massimo Ferrari

This paper explores the philosophical relationship between Clarence Irving Lewis and Moritz Schlick, questioning their understanding of verificationism. At stake is not only the crucial point of the possibility of verifying statements regarding, for instance, the other side of the moon, but also the proper status of ethical values in opposition to, or in connection with, scientific propositions grounded in experience. This latter aspect can better explain how both Lewis and Schlick understand the notion of experience in general, posing the conceptual framework within which Pragmatism and Logical Empiricism established a dialogue in the 1930s but still worthy of closer inquiry.

Thomas Uebel’s penetrating book represents the latest outcome of a series of investigations on Otto Neurath and the “forgotten” Vienna Circle he has published over the last ten years. Within the recent galaxy of studies devoted to logical empiricism, the re-evaluation of Neurath’s all too neglected work as well as of the “first” Vienna Circle are unquestionably very much indebted to Uebel’s contributions, which may be considered, in turn, an original development of Rudolf Haller’s pioneering studies on Austrian philosophy and on its leading role in the rise of the Vienna Circle. In particular, the attention paid by Haller to Neurath’s surprising epistemological actuality and moreover the “new light” he shed on the “first” Vienna Circle 1 constitute the core of Uebel’s wide program of historical and, at the same time, philosophical research. An ambitious, but successful programm, that nowadays appears to us as essentially accomplished

The ignorance about Otto Neurath’s thought and action within the Vienna Circle as well as within the “scientific philosophy” definitely belongs to the past. In the last two decades the rediscovery of Neurath’s legacy represents one of the most significant aspects of the historical and theoretical studies on logical empiricism. As Friedrich Stadler has recently pointed out, “the rediscovery of Neurath [is] not merely a phenomenon of academic nostalgia, but itself constitutes research into the conditions and possibilities of changing a paradigm in the philosophy of science”1. Particulary in the last ten years this re-evaluation has been the subject of numerous books and contributions, which offer a radically new view of the life, the philosophy of science and knowledge, the political and economical thought of Otto Neurath, and, last but not least, of his enthusiastic activity for the Encyclopedia-project. It is sufficient for the readers of this Yearbook to recall the enlightening reconstruction of the emergence of Neurath’s naturalism within the Vienna Circle offered in 1992 by Thomas E. Uebel and the extensive, critical description of Neurath’s work and life which was published in 1996 by Nancy Cartwright, Jordi Cat, Lola Fleck and Thomas E. Uebel

The paper is devoted to an overview of Cassirer’s work both as historian of philosophy and historian of science. Indeed, the “intelletcual cooperation” between history of philosophy and history of science represents an essential feature of Cassirer’s style of philosophizing: while the roots of a wide exploration stretching from Renaissance thought to modern physics go back to the Neo-Kantianism of the Marburg School, the results of a similar cross-fertilization of research fields have deeply contributed to shaping new standards of inquiry. Cassirer’s relationship with the Warburg milieu in Hamburg and late in his life with the American intellectual scenario are surely worthy of closer investigation. Distinguished scholars such as Meyerson, Brunschvicg, Burtt, Koyré, Metzger, Lovejoy, Kristeller, have disussed, appreciated, critizised Cassirer’s still today fascinating studies devoted to Pico della Mirandola, Galileo, Newton, Leibniz, to mention but a few. To explore some of these aspects focusing both on affinities and differences within a cosmpolitian intellectual community can provide a better understanding of philosophy and history of science in the first half of 20th century. Cassirer’s legacy requires, therefore, a new assessment.

“Growth” or “Revolution”? Ernst Cassirer and History of Science. Ernst Cassirer's contributions to history of science have been long time neglected. The aim of this paper is to show the historical and philosophical framework of Cassirer's engagement in this field, starting from his seminal work about the problem of knowledge in science and philosophy of the modern age. Moreover the author suggests that Cassirer's late studies about Galilei and the origins of mathematical science are of some interest in order to comprehend both his commitment to contemporary history of science and his intellectual heritage for our agendas in a post-Kuhnian era

The aim of this paper is to point out some interesting features of Moritz Schlick’s thought regarding both his refusal of Metaphysics and his view of the relationship between Realism and Positivism. In particular, the author stresses the importance of Schlick’s early attempts to define the concept of truth as well as to formulate a kind of pre-linguistic verificationism. Unpublished letters and manuscripts have been considered in order to give a more precise picture of Schlick’s intellectual development, from the beginning of his academic career up to the unknown letters documenting his discussion with Max Planck about Realism in the early Thirties.

Schlick’s relationship with the Tractatus has been mainly investigated in what concerns the conception both of language and world, the insight of logic, the criteria of verifiability, the proper role of philosophy as mental activity. However, some other features of Schlick’s reading of the Tractatus require a closer consideration. In the 1920s, Schlick was dealing with the questions of ethics (and, to some extent, of religion), that represent from the early days the core issue of his philosophy of culture. Schlick’s intellectual relationship with Wittgenstein ought to be explored also in this broader context, namely after his first encounter with the Tractatus. As it emerges from their private conversations in 1929, Schlick did not agree with Wittgenstein’s account of ethics as a domain going beyond the limits of language. Whereas Wittgenstein maintains that “that ethics cannot be put into words. Ethics is transcendental. (Ethics and aesthetics are one and the same [Tractatus 6.421]”, Schlick considers ethics as a factual science. As he says in the Problems of ethics (1930), “if there are ethical questions that have meaning, and are therefore able to be answered, then ethics is a science”. Wittgenstein’s position is patently in contrast with Schlick’s. According to Wittgenstein, ethics, no differently from religion, cannot be tested as is usual for meaningful propositions, namely by recurring to hypotheses, high probability or knowing. My paper aims at highlighting this contrast, that is rooted both in the Tractatus and in Schlick’s conception of ethics as science already endorsed in his work before the arriving in Vienna. How Schlick would have appreciated Wittgenstein’s late thoughts on ethics remains, at any rate, an open question.