Rudolf Carnap: Early Writings

Rudolf Carnap: Early Writings
Author: Rudolf Carnap
Publisher:
Total Pages: 516
Release: 2019
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 019874840X

This volume is the first of a complete edition of the writings of Rudolf Carnap. Translated into English for the first time and supplemented with a detailed introduction, Carnap's early works are contextualised in extensive notes and critically discussed by an international team of scholars who specialize in different aspects of Carnap's thought.

Rudolf Carnap: Early Writings

Rudolf Carnap: Early Writings
Author: A. W. Carus
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 516
Release: 2019-06-25
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0191065269

Rudolf Carnap (1891-1970) is generally acknowledged to have been one of the central figures of twentieth-century philosophy. He was the leading philosopher of the Vienna Circle, a group that was central to the international movement known as logical empiricism, which pursued the goal of making philosophy scientific and eliminating metaphysics that went beyond the limits of what humans can coherently comprehend. Carnap was not only well-versed in this area of thought but also contrary ideas; he interacted philosophically with Gottlob Frege, Bertrand Russell, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Edmund Husserl, and Martin Heidegger, and in his formative years he was influenced by the positivists Mach and Ostwald, neo-Kantians such as Cassirer and Natorp, and Husserl's phenomenology. Interest in logical empiricism waned in the decades following Carnap's death but was revived towards the end of the twentieth century; the wave of new scholarship that resulted identified Carnap as far more subtle and interesting than was previously understood. The complete fourteen-volume edition of Carnap's published writings builds upon these more recent interpretations of his philosophy. This first book contains Carnap's early publications up until 1928, none of which have previously been translated from their original German. The introduction and notes place the text in the relevant scientific and historical contexts, in addition to explaining obscure references or outdated notation and terminology. Carnap's neo-Kantian origins are more obvious in these works than in his later writings, and the overall figure which emerges from this volume is a very different Carnap to the caricature that many philosophers will know.

Early Writings

Early Writings
Author: Rudolf Carnap
Publisher: Open Court Publishing Company
Total Pages:
Release: 2008-11-01
Genre: Philosophy, American
ISBN: 9780812696653

Two Essays on Entropy

Two Essays on Entropy
Author: Rudolf Carnap
Publisher: Univ of California Press
Total Pages: 138
Release: 2023-11-15
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0520324706

This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1977.

The Logical Structure of the World

The Logical Structure of the World
Author: Rudolf Carnap
Publisher: Open Court Publishing
Total Pages: 402
Release: 2003
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 9780812695236

Available for the first time in 20 years, here are two important works from the 1920s by the best-known representative of the Vienna Circle. In The Logical Structure of the World, Carnap adopts the position of "methodological solipsism" and shows that it is possible to describe the world from the immediate data of experience. In his Pseudoproblems in Philosophy, he asserts that many philosophical problems are meaningless.

Carnap's Construction of the World

Carnap's Construction of the World
Author: Alan W. Richardson
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 258
Release: 1998
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0521430089

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.

Carnap and Twentieth-Century Thought

Carnap and Twentieth-Century Thought
Author: A. W. Carus
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 270
Release: 2007-12-13
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1139467867

Rudolf Carnap (1891–1970) is widely regarded as one of the most important philosophers of the twentieth century. Born in Germany and later a US citizen, he was a founder of the philosophical movement known as Logical Empiricism. He was strongly influenced by a number of different philosophical traditions (including the legacies of both Kant and Husserl), and also by the German Youth Movement, the First World War (in which he was wounded and decorated), and radical socialism. This book places his central ideas in a broad cultural, political and intellectual context, showing how he synthesised many different currents of thought to achieve a philosophical perspective that remains strikingly relevant in the twenty-first century. Its rich account of a philosopher's response to his times will appeal to all who are interested in the development of philosophy in the twentieth century.

Dear Carnap, Dear Van

Dear Carnap, Dear Van
Author: Rudolf Carnap
Publisher: University of California Presson Demand
Total Pages: 484
Release: 1990
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 9780520068476

Rudolf Carnap and W. V. Quine, two of the twentieth century's most important philosophers, corresponded at length--and over a long period of time--on matters personal, professional, and philosophical. Their friendship encompassed issues and disagreements that go to the heart of contemporary philosophic discussions. Carnap (1891-1970) was a founder and leader of the logical positivist school. The younger Quine (1908-) began as his staunch admirer but diverged from him increasingly over questions in the analysis of meaning and the justification of belief. That they remained close, relishing their differences through years of correspondence, shows their stature both as thinkers and as friends. The letters are presented here, in full, for the first time. The substantial introduction by Richard Creath offers a lively overview of Carnap's and Quine's careers and backgrounds, allowing the nonspecialist to see their writings in historical and intellectual perspective. Creath also provides a judicious analysis of the philosophical divide between them, showing how deep the issues cut into the discipline, and how to a large extent they remain unresolved. Dear Carnap, I enclose a copy of a paper which I am ready to send off for publication. . . . I am anxious to have you look this over as soon as possible, to see whether you have reason to suppose the system contradictory: for it looks dangerous. Dear Quine: I read your paper very carefully and with the highest interest. . . . So far, I do not see any contradiction in the system itself . . . but I share your feeling that the whole looks rather dangerous. Rudolf Carnap and W. V. Quine, two of the twentieth century's most important philosophers, corresponded at length--and over a long period of time--on matters personal, professional, and philosophical. Their friendship encompassed issues and disagreements that go to the heart of contemporary philosophic discussions. Carnap (1891-1970) was a founder and leader of the logical positivist school. The younger Quine (1908-) began as his staunch admirer but diverged from him increasingly over questions in the analysis of meaning and the justification of belief. That they remained close, relishing their differences through years of correspondence, shows their stature both as thinkers and as friends. The letters are presented here, in full, for the first time. The substantial introduction by Richard Creath offers a lively overview of Carnap's and Quine's careers and backgrounds, allowing the nonspecialist to see their writings in historical and intellectual perspective. Creath also provides a judicious analysis of the philosophical divide between them, showing how deep the issues cut into the discipline, and how to a large extent they remain unresolved. Dear Carnap, I enclose a copy of a paper which I am ready to send off for publication. . . . I am anxious to have you look this over as soon as possible, to see whether you have reason to suppose the system contradictory: for it looks dangerous. Dear Quine: I read your paper very carefully and with the highest interest. . . . So far, I do not see any contradiction in the system itself . . . but I share your feeling that the whole looks rather dangerous.

Meaning and Necessity

Meaning and Necessity
Author: Rudolf Carnap
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
Total Pages: 266
Release: 1988-02-15
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0226093476

"This book is valuable as expounding in full a theory of meaning that has its roots in the work of Frege and has been of the widest influence. . . . The chief virtue of the book is its systematic character. From Frege to Quine most philosophical logicians have restricted themselves by piecemeal and local assaults on the problems involved. The book is marked by a genial tolerance. Carnap sees himself as proposing conventions rather than asserting truths. However he provides plenty of matter for argument."—Anthony Quinton, Hibbert Journal