20th Century Austrian Philosophy, Misc

Abstract: Brentano’s conception of scientific philosophy had a strong influence on his students and on the intellectual atmosphere of Vienna in the late nineteenth century. The aim of this article is to expose Brentano’s conception and to contrast his views with that of two traditions he is said to have considerably influenced: phenomenology and analytic philosophy. I will shed light on the question of how and to what extent Brentano’s conception of philosophy as a rigorous science has had an impact (...) on these two traditions. The discussion will show that both took their liberties in the interpretation of the thesis, a move that allowed them to liberate themselves from Brentano’s inheritance and to fully develop their own philosophical positions. (shrink)

Abstract: One of the institutional highlights of the encounter between Austrian “wissen¬schaftliche Philosophie” and French “philosophie scientifique” in the first half of the 20th century was the “First International Congress for Unity of Science” that took place 1935 in Paris. In my contribution I deal with an episode of the philosophical mega-event whose protagonist was the American philosopher and semiotician Charles William Morris. At the Paris congress he presented his programme of a comprehensive, practice-oriented scientific philosophy and, in a more (...) elaborated version he published it two years later in Logical Positivism, Pragmatism and Scientific Empiricism (Morris 1937). Morris aimed at a synthesis of formalism, pragmatism, and traditional empiricism that combined the virtues of these accounts while avoided their shortocmings. The core of approach was a comprehensive theory of the concept of meaning. Through an analysis of the concept of meaning he sought to sort out the existing differences and the options for a possible future rapprochment between logical empiricism and pragmatism. Against the overly narrow logical empiricist understanding of philosophy as the syntax of the language of science Morris argued for a “scientific pragmatism” that comprised four levels: (1) Philosophy as Logic of Science, (2) Philosophy as Clarification of Meaning (Peirce), (3) Philosophy as Empirical Axiology (Dewey), and (4) Philosophy as Empirical Cosmology (Whitehead). (shrink)

The purpose of this book is to highlight Carl Stumpf's contributions to philosophy and to assess some of the aspects of his work. This book brings together several specialists of Stumpf and the school of Franz Brentano, and includes fourteen original studies (in English and German) on the various aspects of Stumpf's philosophy, and some of his unpublished writings. This book is divided into four sections, and also includes a general introduction on the reception and actuality of Stumpf's philosophy. The (...) first section examines the historical sources of his philosophy, the second examines some of the central themes of his work and the third examines his relationship to other philosophers. The fourth section consists of notes taken by Husserl during Stumpf's lectures on metaphysics in Halle, Stumpf's introduction to the edition of his correspondence with Brentano, which he prepared in 1929, and some important letters pertaining to this correspondence. This book also provides a comprehensive bibliography of Stumpf's works. (shrink)

How does it feel to be a worm? No doubt, it feels Kafkaesque. The metamorphosis (1915) is a story of an ordinary man, Gregor Samsa, who wakes up one morning as an ungeheures Ungeziefer or ‘giant vermin’. Is this only a bodily change, or has his mind been transformed as well? And how do the people around him cope with this transformation? In this paper, I am going to examine these issues by using tools from Franz Brentano’s (1838–1917) and Anton (...) Marty’s (1847–1914) philosophy of mind and language. Rumour has it that Kafka’s stories were not only products of his own troubled soul, but were also profoundly influenced by the work of these two philosophers. In my paper, I will cover the following issues: the influence of Franz Brentano on Anton Marty and a fortiori on Franz Kafka (1883–1924), who was Marty’s student in Prague (and in this way, saying something about the School of Brentano); Brentano’s and Marty’s theory of correct and incorrect emotions, and its traces in Kafka’s The metamorphosis; Marty’s philosophy of language and communication as reflected in Kafka’s writings; and Brentano’s reism in comparison to Kafka’s nominalism, on the basis of Roberto Calasso’s interpretation of Kafka. (shrink)

This book concerns the history of Austrian philosophy, including the Vienna Circle, Wittgenstein, Meinong, Brentano, and Haller. It exhibits the continuity of empiricism and analysis in Austrian philosophy past and present.

Barry Smith has written a book about an important topic in philosophy and its recent history, concerning the legacy of Franz Brentano. “The Legacy of Franz Brentano” is also its subtitle, a subtitle much more revealing of its contents than its title: Austrian Philosophy. That title makes one expect either a general picture of philosophy in Austria, past and/or present, or an account of what Rudolf Haller has called Austrian Philosophy, a term that refers to its golden age, to a (...) tradition whose main characteristics are, according to Haller, empiricism, proximity to science, and a concern with language. Smith includes these properties in his characterization of the legacy of Brentano, and adds quite appropriately for that legacy “a concern with ontological structure” and “an overriding interest in the relation of macro-phenomena ... to ... micro-phenomena which underlie or are associated with them”. Smith is quite aware that this addition does not hold for the tradition of Austrian philosophy, since he opposes it to a German tradition, and delineates the former “by means of a list beginning with Bolzano, Mach and Meinong, and ending with Wittgenstein, Neurath, and Popper”. (shrink)

The term ‘Continental philosophy’ designates not philosophy on the continent of Europe as a whole, but rather a selective slice of Franco-German philosophy. Through a critical analysis of the arguments advanced by Otto Neurath, the paper addresses the issue of why Austrian philosophers in particular are not counted in the pantheon of Continental philosophers. Austrian philosophy is marked by the predominance of philosophical analysis and of the philosophy of science. The paper concludes that it is not Austria which is the (...) special case when seen against the background of contemporary mainstream philosophy, but rather Germany and France. (shrink)

Wie entsteht eine Wahrnehmung? Wir betrachten einen derzeit nahezu vergessenen philosophischen wie psychologischen Ansatz, der eine solche Theorie entwickelte. Die Vorgeschichte dieser Theorie beginnt bei Alexius Meinongs Relationstheorie (1882) und dessen frühen Bemühungen zur Psychologie. Christian von Ehrenfels, aufbauend auf Meinongs Vorarbeiten sowie Ernst Machs Analyse der Empfindungen von 1886, gibt der Theoriegenese 1890 durch seine Arbeit über Gestaltqualitäten starken Auftrieb. Die Grazer Schule übernimmt das Thema unter dem Aspekt: Sind Gestalten als Ganzes erfaßbar, oder werden sie auf der Basis (...) elementarer Empfindungen erst durch einen psychischen Akt produziert? Anhand der geometrisch-optischen Täuschungen gehen zunächst Stephan Witasek und später Vittorio Benussi dieser Frage ab 1894 auch experimentell nach. Zunächst kann ausgeschlossen werden, daß solche Täuschungen Urteilstäuschungen sind, daß sie also Vorstellungstäuschungen sein müssen. Als wichtig für die psychologische Theorie der Vorstellungsproduküon erweist sich Meinongs philosophische Konzeption der Gegenstände höherer Ordnung. Rudolf Ameseder legt 1904 eine gegenstandstheoretische Skizze der Produktionstheorie vor. Benussi zeigt ebenfalls 1904 wiederum am Beispiel der optischen Täuschungen, daß diese keine Empfindungstäuschungen sind (was Witasek angenommen hatte), sondern Produktionstäuschungen. Damit ist experimentell belegt, daß es psychische Produktionen gibt. (shrink)

One of the main goals of the Institute “Vienna Circle”, founded in October 1991, is to do justice to its second name and establish itself as a “Society for Advancement of the Scientific World View”. This includes the effort to document and further develop the work and influence of the Vienna Circle and its “periphery” in areas of science and adult education, as well as “the cultivation and application of logical empiricism, critical rationalism, and linguistic analysis in the sense of (...) a scientific philosophy and coordinated with general socio-cultural developments”. (shrink)

Recent work on Austrian philosophy has revealed, hitherto, unsuspected links between Vienna circle positivism on the one hand, and the thought of Franz Brentano and his circle on the other. the paper explores these links, casting light also on the Polish analytic movement, on the development of gestalt psychology, and on the work of Schlick and Neurath.

The first part of this paper summarizes what I take to be the most important doctrines of Brentano's philosophy. The second part investigates the possible meanings of the term 'Austrian philosophy'. The third part attempts to say something about Brentano's place in Austrian philosophy -- whatever that may be --, while the fourth part focuses on a problem in which I am especially interested. The paper closes with a proposal for what the expression 'Austrian philosophy' could mean.

The first part of this paper summarizes what I take to be the most important doctrines of Brentano's philosophy. The second part investigates the possible meanings of the term 'Austrian philosophy'. The third part attempts to say something about Brentano's place in Austrian philosophy — whatever that may be --, while the fourth part focuses on a problem in which I am especially interested. The paper closes with a proposal for what the expression 'Austrian philosophy' could mean.