The use of biotechnology in food productiongives rise to consumer concerns. The term ``consumerconcern'' is often used as a container notion. Itincludes concerns about food safety, environmental andanimal welfare consequences of food productionsystems, and intrinsic moral objections againstgenetic modification. In order to create clarity adistinction between three different kinds of consumerconcern is proposed. Consumer concerns can be seen assigns of loss of trust. Maintaining consumer trustasks for governmental action. Towards consumerconcerns, governments seem to have limitedpossibilities for public policy. Under current (...) WTOregulations designed to prevent trade disputes,governments can only limit their policies to 1) safetyregulation based upon sound scientific evidence and 2)the stimulation of a system of product labeling. Ananalysis of trust, however, can show that ifgovernments limit their efforts in this way, they willnot do enough to avoid the types of consumer concernsthat diminish trust. The establishment of a technicalbody for food safety – although perhaps necessary –is in itself not enough, because concerns that relatedirectly to food safety cannot be solved by ``pure''science alone. And labeling can only be a good way totake consumer concerns seriously if these concerns arerelated to consumer autonomy. For consumer concernsthat are linked to ideas about a good society,labeling can only provide a solution if it is seen asan addition to political action rather than as itssubstitution. Labeling can help consumers take uptheir political responsibility. As citizens, consumershave certain reasonable concerns that can justifiableinfluence the market. In a free-market society, theyare, as buyers, co-creators of the market, andsocietal steering is partly done by the market.Therefore, they need the information to co-create thatmarket. The basis of labeling in these cases, however,is not the good life of the individual but thepolitical responsibility people have in their role asparticipants in a free-market. Then, public concernsare taken seriously. Labeling in that case does nottake away the possibilities of reaching politicalgoals, but it adds a possibility. (shrink)

This volume brings together a number of important studies by leading scholars on ritual and law, philosophy and religion, literature and entertainments in Qin and Han China. A few contributions deal with the Han legacy to later Chinese culture.

Let g E(m, n)=o mean that n is the Gödel-number of the shortest derivation from E of an equation of the form (m)=k. Hao Wang suggests that the condition for general recursiveness mn(g E(m, n)=o) can be proved constructively if one can find a speedfunction s s, with s(m) bounding the number of steps for getting a value of (m), such that mn s(m) s.t. g E(m, n)=o. This idea, he thinks, yields a constructivist notion of an effectively computable function, (...) one that doesn't get us into a vicious circle since we intuitively know, to begin with, that certain proofs are constructive and certain functions effectively computable. This paper gives a broad possibility proof for the existence of such classes of effectively computable functions, with Wang's idea of effective computability generalized along a number of dimensions. (shrink)

This book centers around a new translation of Aristotle’s small treatise, On Memory. It is preceded by three essays by Sorabji and is followed by a section of notes. The treatise treats of the distinction between memory and recollection and what each is. Memory is "the having of an image regarded as a copy of that which it is an image" and it belongs to "the primary perception part [of the soul] and that with which we perceive time." Here the (...) key ideas, finely modulated, are image as in itself and as copy, and time perception. Recollection is distinct from memory; it is the natural or habitual succession of given image: starting from one image and moving to something similar, opposite or neighboring, until the required image is present. Recollecting is "a sort of search" requiring deliberation and peculiar to men, whereas remembering is common to many higher animals. An interesting point regarding the act of remembering is, besides the succession of images, the attendant perception of proportioned time-lapses, so much so, that "when exercising his memory a person cannot think he is not doing so and fail to notice that he is doing so." The section of notes contains many illuminative remarks on the translator’s choice of words for all the major phrases as well as helpful explanations of the structure and meaning of the textual arguments. The three essays by Sorabji, on memory, mnemonic techniques and recollection, are critical accounts of Aristotle’s doctrine, taking into account the teachings of thinkers ranging from Plato and Berkeley to the Australian materialists and William James. Here Sorabji is most helpful in demonstrating the importance and relationship of the doctrines of On Memory to the larger Aristotelian teaching on thinking and on dialectical reasoning. The essay on recollection centers around Aristotle’s relationship to Plato on the same topic and on the systematic problem of association of ideas. All in all, Aristotle on Memory is an excellent little book, illuminating the larger context and satisfying in itself.—W. A. F. (shrink)

This book contains three essays: "The Mask and the Face: The Perception of Physiognomic Likeness in Life and Art" by Gombrich, the renowned art historian and critic; "The Representation of Things and People" by psychologist, Julian Hochberg; and "How Do Pictures Represent" by philosopher, Max Black. The book is based upon lectures delivered in the Johns Hopkins 1970 Thalheimer Lectures, where, taking off from the question "how there can be an underlying identity in the manifold and changing facial expression of (...) a single individual," there is an interdisciplinary attempt at clarifying the problem of representation. Gombrich’s central thesis is that the key to artistic representation is empathy and projection, which is guided by the interlocking display of the permanent and mobile features of the object represented. Perceptual activity and empathy rely more on the muscular imitation than on passive visual reception. He holds that what is singled out as the likeness-factor uniting the permanent and mobile features in, for example, the photograph of the four-year old Lord Russell and such factors in the ninety-year old Russell is the "general tonus, the melody of transition from given ranges of relaxations to forms of tenseness." Hochberg’s essay spells out the position that perception is purposive behavior, wherein the purpose is the information sought and behavior is the "succession of glances in different directions." Holding that perceptual activity is grounded in expectations, he lays aside Gombrich’s muscularity-thesis in favor of a learned expectation of feature characteristics. Black’s essay is a conceptual analysis of "depiction," or more precisely, of "P displays a subject S if and only if R, where R ‘will constitute the necessary and sufficient condition for P displaying S'." The essay, which proceeds in a Wittgensteinian Investigations-type fashion ends where the reader would hope it begin. He concludes that the problem can only be adequately answered by moving from logical investigation to the world of the artisan and art lover. To arrive at this conclusion he debunks six candidates that claim to meet the depiction conditions: causal history, selective information, intention, mimesis, resemblance, and "looking-like." At best, depiction may be considered a "cluster" concept of all six. Further determination, he holds, requires knowledge of the purpose of a particular depiction, and this takes us out of logic and into art; and so Black stops, unfortunately.—W. A. F. (shrink)

This is an English translation of Schelling's Ideas for a Philosophy of Nature (first published in 1797 and revised in 1803), one of the most significant works in the German tradition of philosophy of nature and early nineteenth-century philosophy of science. It stands in opposition to the Newtonian picture of matter as constituted by inert, impenetrable particles, and argues instead for matter as an equilibrium of active forces that engage in dynamic polar opposition to one another. In the revisions of (...) 1803 Schelling incorporated this dialectical view into a neo-Platonic conception of an original unity divided upon itself. The text is of more than simply historical interest: its daring and original vision of nature, philosophy, and empirical science will prove absorbing reading for all philosophers concerned with post-Kantian German idealism, for scholars of German Romanticism, and for historians of science. (shrink)

On the History of Modern Philosophy is a key transitional text in the history of European philosophy. In it, F. W. J. Schelling surveys philosophy from Descartes to German Idealism and shows why the Idealist project is ultimately doomed to failure. The lectures trace the path of philosophy from Descartes through Spinoza, Leibniz, Kant, Fichte, Jacobi, to Hegel and Schelling's own work. The extensive critiques of Hegel prefigure many of the arguments to be found in Feuerbach, Kierkegaard, Marx, Nietzsche, Heidegger, (...) and Derrida. This is the first English translation of On the History of Modern Philosophy. In his introduction Andrew Bowie sets the work in the context of Schelling's career and clarifies its philosophical issues. The translation will be of special interest to philosophers, intellectual historians, literary theorists, and theologians. (shrink)

Schelling's first systematic attempt to articulate a complete philosophy of nature.

The purpose of this book is to examine and explicate a definition given in Philosophical Investigations. The definition of the meaning of a word is that "the meaning of a word is its use in the language." Hallett understands this as a definition in the strict sense of the word. In Chapter I, the author looks to the Tractatus for its treatment of the picture theory of meaning and the Bedeutung/sinn distinction. The conclusion which he pulls from the early work (...) is that, for Wittgenstein, meaning was already in a proposition by way of the meaning of names. Yet, only in the use or application, i.e., in a proposition with sense is meaning revealed. Although the Tractatus is far from saying that meaning is use, certain guiding themes are elaborated and carried into later works; namely, the search for meaning, the impossibility of meaning outside use, and meaning as revealed by use. Chapter II, III, and especially IV bear the brunt of establishing Hallett’s thesis that Wittgenstein presented a significant and sound definition. He begins by showing what Wittgenstein proved meaning not to be: meaning is not images, objects, mental referents, nor feelings. All of these theories have convincing confirmation in certain respects, yet analysis, i.e., observation of the actual working of language, shows each to be too narrow. In making his transition to the true definition, the author shows Wittgenstein elaborating the theses that meaning is to be found in the system or context of language. These are elaborated only to be cast aside as were the previous suggestions. The pattern elicited from these examinations is that meaning is use and, hence, defined as such. To explicate the definition, Hallett presents and examines seven characteristics of use: complexity, regularity and utility, abstraction, openness, vagueness, variety, and family resemblances. The book concludes with a consideration of the major objections to Wittgenstein’s definition. There are too many objections presented to be handled justly. For the most part, the argument is superficial, usually presuming a familiarity with the issue, and with but an indication of how the objection could be handled. The strength of the book is that it gives an organization to Wittgenstein’s later thinking, especially by way of the above-mentioned seven characteristics. In identifying and elucidating them, Hallett does Wittgenstein students a great service. Its chief weakness, although pale in regard to the overall worth, is that the main thesis is not firmly established. To say that a precise and complete definition is given is contrary to what is maintained throughout the Investigations, and perhaps a serious misreading of the German word, erklaren, as the precise English phrase, "to define." There are extensive notes and an adequate index.—W. A. F. (shrink)

Reilly approaches his topic by presenting the spirit of science and the phases of scientific inquiry as Peirce saw it, keeping before the reader, at all times, Peirce’s overarching view of man and the universe. The two prevailing themes guiding Peirce’s thought are 1) that there is a special conformity of the human mind to nature and of nature to God, and 2) that there is an architectonic qualifying all the various types and levels of treatment which occupy the philosopher’s (...) interest. The first question examined is the nature of the scientific concern. For Peirce, the scientist’s spirit is marked by the pure love of knowledge. It is important to note the theoretical aspect because it explains the possibility of holding belief in abeyance while examining nature: the purity of motive allows that proper questions will be asked and errors will be readily corrected. The scientist’s purpose is the real truth of things; he begins with questions about the world. There are four stages of scientific method: 1) The scientist observes nature as a thinking, analytic inquirer. Observation presupposes that nature is intelligibly structured. 2) He formulates an explanatory hypothesis which is a process of bringing a manifold of characters to a unified whole. 3) By deduction, the inquirer gathers experiential consequents of the hypothesis. 4) By induction the question is put to nature and observed phenomena are matched to the predicted phenomena, resulting in either truth or a modified hypothesis. Peirce’s principle of the kinship of man’s mind to nature supports his dictum to follow instinct over reasoned likelihood in choosing hypotheses. Also important is the doctrine of moderate fallibilism which holds that there is a convergence upon the truth founded upon the regularity of nature, but that chance is a real factor due to nature’s evolution. Reilly’s book gives an adequate account of the aspects of Peirce’s scientific method sacrificing specific and detailed analysis to a more general approach wherein he shows the unity operative throughout Peirce’s thinking. A good index and copious notes are provided.—W. A. F. (shrink)

Ludwig Wittgenstein concludes his Tractatus with the injunction, "What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence." As the concluding proposition of a tersely written, tightly organized work, the reader would expect it to have a strong bite. Yet the statement has been variously ignored, dismissed, and misunderstood, interpreted as the inspired words of a mystic or as the final banishing of metaphysics from philosophical discourse. It is with the help of Janik and Toulmin’s work that it becomes (...) clear how the proposition serves as the crown to a book which Wittgenstein maintained was primarily an ethical work. In presenting the Viennese Weltanshauung [[sic]] of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, there emerges the picture of a society where appearances ruled in all areas of cultural life, in the government, and in the arts. Viennese society was characterized by a vast impotent bureaucracy, the Strauss waltz, and the feutillion. The leader in the inevitable reaction was Karl Kraus. He instigated a critique of Viennese society through an ingenious and refined use of cultural modes of expression. Along with him, leaders emerged for each of the special arts, language, music, architecture, painting, sculpture, who, in their own particular role, tried to restore truth and responsibility to the affairs of men. The development of the characters and the issues involved make this book important. Of lesser value, unfortunately, are the chapters dealing specifically with the work of Wittgenstein, who is represented as one of the emergent leaders. Although we are rhetorically persuaded that his talk of "simples," "representation," "depicting," or "language games" is tied up with the critique of a fundamentally sophistical intellectualism, we are not led on to seeing how the critique was carried out.—W. A. F. (shrink)

Reilly approaches his topic by presenting the spirit of science and the phases of scientific inquiry as Peirce saw it, keeping before the reader, at all times, Peirce’s overarching view of man and the universe. The two prevailing themes guiding Peirce’s thought are 1) that there is a special conformity of the human mind to nature and of nature to God, and 2) that there is an architectonic qualifying all the various types and levels of treatment which occupy the philosopher’s (...) interest. The first question examined is the nature of the scientific concern. For Peirce, the scientist’s spirit is marked by the pure love of knowledge. It is important to note the theoretical aspect because it explains the possibility of holding belief in abeyance while examining nature: the purity of motive allows that proper questions will be asked and errors will be readily corrected. The scientist’s purpose is the real truth of things; he begins with questions about the world. There are four stages of scientific method: 1) The scientist observes nature as a thinking, analytic inquirer. Observation presupposes that nature is intelligibly structured. 2) He formulates an explanatory hypothesis which is a process of bringing a manifold of characters to a unified whole. 3) By deduction, the inquirer gathers experiential consequents of the hypothesis. 4) By induction the question is put to nature and observed phenomena are matched to the predicted phenomena, resulting in either truth or a modified hypothesis. Peirce’s principle of the kinship of man’s mind to nature supports his dictum to follow instinct over reasoned likelihood in choosing hypotheses. Also important is the doctrine of moderate fallibilism which holds that there is a convergence upon the truth founded upon the regularity of nature, but that chance is a real factor due to nature’s evolution. Reilly’s book gives an adequate account of the aspects of Peirce’s scientific method sacrificing specific and detailed analysis to a more general approach wherein he shows the unity operative throughout Peirce’s thinking. A good index and copious notes are provided.—W. A. F. (shrink)

This is a new critical latin edition, with facing English translation, of Peter Abelard’s ethical treatise, sometimes entitled "Know Thyself." The book is one in the series of Oxford Medieval Texts. Accompanying the latin text and simple, easy reading translation is a most helpful introduction by Luscombe which points out the historical importance of this little treatise as among the first finely articulated attempts at bringing the classical concerns with human virtues and character together with the theological concerns of a (...) believing Christian. Ethics deals with the problem of how we may properly speak of the moral formation of a person. Abelard’s treatment is more weighted toward the attitudes of man than the nature of his deeds. What is worked out, with the help of many suggestive examples and frequent reference to the religious practices of the twelfth-century church, is a crucial theory of intention and a definition of sin. He holds that our intention, measured to the standards of divine law, determines the morality of our actions : "We consider morals to be the vices or virtues of the mind which make us prone to good or bad works." Good and bad emerge from the struggle where there is consent to an act virtuously or viciously motivated. Morality does not come from the inclination since the constitution of man includes both his virtues and his vices; nor does it come from his acts since all acts are indifferent, before God, to good or bad. It is the intent or consent to act that is determinant. Sin, the other major theme, complementary to intention, is defined as contempt for God, i.e., "to do by no means on his account what we believe we ought to do for him." He founds his notions of morality on God as that good, the source and whole, such that "although... there is a number of good things so that goodness exists in plurality, it does not follow therefore that goodness is greater." By working out these notions, Abelard delivers an innovative morality of conduct for a man beset with a character marked with both virtues and vices, emphasizing man’s faculty of choice and underscoring his ability to know and be responsible to the divine law. Besides the introduction and text, Luscombe has included a description of the manuscripts used in preparing the text and indices of quotations, allusions, and manuscripts.—W. A. F. (shrink)

Hoping to overcome the deficiencies of Bailey and Dewitt, and taking into account the insights of Diano, Kleve, and Merlan, Rist presents this book as an accurate and complete doxology of Epicurus’ philosophy. The book is written in a condensed style where doctrines treated early in the book are not fully explained until the completion of later parts. In trying to pin down Epicurus, distinct from the Epicureans, he depends heavily upon Lucretius and the few extant writings of Epicurus himself, (...) but he does range over the works of all the later students and commentators. Even so, much is left either vaguely outlined or problematic, and what is accepted from the more distant or biased sources is judiciously measured against the more accepted teachings. There are seven major chapters dealing with the canonic, physics, man and the cosmos, soul and mind and body, pleasure, friendship, and gods and religion. Certain of the teachings presented have a bearing, one upon the other, throughout the book and do much toward showing some consistency and richness to Epicurus’ philosophy: In the canonic, three types of criteria for judging as to the existence of a thing or the truth of a proposition are explained, viz., sensation, general concepts, and feeling. In the physics, a crucial topic is the role of the swerve with its logical priority. In the cosmos, there is the developmental, evolutionary character of the universe. In the soul and body of man, the animus/anima distinction is worked out. The interrelation of all these is brought to bear on the central theme of pleasure and the gods. Pleasure, as the stable condition of the flesh and confident expectation of the future on this score, with complete absence of pain and anxiety, involves the physics, friendship, the soul of man, and the canonic. Also important to his teaching on pleasure is the interplay of those pleasures based upon want and that pleasure which is a state of untroubledness. Rist makes good use of the teachings of the canonic to establish the existence of the gods. In describing their structure, he shows how the gods, as detached exemplars, fit in with the physics and canonic, and with the teaching on pleasure and friendship. He assiduously refrains from interpreting the role of the gods in Epicurus’ philosophy, but with their existence so presented future interpretations should be much enriched. This book is a superb piece of scholarship and an invaluable aid to the study of Greek philosophy.—W. A. F. (shrink)

The purpose of this book is to examine and explicate a definition given in Philosophical Investigations. The definition of the meaning of a word is that "the meaning of a word is its use in the language." Hallett understands this as a definition in the strict sense of the word. In Chapter I, the author looks to the Tractatus for its treatment of the picture theory of meaning and the Bedeutung/sinn distinction. The conclusion which he pulls from the early work (...) is that, for Wittgenstein, meaning was already in a proposition by way of the meaning of names. Yet, only in the use or application, i.e., in a proposition with sense is meaning revealed. Although the Tractatus is far from saying that meaning is use, certain guiding themes are elaborated and carried into later works; namely, the search for meaning, the impossibility of meaning outside use, and meaning as revealed by use. Chapter II, III, and especially IV bear the brunt of establishing Hallett’s thesis that Wittgenstein presented a significant and sound definition. He begins by showing what Wittgenstein proved meaning not to be: meaning is not images, objects, mental referents, nor feelings. All of these theories have convincing confirmation in certain respects, yet analysis, i.e., observation of the actual working of language, shows each to be too narrow. In making his transition to the true definition, the author shows Wittgenstein elaborating the theses that meaning is to be found in the system or context of language. These are elaborated only to be cast aside as were the previous suggestions. The pattern elicited from these examinations is that meaning is use and, hence, defined as such. To explicate the definition, Hallett presents and examines seven characteristics of use: complexity, regularity and utility, abstraction, openness, vagueness, variety, and family resemblances. The book concludes with a consideration of the major objections to Wittgenstein’s definition. There are too many objections presented to be handled justly. For the most part, the argument is superficial, usually presuming a familiarity with the issue, and with but an indication of how the objection could be handled. The strength of the book is that it gives an organization to Wittgenstein’s later thinking, especially by way of the above-mentioned seven characteristics. In identifying and elucidating them, Hallett does Wittgenstein students a great service. Its chief weakness, although pale in regard to the overall worth, is that the main thesis is not firmly established. To say that a precise and complete definition is given is contrary to what is maintained throughout the Investigations, and perhaps a serious misreading of the German word, erklaren, as the precise English phrase, "to define." There are extensive notes and an adequate index.—W. A. F. (shrink)

The book is published in the International Library of Philosophy and Scientific Method. It proceeds under the assumption that the Tractatus and the later works of Wittgenstein are mutually illuminating. The general program is to present the Tractarian picture theory, to explain why it was abandoned and a new theory of language adopted, and to explicate the new theory of use. Conceptually the book is arranged around the problem of intentionality. Bogen believes that Wittgenstein’s chief concern was with the problem (...) of false belief. (shrink)

A new English translation of Schelling’s unfinished magnum opus, complete with a contextualizing introduction by the translator.

Plato is one of the key ancient authors studied by both classicists and philosophers. This long-awaited new edition contains seven of the dialogues of Plato, and is the first in the five-volume complete edition of his works in the Oxford Classical Texts series. The result of many years of painstaking scholarship, the new volume will replace the now nearly 100 year old original edition, and is destined to become just as long-lasting a classic.

Originally published in 1830, this book can be called the first modern work in the philosophy of science, covering an extraordinary range of philosophical, methodological, and scientific subjects. "Herschel's book . . . brilliantly analyzes both the history and nature of science."—Keith Stewart Thomson, American Scientist.

Traduçáo do original alemáo: Schelling, F. W. J. "Einleitung zu dem Entwurf eines Systems der Naturphilosophie oder über den Begriff der speculativen Physik und die innere Organisation eines Systems dieser Wissenschaft". In: Schelling, K. F. A. (Org.). Sämmtliche Werke. 14 Bdn. 1 Abt. I-X; 2 Abt. I-IV, Stuttgart/Augsburg: Cota, 1856-1861.

Background: Although previous studies have shown an inverse relation between life meaning and eating disorder symptoms, the correlational nature of this evidence precludes causal inferences. Therefore, this study used an experimental approach to test the causal impact of life meaning on individuals' weight and shape concerns.Methods: Female students at risk for developing an eating disorder were randomly assigned to the control or the meaning condition, which involved thinking about and committing to pursue intrinsically valued life goals. A color-naming interference task (...) was used to assess the motivational salience of body-related stimuli, and self-report measures were used to assess participants' overvaluation of weight and shape.Results: The meaning manipulation was effective in activating intrinsically valued life goals. However, it did not result in lower self-reported overvaluation of weight and shape or lower color-naming interference effects of body-related stimuli, compared to the control condition. Post-hoc analyses suggested that baseline meaning in life was related to the impact of the manipulation.Conclusions: This experimental study did not provide evidence for a causal influence of life meaning on the overvaluation of weight and shape in a high-risk group. The current findings suggest that we first need to examine the relationship between life meaning and eating disorder symptoms in more detail, before implementing brief meaning manipulations in clinical practice. (shrink)

Ludwig Wittgenstein concludes his Tractatus with the injunction, "What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence." As the concluding proposition of a tersely written, tightly organized work, the reader would expect it to have a strong bite. Yet the statement has been variously ignored, dismissed, and misunderstood, interpreted as the inspired words of a mystic or as the final banishing of metaphysics from philosophical discourse. It is with the help of Janik and Toulmin’s work that it becomes (...) clear how the proposition serves as the crown to a book which Wittgenstein maintained was primarily an ethical work. In presenting the Viennese Weltanshauung [[sic]] of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, there emerges the picture of a society where appearances ruled in all areas of cultural life, in the government, and in the arts. Viennese society was characterized by a vast impotent bureaucracy, the Strauss waltz, and the feutillion. The leader in the inevitable reaction was Karl Kraus. He instigated a critique of Viennese society through an ingenious and refined use of cultural modes of expression. Along with him, leaders emerged for each of the special arts, language, music, architecture, painting, sculpture, who, in their own particular role, tried to restore truth and responsibility to the affairs of men. The development of the characters and the issues involved make this book important. Of lesser value, unfortunately, are the chapters dealing specifically with the work of Wittgenstein, who is represented as one of the emergent leaders. Although we are rhetorically persuaded that his talk of "simples," "representation," "depicting," or "language games" is tied up with the critique of a fundamentally sophistical intellectualism, we are not led on to seeing how the critique was carried out.—W. A. F. (shrink)

The subject of this book is the construction of a house commissioned by Mrs. Margarethe Stonborough-Wittgenstein, which was partially designed and supervised by her brother, Ludwig. The book consists of two main parts. At the beginning Leitner presents, in the original German, with an English translation, a recollection of Wittgenstein and the building of the house. They are short excerpts from Family Recollections written in the early forties by his other sister, Hermain Wittgenstein. Speaking of the house, she writes, "I (...) always knew that I neither wanted to, nor could, live in it myself. It seemed indeed to be much more a dwelling for the gods... at first I even had to overcome a faint opposition to this ‘house turned logic', as I called it, to this perfection and monumentality. However, this house fitted my sister Gretl like a glove...." Throughout, the tone of the excerpts is easy but tempered by the style of an intelligent, perceptive, cultured woman. (shrink)

This book covers a period of Austrian history stretching from 1848 to 1933, a period of amazing intellectual activity, on a scale comparable perhaps only with renaissance Italy. Johnston includes chapters on Emperor Franz Joseph, the Beidermeir culture, legal and economic theorists, Austro-marxists, and Viennese aestheticism. Perhaps most interesting for philosophers are sections on positivism and impressionism and the author’s discussions of men such as Mach, Boltzman, Schlick, Mauthner, the ever-present Karl Kraus, Wittgenstein, Buber, and Freud. There is another notable (...) section on Bohemian Reform Catholicism which includes discussions of Bolzano, Herbart, Brentano, and Husserl. The author’s scholarship is excellent. A large amount of significant information is exceedingly well-organized. (shrink)

This book is an intellectual biography of Ludwig Wittgenstein covering the decade following the First World War. For the most part the work is narrated after the fashion of a field research journal and is filled with incidents and anecdotes that are new to Wittgenstein lore. The book has three major sections. The first discloses previously unrevealed aspects of Wittgenstein’s character and personal life with the open shamelessness common to contemporary writers. The second part is devoted to a consideration of (...) "Der Satz," Wittgenstein’s preferred title for the Tractatus. Bartley claims that the main thrust of the work was a theme common to the major turn-of-the-century German and Austrian writers, Hofmansthal, Karl Kraus, Kafka, and Mauthner, namely, that "speech was becoming a vehicle not of communication but of mendacity and pointlessness". Bartley hopes to show how Wittgenstein’s "significant silence" is effected not by forging a classic of epistemological empiricism nor by writing a Kantian treatise but rather through an explication of the pre-Kantian belief that somehow language mirrors the world. (shrink)

For 20th century mathematicians, the role of Cantor's sets has been that of the ideally featureless canvases on which all needed algebraic and geometrical structures can be painted. (Certain passages in Cantor's writings refer to this role.) Clearly, the resulting contradication, 'the points of such sets are distinc yet indistinguishable', should not lead to inconsistency. Indeed, the productive nature of this dialectic is made explicit by a method fruitful in other parts of mathematics (see 'Adjointness in Foundations', Dialectia 1969). This (...) role of Cantor's theory is compared with the role of Galois theory in algebraic geometry. (shrink)