The Voices of Wittgenstein: The Vienna Circle

Book reviewed:
The Voices of Wittgenstein: The Vienna Circle – Ludwig Wittgenstein and Friedrich Waismann (Transcribed, Edited and with an Introduction by Gordon Baker; Translated by Gordon Baker, Michael Mackett, John Connolly and Vasilis Politis); Routledge; London and New York, 2003 (Pp xlviii + 558. German and English Texts on Facing Pages.)     

维也纳学派在中国的命运

洪谦先生是维也纳学派在中国的主要传人,但在历史上,第一个向国内学术界介绍维也纳学派的哲学家是张申府及其胞弟张岱年.洪谦对维也纳学派思想在中国的传播起到了关键作用.冯友兰也曾对维也纳学派做过介绍和分析,并试图利用逻辑分析的方法处理形而上学问题.金岳霖及其学生殷海光从逻辑学研究的角度对维也纳学派哲学在中国的传播发挥了作用.洪谦与冯友兰之间在20世纪40年代发生的学术争论,反映了中西两种哲学思维方式的差异.虽然经历了政治上的磨难,但正是由于洪谦先生毕生坚持了对维也纳学派思想的研究和发展,最终成为国际著名的哲学家.洪谦与冯友兰之间的思想交锋也反映了他们对哲学性质的不同理解.     

Coherence,anti-realism and the Vienna Circle

Some members of the Vienna Circle argued for a coherence theory of truth. Their coherentism is immune to standard objections. Most versions of coherentism are unable to show why a sentence cannot be true even though it fails to cohere with a system of beliefs. That is, it seems that truth may transcend what we can be warranted in believing. If so, truth cannot consist in coherence with a system of beliefs. The Vienna Circle's coherentists held, first, that sentences are warranted by coherence with a system of beliefs. Next they drew upon their verification theory of meaning, a consequence of which is that truth cannot transcend what can be warranted. The coherence theory of knowledge and verificationism together entail that truth cannot transcend what can be warranted by coherence with a system of beliefs. The Vienna Circle's argument for coherentism is strong and anticipates contemporary anti-realism.     

The Metaphysics of Meaning: Hopkins on Wittgenstein

Abstract

Jim Hopkins (2012 Hopkins, Jim (2012) ‘Rules, Privacy, and Physicalism’, in Jonathan Ellis and Daniel Guevara (eds) Wittgenstein and the Philosophy of Mind, Oxford: Oxford University Press.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]) defends a ‘straight’ (non-skeptical) response to Wittgenstein’s rule-following considerations, a response he ascribes to Wittgenstein himself. According to this response, what makes it the case that A means that P is that it is possible for another to (correctly) interpret A as meaning that P. Hopkins thus advances a form of interpretivist judgment-dependence about meaning. I argue that this response, as well as a variant, does not succeed.