Vienna Circle Institute Yearbook

Transcription

1 Vienna Circle Institute Yearbook Institute Vienna Circle, University of Vienna Vienna Circle Society, Society for the Advancement of Scientific World Conceptions Volume 19 Series Editor Friedrich Stadler, Univ. of Vienna, Inst. Vienna Circle, Vienna, Austria Advisory Editorial Board Jacques Bouveresse, Collège de France, Paris, France Martin Carrier, University of Bielefeld, Germany Nancy Cartwright, Durham University, UK Richard Creath, Arizona State University, USA Massimo Ferrari, University of Torino, Italy Michael Friedman, Stanford University, USA Maria Carla Galavotti, University of Bologna, Italy Peter Galison, Harvard University, USA Malachi Hacohen, Duke University, USA Rainer Hegselmann, University of Bayreuth, Germany Michael Heidelberger, University of Tübingen, Germany Don Howard, University of Notre Dame, USA Paul Hoyningen-Huene, University of Hanover, Germany Clemens Jabloner, Hans-Kelsen-Institut, Vienna, Austria Anne J. Kox, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands Martin Kusch, University of Vienna, Austria James G. Lennox, University of Pittsburgh, USA Thomas Mormann, University of Donostia/San Sebastián, Spain Edgar Morscher, University of Salzburg, Austria Kevin Mulligan, Université de Genève, Switzerland Elisabeth Nemeth, University of Vienna, Austria Julian Nida-Rümelin, University of Munich, Germany Ilkka Niiniluoto, University of Helsinki, Finland Otto Pfersmann, Université Paris I Panthéon Sorbonne, France Miklós Rédei, London School of Economics, UK Alan Richardson, University of British Columbia, CDN Gerhard Schurz, University of Düsseldorf, Germany Hans Sluga, University of California at Berkeley, USA

2 Elliott Sober, University of Wisconsin, USA Antonia Soulez, Université de Paris 8, France Wolfgang Spohn, University of Konstanz, Germany Michael Stöltzner, University of South Carolina, Columbia, USA Thomas E. Uebel, University of Manchester, UK Pierre Wagner, Université de Paris 1, Sorbonne, France C. Kenneth Waters, University of Calgary, Canada Gereon Wolters, University of Konstanz, Germany Anton Zeilinger, Austrian Academy of Sciences, Austria Honorary Consulting Editors Robert S. Cohen, Boston, USA Wilhelm K. Essler, Frankfurt/M., Germany Adolf Grünbaum, Pittsburgh, USA Gerald Holton, Cambridge, MA, USA Allan S. Janik, Innsbruck, Austria Andreas Kamlah, Osnabrück, Germany Eckehart Köhler, Vienna, Austria Juha Manninen, Helsinki, Finland Brian McGuinness, Siena, Italy Erhard Oeser, Vienna, Austria Peter Schuster, Vienna Austria Jan Šebestík, Paris, France Karl Sigmund, Vienna, Austria Christian Thiel, Erlangen, Germany Jan Woleński, Cracow, Poland Review Editor Bastian Stoppelkamp, University of Vienna, Austria Editorial Work/Layout/Production Robert Kaller Editorial Address Wiener Kreis Gesellschaft Universitätscampus, Hof 1 Spitalgasse 2-4, A 1090 Wien, Austria Tel.: +431/ (international) or 01/ (national) ivc@univie.ac.at Homepage: More information about this series at

3 Sami Pihlström Friedrich Stadler Niels Weidtmann Editors Logical Empiricism and Pragmatism

4 Editors Sami Pihlström Faculty of Theology University of Helsinki Helsinki, Finland Friedrich Stadler Institute Vienna Circle University of Vienna Vienna, Austria Niels Weidtmann Forum Scientiarum Universität Tübingen Tübingen, Germany ISSN Vienna Circle Institute Yearbook ISBN DOI / ISSN (electronic) ISBN (ebook) Library of Congress Control Number: Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2017 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Printed on acid-free paper This Springer imprint is published by Springer Nature The registered company is Springer International Publishing AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

5 Editorial This volume contains most of the papers presented at the international conference on Logical Empiricism and Pragmatism, held at the University of Vienna, November 7 9, This conference was an activity of the triliteral cooperation project Science, Culture, and Society organized by the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies (University of Helsinki), the Forum Scientiarum (University of Tübingen), and the Institute Vienna Circle (University of Vienna), with four conferences in all three locations. According to its mission statement, this cooperative project: Seeks to critically reassess science and the humanities in their respective endeavors to explain, but also to understand the causes, conditions and consequences of artistic, ethical, and religious phenomena in our current European cultures. The revived idea of a scientific philosophy is expected to deliver the required means for realizing this aim. The collaborative research project thereby addresses the huge tension that has grown between public and private worldviews due to the increasing implicitness with which science is commonly accepted to be the exclusive measure of successful social engineering while, on the other hand, religious beliefs, moral convictions and motivations, and artistic experiences still are most highly valued in a private sphere. This tension threatens to burst the coherence of European cultures also because science has developed schemes to explain art and religion by its own means in the last decade or two. Philosophy can play a decisive role in analyzing the relationship between science, art, ethics and religion and help to set up a dialogue between these different cultural phenomena. However, we suggest that to do so it has to go beyond the Kantian distinction of art, ethics, religion, and science and face the challenge posed by recent empirical approaches to these fields. It is the central starting point of the present project that this step may be taken with recourse to scientific philosophy as it has been developed in quite different measures in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, i.e. neo-kantianism, logical empiricism, phenomenology, and pragmatism. This volume deals with the relation of European Logical Empiricism and North- American pragmatism from various points of view systematically and historically. In general, the articles manifest a strong interaction between these two main philosophical currents, on the one hand, but also independent developments, on the other, since the end of the nineteenth century. v

6 vi Editorial This is only one reason for the remarkable convergence of the Vienna Circle in exile and the US (neo-) pragmatism from the 1930s onward, which was anticipated by the early reception of Ernst Mach in the US with William James and the journal The Monist. Therefore, we may speak of a mostly undervalued but flourishing transatlantic interaction in philosophy and philosophy of science covering at least three generations and several European countries and bridging the absolute gap between continental and analytic tradition. In addition, the complexity of both philosophical traditions and their origins show a pluralist image of this relation and interaction with an obvious family resemblance. The contributions document the common features and differences of these two path-breaking traditions of modern philosophy since the beginning of their mutual communication in the hope of opening new research questions and perspectives for further investigations. As usual in all Yearbooks of the Institute Vienna Circle, also these conference proceedings are complemented by a general part, this time with the 21st Vienna Circle Lecture of Ilkka Niiniluoto on Eino Kaila and the Vienna Circle, a report on a finished research project on logical empiricism in Berlin and Vienna by Günther Sandner and Christian Pape, and a review section on recent related publications like the biography of Otto Neurath. Many thanks go to Sami Pihlström (Helsinki), Niels Weidtmann, Michael Heidelberger, and Matthias Neuber (Tübingen) for the pleasing cooperation within our network, as well as to all speakers and authors of this proceedings, and Robert Kaller from the Institute Vienna Circle for his editorial work. Institute Vienna Circle University of Vienna Vienna, August 2016 Friedrich Stadler

7 Contents Part I Logical Empiricism and Pragmatism Ernst Mach and Pragmatism The Case of Mach s Popular Scientific Lectures (1895) Friedrich Stadler William James and the Vienna Circle Massimo Ferrari Classical Pragmatism and Metaphysics: James and Peirce on Scientific Determinism Donata Romizi Beyond Realism and Antirealism? The Strange Case of Dewey s Instrumentalism Giovanni Rubeis American Pragmatism, Central-European Pragmatism and the First Vienna Circle Thomas Uebel On Rational Restraints of Ontology Heikki J. Koskinen Feigl, Sellars, and the Idea of a Pure Pragmatics Matthias Neuber On the Viennese Background of Harvard Neopragmatism Sami Pihlström The Ghost of Pragmatism. Some Historical Remarks on the Debate on the Foundations of Probability Maria Carla Galavotti vii

8 viii Contents Part II General Part Eino Kaila and The Vienna Circle Ilkka Niiniluoto Review Essay: Two books on the Berlin Group of Logical Empiricists Günther Sandner Report/Documentaion From Late Enlightenment to Logical Empiricism: The Berlin Society of Empirical/Scientific Philosophy and the Ernst Mach Association in Vienna Günther Sandner and Christian Pape Reviews Index