Book Description

Customer Reviews (6)

Review by LP
A cultural cornerstone. Must be read by those who are interested in science and its history.

Not only for specialists
The value of this book is that it contains a summary of the views of Carnap in his last years, but it is readable not only for specialists. The "introduction" really menas that it is not so technical. You may read this book if you are interested in special relativity and some philosophy, or if you are curious about the scientific method and like to think abot it.

Carnapian survivals and computerized successes
Positivism is dead.Most of the philosophy in this book is now obsolete, but it has relevance today following the passing of the brief but popular anti-analytical Kuhnian fad.

Carnap rejected the idea of a machine for creating theories, which reference unobservables.And in his Logical foundations of probability (1950) he concluded that there cannot be an "inductive machine", i.e. a computer system, into which the scientist can input all the relevant observation sentences, and then get an output consisting of a system of empirical laws that explain the observed phenomena. He only believed that given observation e and hypothesis h, there can be an inductive machine which will mechanically determine the logical probability or degree of confirmation of h on the basis of e.

It is regrettable that the computer age had not begun thirty years earlier, because Carnap's linguistic-analysis constructionalist approach and his idea of semantical systems could have found evident application in contemporary computational philosophy of science - of course with large and important modifications to accommodate both contemporary pragmatism and modern systems design.

There have been many computerized discovery systems, sometimes called "artificial intelligence systems", as found in Herbert Simon's book Scientific Discovery: Computational Explorations of the Creative Processes.I created a discovery system for social science, and found similarities between Carnap's ideas and the pragmatic concepts in my system design.

Perhaps the reader of this review interested in computational philosophy of science will permit me to share some personal experience in the linguistic-analysis approach.A summary of my modifications and similarities to Carnap's approach, which are discussed in my books titled Introduction to Metascience and History of Twentieth-Century Philosophy of Science, is as follows:

1. Unlike Carnap scientists never use the Russellian symbolic logic for the expression of their theories.The object-language theories constructed by my discovery system are expressed as mathematical equations of the type actually used in the relevant science.

2. The computer language constituting the discovery system is the metalanguage expressing a mechanized generative grammar in the program.

3. The semantical rules that describe the semantical interpretation of the object-language statements are sentences that are both analytic and synthetic like Quine's analytical hypotheses or discursive postulates.They might also be viewed as similar to Carnap's reduction sentences, which he says determine only "part" of the meaning of theoretical terms.

4. The state descriptions are the computer system input and output expressed in the object language, and they reveal the semantical changes produced by the discovery system.

5. The theory of information is similar to Yu Shreider's semantical metatheory, and the state descriptions are identified with Shreider's concept of a thesaurus.Thus the amount of information communicated depends on the degree of transformation between his initial thesaurus and the outputted theory that must transform his thesaurus for the user to understand the new theory, and the psychological resistance to a new theory is large if the amount of information communicated is large.

Had history been kinder to Carnap, I believe that notwithstanding his positivist pessimism about a theory-making "inductive machine", he would have contributed to computational philosophy of science, perhaps anticipating Herbert Simon's Stahl and Dalton systems.

Even more significantly computational philosophy of science might have taken the linguistic-analysis turn, which I prefer, instead of its now popular psychologistic turn, which I think is misconceived.I believe that today's computational philosophy of science would be better served were discovery systems construed as language-processing constructionalist systems producing new semantical state descriptions, and that the legacy of Carnap can contribute some needed perspective for twenty-first century philosophy of science.

Readers are invited to Google my book at my com web site philsci, which offers free downloads.

Thomas J. Hickey

A unique product of a unique collaberation
Is this book still relevant, despite being a bit old?The answer is
an unqualified YES.Why is this book the best introduction to the
philosophy of science ever written?Because it is the result of a
collaberation between Rudolf Carnap (a philosophical giant) and Martin
Gardner--the celebrated columnest who gave us so many years of
"Mathematical games," during Scientific American's golden years.

Because it was co-written by a professional writer of popular
mathematics, it is probably the only philosophy of science book which
can be read and understood by the interested lay person.But because
it is based on a series of lecture notes from one of the worlds
all-time great philosophers of science, it doesn't "wimp out" on the
technical level.If you read it you will be brought to the forefront
of philosophy of science, at least as understood by the later logical
positivists.

In short, a remarkable collaberation by two men who were at the top of
their game.Thank God for Dover.For ten bucks you can buy a priceless
book.

a great introduction to the philosophy of science
This is perhaps the only book in which Carnap is almost invariably informal. It is a remarkably clear introduction to some important topics in the philosophy of science: the nature of scientific laws, probability, scientific measurement, the structure of space, causality and determinism, theoretical concepts and laws, and a last chapter called "beyond determinism". The point where Carnap gets a bit formal, sections 26-28, is boring and absolutely out of date; his approach to analyticity is certainly not the best available. As for the rest, Carnap's conceptions are generally reliable (although it should be observed that his "logical conception" programme for probability was a complete failure). The sections I enjoyed most are those which deal with the structure of space. Carnap is highly proficient there (Carnap's doctoral dissertation was called "Der Raum") and his philosophical observations are always lucid and precise. ... Read more

Book Description

Book Description

Customer Reviews (1)

Most important resource on Carnap
This book contains Carnap's philosophycal autobiography, a lot of articles about the philosophy of Canrap, and Carnap's answer on them.

It is highly valuable to read contemporary fresh philosophers' view on Carnap, and also read his reaction on some critique.

A lot of sharp questions raised, and sharp answers as well. ... Read more

Book Description

Customer Reviews (3)

A real bargain by a true master
Rudolf Carnap was one of the greatest philosophers of the 20th century, and the only student of Frege's worth thinking about. But what a student!

This is his intro text, a doubtful first text, but full of insight for those who already know some logic. Carnap trained as a mathematician; surprisingly, his text is of value mainly for philosophers. For instance, this is the ONLY undergrad logic text I know that grapples with the intension-extension dichotomy, with the Carnap-Morris syntax-semantics-pragmatics trichotomy. Metatheory is nonexistent, and Carnap's notion of proof is emphatically too casual for my taste.
The book is also dated. In its treatment of first order logic, Carnap is a bit too loyal to Principia Mathematica. His axioms are a bit pedantic, a bit inelegant for my taste. (Quantified formulae are much easier to work with than Carnap and his contemporaries realized; all you need to do with quantified variables is to instantiate them! See the "main method" of Quine's Methods of Logic.) You won't learn any natural deduction, truth trees, or Gentzen sequents here. You most definitely won't learn anything about recursion. But the exposition incorporates thoughout Carnap's greatest discovery: his formal theory of semantics. You will also learn more about the logic of relations than you will in any other undergrad text. You will be given an idea of the mathematical power of logic (infinity, continuity, numbers). You will even be introduced to the lambda calculus, Alonzo Church's great discovery. Carnap was comfortable with the notion of a predicate letter like few logicians since.

Part II of the book is without parallel anywhere: an introduction to a very wide range of axiomatic theories, presented as interesting applications of modern formal logic. This is a wonderful reference for ZF set theory, Peano axioms, Tarski's axioms for the reals, the Hausdorff- Bohnenblust axioms for topology, axioms for geometry, space-time, and mirabile dictu, even mereology. Other texts present at most the first 2 items on this list.

good books
It ismy experience as a reader that good books are always books thathave lots of examples because they make our understanding easier.Therefore, if this math book has examples in it,then it must mean it isvery good.So I recommend that whenever you have a chance to see it that youbuy it.

Carnap and Vienna Circle
Rudolf Carnap is the one of the most famous analytic philosophers of 20th Century and he is one of the leaders of Vienna Circle. Learning Symbolic Logic from this classical book would be enthusiastic ... Read more

Book Description
This book is a major contribution to the history of analytic philosophy in general and 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. This book fills a significant gap in the literature on the history of twentieth-century philosophy, and will be of particular importance to historians of analytic philosophy, philosophers of science, and historians of science. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Richardson on Carnap and Aufbau
This book is on the book "Aufbau..." of Carnap and the view of Richardson on it. Only interesting for specialists.

an excellent resource on analytic philosophy
Alan Richardson does an excellent job of explaining and defending Carnap's project.Richardson combines his extensive knowledge of the history of philosophy (especially Kant and the analytics) and his ability to makeclear otherwise difficult passages from Carnap.The book is informative,well-written, and very rewarding if a good effort is put forth into readingit. ... Read more

Book Description

Customer Reviews (1)

Articles on Carnap
This book is a collection of articles on Carnap. Interesting for specialists. You should consider the year of publication, the authors and the table of content, if you are interested in it. ... Read more

Book Description
This collection, with essays by Graham H. Bird, Jaakko Hintikka, Ilkka Niiniluoto, Jan Wolenski, will interest graduate students of the philosophy of language and logic, as well as professional philosophers, historians of analytic philosophy, and philosophically inclined logicians.
Language, Truth and Knowledge brings together 11 new essays that offer a wealth of insights on a number of Carnap's concerns and ideas. The volume arose out of a symposium on Carnap's work at an international conference held in Vienna in 2001.
The essays are written from a variety of perspectives:

-some essays aim at rebutting influential criticisms directed at Carnap's views;

Book Description
MEANING AND NECESSITY A Study in Semantics and Modal Logic By RUDCJLF C RNAP Professor of Philosophy in the University of Chicago THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS CHICAGO ILLINOIS THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS, CHICAGO 37 Cambridge University Press, London, N. W. 1, England W. J. Gage Co., Limited, Toronto 2B, Canada Copyright 1947 by the University of Chicago. All rights reserved. Published 1947. Second Impression 1948. Composed and printed by THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS, Chicago, Illinois , U. S. A. PREFACE The main purpose of this book is the development of a new method for the semantical analysis of meaning, that is, a new method for analyzing and describing the meanings of linguistic expressions. This method, called the method of extension and intension, is developed by modifying and ex tending certain customary concepts, especially those of class and property. The method will be contrasted with various other semantical methods used in traditional philosophy or by contemporary authors. These other methods have one characteristic k corfflHbi Wrhey all regard an expression in a language as a name of a concrete or abstract entity. In contradistinc tion, the method here proposed takes an expression, not as naming any thing, but as possessing an intension and an extension. This book may be regarded as a third volume of the series which I have called Studies in Semantics, two volumes of which were published ear lier. However, the present book does not presuppose the knowledge of its predecessors but is independent. The semantical terms used in the present volume are fully explained in the text. The present method for defining the L-terms for example, L-true, meaning logically true, analytic differs from the methods discussed in the earlier Introduction to Semantics. I now think that the method used in this volume is more satisfactory for lan guages of a relatively simple structure. After meaning analysis, the second main topic discussed in this book is modal logic, that is, the theory of modalities, such as necessity, contin gency, possibility, impossibility, etc. Various systems of modal logic have been proposed by various authors. It seems to me, however, that it is not possible to construct a satisfactory system before the meanings of the modalities are sufficiently clarified. I further believe that this clarification can best be achieved by correlating each of the modal concepts with a cor responding semantical concept for example, necessity with L-truth. It will be seen that this method also leads to a clarification and elimination of certain puzzles which logicians have encountered in connection with modalities. In the Preface to the second volume of Studies in Semantics, I announced my intention to publish, as the next volume, a book on modal logic containing, among other things, syntactical and semantical systems which combine modalities with quantification. The present book, however, is not as yet the complete fulfilment of that promise it contains vi PREFACE only analyses and discussions of modalities, preliminary to the construc tion of modal systems The systems themselves are not given here. In an article published elsewhere see Bibliography, I have stated a calculus and a semantical system combining modalities with quantification, and have summarized some of the results concerning these systems. A more comprehensive exhibition of results already found and those yet to be found must be left for another time. The investigations of modal logic which led to the methods developed in this book were made in 1942, and the first version of this book was writ ten in 1943, during a leave of absence granted by the University of Chi cago and financed by the Rockefeller Foundation. To each of these insti tutions I wish to express my gratitude for their help. Professors Alonzo Church and W. V. Quine reaorhe first version and discussed it with me in an extensive correspondence... ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

A philosophy of language primer for late 20th century
It's somewhat incredible just how much of the philosophy of language to emerge in the last half of the 20th century was anticipated by Carnap here. Indeterminacy of translation, primary and secondary intensions; there are passages that foreshadow Kripke as well. There is very little to object to. Indeed, just about everything Carnap says seems pretty obvious. Still, this seems to be the really hard thing to pull off, judging by the missteps many other philosophers manage to talk themselves into. One is continually awed in Carnap by his tremendous judgement. Like Russell before him, he sees very clearly that when it comes to the choice of a semantic method, that is, a method of interpretation of utterances (assignation of "meaning"), "right" and "wrong" aren't useful categories. (Almost all philosophers these days speak of their opponents' theories being "wrong", "false", "obviously false" or "demonstrably false", a real disaster not only for the ill will it engenders.) Various theories may be more or less useful for one purpose or another.

Now, there are some well known objections to much of what is here. Carnap does make a point of separating the meaning ("intension") from the truth ("extension") of an utterance and hence views interpretation as being analyzable into two dissimilable components, one a sort of armchair process and the other empirical. Quine's objections to this are legendary but not particularly useful to science. Indeed, if one were to do a probabilistic analysis of Quine, one would find that what he's worried about are events of asymptotically vanishing probability. This sort of theme is common in mathematics; there are notions of stability and instability that are second-nature to most scientists that ordinary philosophers don't seem to really have. All of Quine's imagined "alternate conceptual schemes" are almost certainly wildly unstable; all of the aliens *we'll* ever meet are tremendously likely to see and discuss the same sorts of everyday objects we see and discuss; this is because natural probabilities are a much different lay of land than "metaphysical possibilities" or "logical possibilities". In truth, of course, you only need to know that other humans have similar conceptual schemes. Searle was onto this in answer to Quine, though he didn't really have the resources to say it very well. (He speaks of a "background" or some such nonsense when he really should be talking about brain architecture.) On the other hand Carnap (shockingly) was really ahead of this all along if you read him closely; he properly sidesteps the issue of ontology altogether.

Reading back over the paragraph I just wrote, this is probably the most disjointed review I have ever written. Partly this is because I haven't fully digested Carnap's achievement in this book--which is a vast one.

Highly technical
This bookis interesting for you only if you are really interested in complex, technical views about semantics or modal logic, or the pphilosophy of Carnap.

If you are jsut interested in Carnap's philosophy, but want to read some interesting stuff, then this is not your book. Try Introduction to Philosophy of Science, or try the autobiography of Carnap.

Meaning At Midcentury: Carnap's Rules Of Ramifying Order
Though Willard van Orman Quine taught a generation of analytic philosophers to disparage Rudolf Carnap's *Meaning and Necessity*, in reality (as in Carnap's private helps to understanding this period of his work) there is very little to dislike about this book.Carnap's "assimilation" of Tarski and Goedel's limitative results with respect to the logical syntax of language did not cause him to completely abandon the habits of mind he had accustomed himself to, but led him to write a series of books on semantics. And in this third volume, his last major work on the philosophy of language, Carnap extends his analysis to include modal phenomena (possibility and necessity) which were formerly intellectually distasteful to the Vienna Circle.The volume is rounded out with a number of papers, including Carnap's famous "Empiricism, Semantics and Ontology" and a discussion of Charles W. Morris' tripartite division of semiotics.

Although Quine (whom Carnap engaged in a spirited correspondence with concerning these topics) spent a great deal of time during the '50s and '60s demonstrating the logical inconsistency of Carnap's analysis, this book is very much an "implementation" of Carnap's Principle of Tolerance concerning modalities and their role in semantic analysis: although Carnap is usually understood as a slightly lax Fregean, here he presents a formalization of Frege alongside multiple theories of his own.Furthermore, all subsequent work in intensional logic and the semantics of modal logic owes something to Carnap's treatment of "possible worlds" in terms of state-descriptions: contemporary modal logic has rather less to do with the metaphysics of modality than with the issues of descriptive adequacy raised by possible-worlds semantics and addressed at length in Barwise and Perry's *Situations and Attitudes* (a book which would not have existed but for this one, as perhaps could be honestly said of many linguistic works informed by "generative semantics").All in all, an important document of postwar intellectual life and a model for genuinely critical analysis -- an excellent buy. ... Read more

Book Description
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. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Interesting collection
This book is very interesting if you are interested in Carnap. You get a lot of the personality of Carnap, and some of his views. It is a real experience to read this after a long research in the philosophy of Carnap.

Other may find the correspondence also interesting just because it contains some views and personal experiences of a philosopher. If you are on such thing, you may buy it as well.

An excellent book
This book, edited by Richard Creath, is valuable both as a biographical work on the lives of Carnap and Quine, and as an resource for scholars interested in the Carnap-Quine debates (and the history of 20th century analytic philosophy more generally). The correspondence, which constitutes most of the book, provides a nice glimpse into the personal and academic friendship between Carnap and Quine: a friendship that developed from their first meeting in the 1930's till Carnap's untimely death in 1970. The book also includes a useful 43 page introduction by Creath focusing on the Carnap-Quine debates on analyticity. Previously unpublished manuscripts, i.e., Quine's "Three Lectures on Carnap" and Carnap's "Quine on Analyticity," are valuable resources for philosophers interested in the Carnap-Quine debates. The book concludes appropriately with Quine's "Homeage to Carnap," a personal tribute to his mentor. Overall, Creath does a superb editorial job and the resulting book is a pleasure to read. ... Read more

Book Description
It is not inacurate to say that from 1928 to 1936 Carnap was a member of the Vienna Circle, even though during this period he was not always present in Vienna. During this years, which spanned roughly the period from the Aufbau to "Testability and Meaning", he worked or at least discussed frequently with the members of the group.

However, traditionally it has been difficult to form a proper view of the development of Carnap's ideas throughout this period, mainly because of three errors which have persisted in the commonly accepted historical interpretation of Carnap and the Vienna Circle: emphasis on the Circle as a unit rather than a collective of individuals; insistence on verificationism as the defining characteristic of Logical Positivism; and the systematic abstraction of the work of the Circle from its historical context. As against this historically distorted image, this book argues for an alternative reading, evaluating the different influences on Carnap of Schlick, Wittgenstein, Neurath and Popper, and making sense of Carnap's evolution from physicalism to phenomenalism and the syntactic point of view.
... Read more

Book Description
A new direction in philosophy
Between 1920 and 1940 logical empiricism reset the direction of philosophy of science and much of the rest of Anglo-American philosophy. It began as a relatively organized movement centered on the Vienna Circle, and like-minded philosophers elsewhere, especially in Berlin. As Europe drifted into the Nazi era, several important figures, especially Carnap and Neurath, also found common ground in their liberal politics and radical social agenda. Together, the logical empiricists set out to reform traditional philosophy with a new set of doctrines more firmly grounded in logic and science.

Criticism and decline
Because of Nazi persecution, most of the European adherents of logical empiricism moved to the United States in the late 1930s. During the 1940s, many of their most cherished tenets became targets of criticism from outsiders as well as from within their own ranks. Philosophers of science in the late 1950s and 1960s rejected logical empiricism and, starting in the 1970s, presented such alternative programs such as scientific realism with evolutionary epistemology.

A resurgence of interest
During the early 1980s, philosophers and historians of philosophy began to study logical empiricism as an important movement. Unlike their predecessors in the 1960s-for whom the debate over logical empiricism now seems to have been largely motivated by professional politics-these philosopher no longer have to take positions for or against logical empiricism. The result has been a more balanced view of that movement, its achievements, its failures, and its influence.

Hard-to-find core writings now available
This collection makes available a selection of the most influential and representative writings of the logical empiricists, important contemporary criticisms of their doctrines, their responses, as well as the recent reappraisals. Introductions to each volume examine the articles in historical context and provide important background information that is vital to a full understanding of the issues discussed. They outline prevalent trends, identifying leading figures and summarize their positions and reasoning, as well as those of opposing thinkers. ... Read more

Book Description

Term paper due tomorrow? Need to bone up for a test? Or just looking for the best information about a favorite literary figure?

Turn to "Dictionary of Literary Biography" for the finest literature reference material. Brought to you by the Gale Group--the world's leading source of reference information--this e-doc contains a biographical essay written by a noted literary expert as well as extensive primary and secondary bibliographies.Download Description

Term paper due tomorrow? Need to bone up for a test? Or just looking for the best information about a favorite literary figure?

Turn to "Dictionary of Literary Biography" for the finest literature reference material. Brought to you by the Gale Group--the world's leading source of reference information--this e-doc contains a biographical essay written by a noted literary expert as well as extensive primary and secondary bibliographies. ... Read more