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On the Character of Philosophic Problems

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2022

Rudolf Carnap
Translated by
W. M. Malisoff
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Extract

Philosophers have ever declared that their problems lie at a different level from the problems of the empirical sciences. Perhaps one may agree with this assertion; the question is, however, where should one seek this level. The metaphysicians wish to seek their object behind the objects of empirical science; they wish to enquire after the essence, the ultimate cause of things. But the logical analysis of the pretended propositions of metaphysics has shown that they are not propositions at all, but empty word arrays, which on account of notional and emotional connections arouse the false appearance of being propositions. This conception that the “propositions” of metaphysics, including those of ethics, have no theoretical content, is to be sure still disputed. We shall not, however, enter here on its demonstration, but, under its guidance, will limit ourselves to non-metaphysical and non-ethical (non-evaluating) philosophical problems.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 1 , Issue 1 , January 1934 , pp. 5 - 19
Copyright
Copyright © Philosophy of Science Association 1934

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Footnotes

1

Attention is called to the following choices taken by the translator:—Auffassung has been rendered variously as interpretation, conception, position; Folgerung as deduction, conclusion, inference, but in conformance with the discussion, most often as entailment. Gehalt which may mean value, has been rendered only as content; Inhalt as meaning; but inhaltlich as connotative, rather than strict or meaningful or intensional, which may convey as much.

References

Literature

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Wittgenstein, L., Tractatus logico-philosophicus. With an introduction by Russell, B.. Kegan Paul, London, 1922.Google Scholar
Carnap, R., Ueberwindung der Metaphysik durch logische Analyse der Sprache. Erkenntnis 2, p. 219, 1931.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
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Carnap, R., Logische Syntax der Sprache. (Schriften zur wiss. Weltauffassung, herausgeg. von Schlick und Frank, Band. ...), Springer, Wien, 1933.Google Scholar