I. Introductory Remarks
The philosophical movement referred to
as Anglo-American philosophy within the text authored by Dwayne Mulder and Paul
Moser does not constitute a philosophical “school” in the proper sense. That is to say that the individuals discussed
in the chapter on “Anglo-American Philosophy” in the book Contemporary Approaches to Philosophy cannot be classified as a
philosophic movement akin to Hegelian idealism, Neo-Kantianism, Marxism
etc. Within the context of
Anglo-American thought, there existed no foundational thinker or book to which
everyone made reference. Rather, what
the reader is confronted with is an aggregation of philosophers and
philosophical systems that are drawn together and fused in purpose according to
a shared interest in the relation that exists between linguistic, or discursive
iteration and the ontic presence of sensible/sensuous reality. Mulder and Moser note this in their text,
stating that “Anglo-American philosophy…has been greatly occupied by the
question of how language ‘hooks on’ to the world.”[1] A secondary, though equally important
component, or characteristic of Anglo-American philosophic method is an élan
for logic and a punctuated interest in the application of the scientific method
to human language and cognition.[2] This logo-philiac philosophical approach was
both influenced by previous philosophical systems (recovering certain elements
of Humean empiricism) and, in turn, influenced future philo-theoretical
positions.[3]
For the purposes of the current
project, only the methodological systems of Bertrand Russell and Alfred Jules Ayer
will be discussed.[4] The particular systems of philosophical
cognition developed by each of these individuals will provide significant
insight apropos the varying elements, or concepts which prove to be of import
to the Anglo-American anti-metaphysical[5]
collective. Recognizing that no philosophy
comes to fruition in a void, it is often a constructive and pragmatic
propaedeutic to examine the theoretical milieu out of which the philosophy in
question arose. For this reason, the antecedent
section will provide a cursory review of the methods and philosophic constructs
that formed the “backdrop” for early Anglo-American thought.
II.
Aegri Somnia[6]:
British and American Idealism as the Environs of Anglo-American Philosophy
During the course of the historical
epoch immediately preceding the genesis of Anglo-American philosophy proper,
Hegelian idealism had taken root in both the Continental United States and in
Great Britain,[7]
the former being of greater significance apropos the development of Russell and
Ayer.[8] This historical philosophic augmentation was
itself a partial reaction[9]
to empiricism, agnosticism and positivism, which in a manner found is
denouement in the writings, discursive activity and iteration of Herbert
Spencer.[10] In essence, British Idealism was an
indication of the “resurrection,” or renaissance of metaphysics in British
scholarship and philosophic engagement. The
philosopher and Jesuit Fredrick Copleston makes note of the undeniably
spiritual nature of British Idealism in the eighth volume of his work A History of Philosophy:
Nineteenth-century
British Idealism thus represented a revival
of explicit metaphysics. That which is the manifestation of Spirit can
in principle be known by the human spirit.
And the whole world is the
manifestation of Spirit. Science is
simply one level of knowledge, one aspect of complete knowledge to which the
mind tends, even if it cannot fully actualize its ideal. Metaphysical philosophy endeavors to complete
the synthesis…The idealist metaphysics
was thus a spiritualist metaphysics, in the sense that for it ultimate reality
was in some sense spiritual.[11]
(emphasis added)
This particular mode of British cognition was to develop
throughout the 19th century, through the work and ideas of Samuel
Taylor Coleridge[12]
and James Frederick Ferrier,[13]
to Thomas Hill Green[14]
and Edward Caird,[15]
and culminating in the though of Bernard Bosanquet[16]
and Francis Herbert Bradley.[17]
Among the members of the British
Idealist school, F. H. Bradley must be given a place of primacy (especially
with respect to the current project), not only because his treatment of
Idealism proved to be (at least in some respects) the most original,[18]
but also because the particular form of british Hegelian idealism which he
developed had the most impact on Bertrand Russell, and consequently, much of
the philosophy that was to follow Russell.
The gravity and significance of Bradley’s philosophy for Russell is not nugatory
or miniscule, for Russell was at one point a neo-Hegelian idealist; and[19]
once he abandoned this form of analysis for neo-Empiricism, he would directly
attack the philosophy of Bradley.[20] The debate between Copleston and Ayer also
makes it readily apparent that, while formulating the philo-epistemological
system known as logical positivism, the former was interested in countering the
influence of philosophical systems not entirely dissimilar to that developed by
Bradley.[21] Recognizing that the “rebirth” of metaphysics
in British scholastics and philosophy provided Russell and Ayer with a
substantive catalyst in relation to their systems of logic and analysis, an
examination of Russell’s Logical Atomism and Ayer’s Logical Positivism will
prove to be more efficacious. The
current essay will start with an examination of the more celebrated, or
prominent of the two thinkers: Bertrand Russell.
III.
Bertrand Russell and Logical Atomism
It was previously noted that Russell
had himself formulated a form of British Idealism/neo-Hegelianism early in his philosophical
enterprise. In this prevenient stage
Russell even “conceived the idea of an idealist encyclopedia of the sciences to
be developed by the use of transcendental arguments to establish the conditions
under which the special sciences are possible.”[22] However, in response to several
contradictions and problems which he saw to be inherent in idealism itself[23]
- under the influence of the logician Giuseppe Peano[24]
and Friedrich Ludwig Gottlob Frege[25],
and through the work he completed in connection with the now famous/infamous
text the Principia Mathematica[26]
- Russell was able to move resolutely and irreversibley away from
neo-Hegelianism and idealism and towards logical atomism.[27] It is this particular system of epistemology
and logical analysis which must be explicated in the present section of this
text.
Upon initial
inspection, the nomenclature and terminology which Russell uses to describe his
philosophical position is a bit perplexing.
Russell himself admits as much when he initiates the discussion of
logical atomism in an essay of the same name, stating that “[t]he philosophy which
I advocate is generally regarded as a species of realism, and accused of
inconsistency because of the elements in it which seem contrary to that
doctrine.”[28] He would continue this passage, saying that
logic
is what is fundamental in philosophy, and that schools should characterized
rather by their logic than by their metaphysic.
My own logic is atomic, and it is this aspect upon which I should lay
stress. Therefore I prefer to describe
my philosophy as “logical atomism,” rather than as “realism,” whether with or
without some prefixed adjective.[29]
The
philosophy of “logical atomism” represented an attempt by Russell to remove the
necessity for recourse to metaphysical principles and return philosophic
inquiry to a more chthonic state. This
attempt consisted mainly of an insistence upon the desideratum of basing
fundamental knowledge upon empirically verifiable sense-data and an analogical
argument that language can be reduced to its “atomic level” to discover which
discursive units (phrases, words, morphemes, phonemes, and graphemes) are
actually meaningful with regard to philosophic grammar, and which ones are
superfluous.[30] According to Russell, most of the
contradictions and problematic hypotheses encountered by philo-logical inquiry
are actually the result of bad grammar.[31] To develop a more clarified understanding of
Russell’s “logical atomism,” a cursory review of his theory of descriptions is required.
Russell came
to formulate this theory in order to assist those engaged in philosophic logic.
Essentially, it is a method by which one may determine which linguistic signs
are actually significant, in that they are signifiers of “external relations,”
or relations that exist between external objects of determinate substance, as
well as those which have now inherent meaning.
In his classic text Philosophy in
the Twentieth Century, the British philosopher A.J. Ayer provides perhaps
the most succinct definition of Russell’s theory:
The
problems which led Russell to formulate his theory of descriptions were
connected with his assumption that the meaning of a name is to be identified
with the object which the name denotes.
The question whether a sign is a name is thereby linked with the
question whether there is an object for which it stands.[32]
Stated in other terms, for a proper name, descriptive word,
or a statement to be meaningful, there must be an object which is external to
oneself and is (at least possibly) verifiable through sense perception to which
the name, word or statement corresponds.
The
implications for metaphysical inquiry, especially theology, should be readily
apparent. Statements or references to
the “human soul,” “God,” or “transcendental ethical law” are rendered
meaningless by the rules of the theory of description. Poetic language is also made problematic.[33] Topics of this with possessed of this
typological character are to be relegated to the sphere of private iteration,
but should be of little use to those engaged in logical, scientific
philo-epistemological inquiry. In a certain
sense, Russell’s method of logical analysis can be seen as a recovery of the
empiricism to which Bradley and the British school of idealism reacted.
The
repercussion of Russell’s contribution remains significant. The basic principles of Russell’s logical
atomism and theory of description left an indelible impression upon the
philosophy and method of a number of twentieth century philosophers, but,
arguably, none more significantly than A. J. Ayer. Ayer’s philosophy, to which he ascribed the
philosophical sobriquet/appellation “logical positivism,” is to be the central
focus of the next section.
IV.
Alfred Jules Ayer and Logical
Positivism
The philosophy of Russell and Ayer
both have the appearance of being “techniques,” of methods rather than grand systems. For Ayer, philosophy represents a process of
deconstruction (though not in the same vein or with the same predilections as
the French philosopher Jacques Derrida), or critical analysis.[34] Philosophers should not engage in speculative
activity or metaphysical cognition.[35] Rather, proper epistemological analysis
should relegate itself to the logical dissection of language and syntax. Like Russell, Ayer held that most of the of
the problems and contradictions found within the science of philosophic method find
their origin in the misuse of language and valorization of metaphor that
results from the misconstrued concept of the subject-predicate relationship
inherent in metaphysical conjecture.
Ayer explicates and expounds upon this position in his debate with
Frederick Copleston regarding the methodology of logical positivism:
Logical
Positivism is not a system of philosophy.
It consists rather in a certain technique – a kind of attitude towards
philosophic problems. Thus, one thing
which those of us who are called logical positivists tend to have in common is
that we deny the possibility of philosophy as a speculative discipline. We should say that if philosophy was to be a
branch of knowledge, as distinct from the sciences, it would have to consist in
logic or in some form of analysis, and our reason for this would be somewhat as
follows. We maintain that you can divide
propositions into two classes, formal and empirical. Formal propositions, like those of logic and
mathematics, depend for their validity on the conventions of a symbolic
system. Empirical propositions, on the
other hand, are statements of actual or possible observation, or hypotheses,
from which such statements can be logically derived…Now it is our contention
that this exhausts the field of what maybe called speculative knowledge. Consequently we reject metaphysics…in as much
as metaphysical statements are not testable by observation, we hold they are
not descriptive of anything.[36]
Within the
passage cited above, an implicit reference is made regarding the most
celebrated/infamous aspect of Ayer’s logical positivist methodology: the principle of verification. This principle is, arguably, the dictum at
the core of logical positivism. Ayer
asserts that, according to the principle of verification, a statement is
determined to be meaningful only if it can be placed within one of the two
categories mentioned above; id est if the statement can be determined to be
either a formal or an empirical proposition.[37] The statement in question must either be a
component of a symbolic system from which it derives, or is bequeathed its
significance, or it must be (at least hypothetically) verifiable in accordance
with scientific experimentation.[38] If one accepts its validity, Ayer’s principle
of verification effectively nullifies the Occidental metaphysical endeavor in a
manner similar to that of Russell’s theory of descriptions.
V. Concluding Remarks
In concluding it is necessary to make two critical remarks in relation to
the philosophic methodologies developed by Ayer and Russell. First, it must be noted that a couple of the
principles which are central to logical atomism and logical positivism do not
meet the criteria established by the methods themselves. For instance, Ayers principle of verification
is not itself a formal or empirical statement.
This means that it cannot be given meaning by virtue of reference to an
established symbolic order (mathematics or science) and the veracity of the
statement cannot be established in accordance with scientific experimentation,
hypothetical or otherwise. The
legitimacy of Russell’s theory of descriptions can be challenged in a similar
fashion. There is no tangible, external
object (or series of objects) to which the theory of descriptions can be said
to correspond. The theory of
descriptions is in the precarious situation of being a metaphysical statement
that insists upon the illegitimacy of metaphysical statements.
Secondly,
the philosophies established by both Russell and Ayer have the quality of
self-reference. It is argued by both
Russell and Ayer that logical atomism and logical positivism are better than
metaphysical systems of thought because they are more logical. They are more logical it is claimed, due to
the fact that they are more scientifically oriented. Logical atomism and logical positivism are
more scientifically oriented due to the logical foundations which these
philosophies possess. It seems as though
one must admit an outside principle, or axiom to extricate the thinker from
this circle.
Works Cited
Audi, Robert The
Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy: Second Edition (Cambridge, England:
Cambridge University Press, 2009).
Ayer, A. J. Language,
Truth and Logic (London: Dover Publications, 1952).
Ayer, A. J. Philosophy in the Twentieth Century (New
York: Vintage Books, 1984).
Caird, Edward A
Critical Account of the Philosophy of Kant (Ann Arbor, Michigan: University
of Michigan Press, 2009).
Candlish, Stewart The Russell/Bradley Dispute and
its Significance for Twentieth-Century Philosophy (Oxford :Palgrave
Macmillan, 2007).
Cohen, Martin Philosophical
Tales (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2008).
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor Aids to Reflection (New York: Forgotten Books, 2010).
Copleston, Frederick S. J. A History of Philosophy: Modern Philosophy – Empiricism, Idealism and
Pragmatism in Britain and America (Volume VIII) (New York: DoubleDay Books,
1994).
Egner, Robert E.
and Lester E. Dennon (Eds.) The
Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1970).
Ferrier, James Frederick Institutes of Metaphysic: The Theory of Knowing and Being (New
York: Forgotten Books, 2010).
Green,
Thomas Hill The Works of Thomas Hill
Green Volumes 1-3 (Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts: Adamant Media Corporation,
2005).
Hager, Paul
J. Continuity and Change in the
Development of Russell’s Philosophy (London: Kluwer Academic Publishers,
1994).
Heidegger,
Martin The German Library: Martin
Heidegger – Political and Philosophical Writings (London: Continuum Books,
2003).
Horace, Satires, Epistles and Ars Poetica (Loeb Classical Library No. 194) (Cambridge,
Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1999).
Moser, Paul
and Dwayne Mulder, Contemporary
Approaches to Philosophy (New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1994).
[1]
Paul Moser and Dwayne Mulder, Contemporary
Approaches to Philosophy (New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1994),
77.
[2]
Ibid, 77.
[3]
Though it is difficult to provide a definitive chronology of influence for an
system of thought (due to the fact that influence in philosophy often extends
indefinitely, even beyond the period of the individual concerned with said
chronology), one is often able to detect a line of demarcation regarding the effect
of particular philosophic endeavors. In
certain respects, the later “linguistic turn” in philosophy, marked by the
advent of the “ordinary language” movement and, even later, the structuralist
and post-structuralist movements, can be seen as responses to (if not the
direct causatum of) the postulates and methods developed by the Anglo-American
philosophical school.
[4]
This particular philosopher’s (Ayer’s) system will be examined partially in
juxtaposition with that of the Jesuit philosopher Fredrick Copleston in the
form of debate.
[5]
Usage of the term “metaphysical” would be problematic in this case. While other philosophers and philosophical
schools can easily be associated with the quandaries, concepts and questions
classically encompassed/enveloped within the discipline of metaphysical
inquiry, the Anglo-American philosophers, to a certain extent, developed their
methods in (negative) reaction to philosophies that dealt primarily with the
metaphysical. The Anglo-American
philosophers were intent to explicate problems of logic, mathematics and
language in a manner that referred only (or at least as much as this is
possible) to those aspects of reality that can be experience through sense
perception. This will be expounded upon
at a later point in the present text.
[6]
A phrase from the poetry of Horace, Ars Poetica, 7, literally translated
as “a sick man’s dreams,” but more loosely translated as "troubled
dreams". Horace Satires, Epistles and Ars Poetica
(Loeb Classical Library No. 194) (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University
Press, 1999).
[7]
Recognizing the necessity for brevity and the fact that both of the main
personages dealt with in this essay are British, the discussion of American and
British idealism will focus mainly on examples of the latter school of
method. For those interested, there are
a number of American Hegelian/Idealist philosophers that deserve a great deal
more attention than is possible here, two of the most notable being Josiah
Royce (see The Religious Aspect of Reality
and The Conception of God) and
Sylvester Morris (see Hegel’s Philosophy
of the State and of History: An Exposition).
[8]
Frederick Copleston, S. J., A History of
Philosophy: Modern Philosophy – Empiricism, Idealism and Pragmatism in Britain
and America (Volume VIII) (New York: DoubleDay Books, 1994), 146-289.
[9]
British Idealism represents only a partial reaction because it is not simply an
autochthonous (αὐτόχθων) or indigenous revulsion to philosophical empiricism or
positivism. On the contrary, much of
British Idealism can be said to originate in the ideas of Hegel and Kant.
[10]
Frederick Copleston, S. J., A History of
Philosophy: Modern Philosophy – Empiricism, Idealism and Pragmatism in Britain
and America (Volume VIII) (New York: DoubleDay Books, 1994) , 93-145.
[11]
Ibid., 146-147.
[12]
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Aids to
Reflection (New York: Forgotten Books, 2010).
[13]
James Frederick Ferrier, Institutes of
Metaphysic: The Theory of Knowing and Being (New York: Forgotten Books,
2010).
[14]
Thomas Hill Green, The Works of Thomas
Hill Green Volumes 1-3 (Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts: Adamant Media
Corporation, 2005).
[15]
Edward Caird, A Critical Account of the
Philosophy of Kant (Ann Arbor, Michigan: University of Michigan Press,
2009).
[16]
Frederick Copleston, S. J. A History of
Philosophy: Modern Philosophy – Empiricism, Idealism and Pragmatism in Britain
and America (Volume VIII) (New York: DoubleDay Books, 1994), 219-236.
[17]Ibid.,
187-218.
[19]
Paul J. Hager, Continuity and Change in
the Development of Russell’s Philosophy (London: Kluwer Academic
Publishers, 1994), 31-33.
[20]
Stewart Candlish, The Russell/Bradley Dispute and its Significance for
Twentieth-Century Philosophy (Oxford :Palgrave Macmillan, 2007).
[21]
Paul Moser and Dwayne Mulder, Contemporary
Approaches to Philosophy (New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1994),
141-170. (see especially pp. 141-150)
[22]
Robert Audi (General Editor), The
Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy: Second Edition (Cambridge, England:
Cambridge University Press, 2009), 802.
[23]
Ibid, 802. The most important problem
being one that “arose in connection with asymmetrical relations, which led to
contradictions if treated as internal relations, but which were essential for
any treatment of mathematics.”
[24]
Martin Cohen, Philosophical Tales
(Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2008), 207.
[25]
Frederick Copleston, S. J. A History of
Philosophy: Modern Philosophy – Empiricism, Idealism and Pragmatism in Britain
and America (Volume VIII) (New York: DoubleDay Books, 1994), 428-429.
[26]
Ibid., 428.
[27]
A significant portion of Russell’s philosophic development must be relegated to
a nominal mention within the footnotes.
For the sake of brevity an in depth discussion of what is commonly
referred to in scholastic circles as Russell’s Platonic/Platonistic phase has
been omitted. Those interested in a more
detailed account of this stage in Russell’s cognitive maturation should refer
to Paul J. Hager’s text Continuity and
Change in the Development of Russell’s Philosophy (London: Kluwer Academic Publishers,
1994).
[28]
Bertrand Russell, “Logical Atomism” in Contemporary
Approaches to Philosophy, Paul Moser and Dwayne Mulder (Eds.) (New York:
Macmillan Publishing Company, 1994), 87.
[29]
Ibid., 87.
[30]
Robert Audi, The Cambridge Dictionary of
Philosophy: Second Edition (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press,
2009), 802-804.
[31]
For Russell the aforementioned problematic hypotheses included most of the
concerns of traditional metaphysics; i.e. theodicy, the existence and nature of
the human soul, and the transcendental foundations of ethics. In the essay “Logical Atomism” Russell
specifically targets the traditional metaphysical approach to ontology stating
that “[t]he ontological argument and most of its refutations are found to
depend upon bad grammar.” Bertrand Russell, “Logical Atomism” in Contemporary Approaches to Philosophy,
Paul Moser and Dwayne Mulder (Eds.) (New York: Macmillan Publishing Company,
1994), 91.
[32]
A. J. Ayer, Philosophy in the Twentieth
Century (New York: Vintage Books, 1984), 25.
[33]
The possibility/impossibility of poetic language is an issue of great concern
for the later thought of Martin Heidegger.
For Heidegger poetry represented the closet and most legitimate form of
discursive activity apropos Ontology proper.
See the article “…Poetically, Man Dwells…” in The German Library: Martin Heidegger – Political and Philosophical
Writings (London: Continuum Books, 2003), 265-278.
[34]
A. J. Ayer and F. C. Copleston, “Logical Positivism – A Debate” in Contemporary Approaches to Philosophy,
Paul Moser and Dwayne Mulder (Eds.) (New York: Macmillan Publishing Company,
1994), 141.
[35]
A. J. Ayer, Language, Truth and Logic
(London: Dover Publications, 1952), 133.
[36]
A. J. Ayer and F. C. Copleston, “Logical Positivism – A Debate” in Contemporary Approaches to Philosophy,
Paul Moser and Dwayne Mulder (Eds.) (New York: Macmillan Publishing Company,
1994), 141.
[37]
Ibid., 142.
[38]
Robert Audi, The Cambridge Dictionary of
Philosophy: Second Edition (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press,
2009), 514-516. See also A. J. Ayer Language, Truth and Logic (London: Dover
Publications, 1952), 31.
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