A Brief History of Analytic Philosophy A Brief History of Analytic Philosophy From Russell to Rawls By Stephen P. Schwartz A John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., Publication This edition first published 2012 © 2012 John Wiley & Sons Inc. Wiley-Blackwell is an imprint of John Wiley & Sons, formed by the merger of Wiley’s global Scientific, Technical and Medical business with Blackwell Publishing. Registered Office John Wiley & Sons Ltd, The Atrium, Southern Gate, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 8SQ, UK Editorial Offices 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148-5020, USA 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford, OX4 2DQ, UK The Atrium, Southern Gate, Chichester, West Sussex, PO19 8SQ, UK For details of our global editorial offices, for customer services, and for information about how to apply for permission to reuse the copyright material in this book please see our website at www.wiley.com/wiley-blackwell. The right of Stephen P. Schwartz to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, except as permitted by the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, without the prior permission of the publisher. Wiley also publishes its books in a variety of electronic formats. Some content that appears in print may not be available in electronic books. Designations used by companies to distinguish their products are often claimed as trademarks. All brand names and product names used in this book are trade names, service marks, trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners. The publisher is not associated with any product or vendor mentioned in this book. 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Typeset in 10/12pt Palatino by Laserwords Private Limited, Chennai, India. 1 2012 To my wife, Diane Contents Preface xi Introduction: What is Analytic Philosophy? 1 Leading Analytic Philosophers 6 1 Russell and Moore 8 Empiricism, Mathematics, and Symbolic Logic 8 Logicism 12 Russell on Definite Descriptions 20 G. E. Moore’s Philosophy of Common Sense 27 Moore and Russell on Sense Data 30 Moore’s and Russell’s Anti-Hegelianism 33 Summary 38 2 Wittgenstein, the Vienna Circle, and Logical Positivism 46 Introduction 46 Ludwig Wittgenstein and the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus 48 Historical Note: The Vienna Circle and their Allies 58 The Elimination of Metaphysics and the Logical Positivist Program 59 The Demise of the Vienna Circle 68 The Influence of the Logical Positivists 69 3 Responses to Logical Positivism: Quine, Kuhn, and American Pragmatism 76 Introduction 76 The Demise of the Verifiability Criterion of Meaningfulness 78 Quine’s Rejection of the Analytic/Synthetic Distinction 82 Quinean Empiricism without the Dogmas 86 American Pragmatists after Quine: Nelson Goodman, Richard Rorty, and Hilary Putnam 101 Contents 4 Oxford Ordinary Language Philosophy and Later Wittgenstein 119 Introduction 119 The Attack on Formalism – Strawson and Ryle 124 Philosophy of Language – Austin and Wittgenstein 128 Philosophy of Mind – Ryle, Strawson, and Wittgenstein 138 The Rejection of Sense Data Theory 147 The Legacy of Ordinary Language Philosophy 153 5 Responses to Ordinary Language Philosophy: Logic, Language, and Mind 160 Part 1: Formal Logic and Philosophy of Language 161 Godel¨ and Tarski 161 Davidson 166 Grice 174 Carnap – Meaning and Necessity 178 Chomsky 180 Part 2: Philosophy of Mind 183 Functionalism 183 Objections to Functionalism – Bats and the Chinese Room 188 Anomalous Monism 192 The Problem of Mental Causation 194 6 The Rebirth of Metaphysics 204 Modal Logic 204 Possible Worlds 212 Problems with the Canonical Conception of Possible Worlds 216 Transworld Identity and Identification 223 The Modal Version of the Ontological Argument 229 7 Naming, Necessity, and Natural Kinds: Kripke, Putnam, and Donnellan 239 Introduction 239 The Traditional Theory of Meaning and Reference 240 Kripke’s and Donnellan’s Criticism of the Traditional Theory: Names and Descriptions 243 Natural Kind Terms 247 Problems for the New Theory of Reference 253 Applications of the New Theory of Reference to the Philosophy of Mind 257 The Social, Cultural, and Institutional Basis of Meaning and Reference 260 8 Ethics and Metaethics in the Analytic Tradition 264 Introduction 264 G. E. Moore’s Principia Ethica 266 viii Contents The Non-Cognitivism of C. L. Stevenson 269 The Universal Prescriptivism of R. M. Hare 272 The Return to Substantive Ethics 275 Questioning the Fact/Value Divide 278 Peter Singer and Animal Liberation 281 John Rawls’ Theory of Justice 285 9 Epilogue: Analytic Philosophy Today and Tomorrow 299 Analytic Philosophy since 1980 299 What is the Future of Analytic Philosophy? 321 References 327 Index 337 ix Preface Analytic philosophy was the dominant Anglo-American philosophical movement of the twentieth century, and remains dominant today. Enough time has now passed that we are able to have historical perspective on this vital philosophical tradition. My aim with this book is to provide a general overview of the leading philosophers, theories, movements, and controversies of analytic philosophy, as well as some idea of its cultural, political, and social setting. The Anglo-American analytic tradition starts with Bertrand Russell and G. E. Moore at the beginning of the twentieth century. The most recent works that I focus on are from the 1970s. The Epilogue is a brief discussion of the development of analytic philosophy from 1980 to the present day, and a look to the future. I have not assumed that the reader has any formal background in philosophy. Analytic philosophy is technical, however. It grew out of developments in logic and the foundations of mathematics. Leaving out all technicalities would mean leaving out many interesting and central aspects of analytic philosophy. Rather than clutter the text with explanations of terms and issues that would be familiar to those readers who have studied philosophy, I have provided background snippets at the end of each chapter. These are indicated in the text as [Background n.m – Subject]. Those who would find the background helpful can flip to the end of the chapter. Others can skip them. The use of symbolic logic at places in the text is unavoidable. At the end of Chapter 1 I have provided a background on basic symbolism for those unfamiliar with symbolic logic. At the end of each chapter I have appended an annotated list of further readings for those interested in pursuing topics in more depth or following out other tentacles. For each philosopher that I discuss I have given relevant and repre- sentative quotes to illustrate my expositions. I want the philosophers to have a chance to speak for themselves, and to give a sense of how Preface they sound in their own voices. I hope to inspire readers to seek out the original sources and pursue them on their own. But for many, I realize, this book will be their only chance to engage with many of these texts. For each quote I give the source including page number. Often I give two publication dates. Many of the works I cite are classics that have been reprinted. Thus I may quote from a 1978 reprint of an article that was originally published in 1912. I indicate this by (Author’s name 1978/1912, p. nn). Refer to the bibliography. I transcribe these quotes exactly as they appear in the original texts. I have not edited them for consistency of spelling and punctuation. I have usually not included the works cited in the text in the suggested further readings, since they are obvious choices for further reading and study. I have given standard, accepted interpretations when they square with my understanding of the original texts. I have not engaged in historical disputes or attempted to adjudicate among various interpre- tations of the philosophers’ ideas. This history is meant to be a start, not the final word. It would be an appropriate text in courses such as Ana- lytic Philosophy, Twentieth-Century Philosophy, and Contemporary Philosophy. The structure of the book is basically chronological beginning about 1905 and extending into the 1970s. The history of analytic philosophy is not, however, a direct chronological development. Some strands that differ markedly are simultaneous. Within the tradition of analytic philosophy, criticizing, rethinking, and reworking former notions is crucial. Major figures such as Bertrand Russell and Ludwig Wittgenstein changed their views, attacking their earlier selves. The story of analytic philosophy is the story of analytic philosophers struggling with and against themselves, and each other; struggling with and against its origins, and former movements and doctrines. Later parts of the story can only be understood as reactions to earlier parts. The reader will not find discussion of major thinkers limited to single chapters. Rather, the philosophical stories of Russell, Wittgenstein, Carnap, Quine, and others weave through several chapters. I have provided a useable index for those who want to trace a particular thinker or issue through the history.