The influence of Kant’s critical philosophy on Logical Positivism

[Philip Thrift]

https://www.ajol.info/index.php/ijhss/article/view/153555/143144

The influence of Kant’s critical philosophy on Logical Positivism

Francis Israel Minimah

This paper attempts to show the influence of Kant’s critical philosophy on Logical Positivism. In order to achieve this objective, we set out in the first half to examine Kant’s analysis of the nature, limits and conditions of our knowing process. Having established Kant’s position, the burden of the second half is precisely to explore and explicate the relationship between his system and the Logical Positivists. Most studies on the Positivists do not deal with the possibility of an influence exercised by Kant’s transcendental strategy. The more general reason has to do with the mistaken belief that a philosophical theory can be separated from the intellectual culture in which it is articulated. It has become fashionable to evaluate a  philosophical position without taking into account either the roots of the idea in the history of philosophy or the way in which the position emerges within a system of thought. This is one reason why the most intriguing part of the twentieth century philosophy has not been understood – not enough attention has been paid to the indebtedness of the Positivists to the Kantian tradition. This work tries to correct the inadequacy of these studies by demonstrating that Kant indeed leaves a lasting influence on the Logical Positivists’ philosophy.

@philipthrift

[Lawrence Crowell]

I always thought Kant's concepts on the limits of what we can know or observe as being somewhat in line with positivism. However, Kant in an almost Platonist way states there is the noumena that is beyond or transcendent from the phenomenon that we can directly observe or know with some degree of certainty. Positivism always struck me as a denial system on the noumena. In psychology this found its form in the Skinner idea that consciousness had not bearing, and just outwards behavior was all.

LC

[Philip Thrift]

Kantianism post Kant branched roughy into Kantian Materialisms and Kantian Idealisms.

https://www.iep.utm.edu/neo-kant/

@philipthrift

[Bruno Marchal]

On 3 Feb 2020, at 11:31, Lawrence Crowell <goldenfield...@gmail.com> wrote:

I always thought Kant's concepts on the limits of what we can know or observe as being somewhat in line with positivism.

Logical positivism is a reaction to metaphysics, and it is a motto to prevent question and reach. Some early logical positivist were af-even against the use of microscope. It is fundamentally an anti-science ideology.

I sort of agree with You if by Kant you mean its critics of the “raison pratique” (the FAPP idea). But Kant is far more serious in its critic or “pure reason”, it seems to me, and well aware that if we cannot answer a question, it is a more a symptom of a reality beyond us than an argument against it.

However, Kant in an almost Platonist way states there is the noumena that is beyond or transcendent from the phenomenon that we can directly observe or know with some degree of certainty.

OK.

Positivism always struck me as a denial system on the noumena. In psychology this found its form in the Skinner idea that consciousness had not bearing, and just outwards behavior was all.

Yes indeed. Logical positivism is an ancestor to consciousness and first person elimination. It is self-defeating. When Wittgenstein said “we should not talk about what we can’t talk” we can ask him what it is he is talking about. The old Wittgenstein grasped this well.

Bruno

LC

On Sunday, February 2, 2020 at 1:58:55 AM UTC-6, Philip Thrift wrote:

https://www.ajol.info/index.php/ijhss/article/view/153555/143144

The influence of Kant’s critical philosophy on Logical Positivism

Francis Israel Minimah

This paper attempts to show the influence of Kant’s critical philosophy on Logical Positivism. In order to achieve this objective, we set out in the first half to examine Kant’s analysis of the nature, limits and conditions of our knowing process. Having established Kant’s position, the burden of the second half is precisely to explore and explicate the relationship between his system and the Logical Positivists. Most studies on the Positivists do not deal with the possibility of an influence exercised by Kant’s transcendental strategy. The more general reason has to do with the mistaken belief that a philosophical theory can be separated from the intellectual culture in which it is articulated. It has become fashionable to evaluate a  philosophical position without taking into account either the roots of the idea in the history of philosophy or the way in which the position emerges within a system of thought. This is one reason why the most intriguing part of the twentieth century philosophy has not been understood – not enough attention has been paid to the indebtedness of the Positivists to the Kantian tradition. This work tries to correct the inadequacy of these studies by demonstrating that Kant indeed leaves a lasting influence on the Logical Positivists’ philosophy.

@philipthrift

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[Brent Meeker]

On 2/3/2020 2:31 AM, Lawrence Crowell wrote:

I always thought Kant's concepts on the limits of what we can know or observe as being somewhat in line with positivism. However, Kant in an almost Platonist way states there is the noumena that is beyond or transcendent from the phenomenon that we can directly observe or know with some degree of certainty. Positivism always struck me as a denial system on the noumena.

I think positivists just renounced the ability to know anything about the noumena.  Vic was less of a positivist than Kant, since he said the our theories are constrained by reality and so must tell us something about it.

Brent