The spirit of the Vienna circle devoted to questions of Lebens- and Weltauffassung

Arne Naess

pp. 359-367

in: Werner Leinfellner, Eckehart Köhler (eds), Game theory, experience, rationality, Berlin, Springer, 1998

Abstract

The history of the Vienna Circle is bound up with what was called the Wissenschaftliche Weltauffassung. But with the requirements of the members when it came to deciding whether a sentence expressed scientific knowledge or not, the basic sentences expressing a Lebens- und Weltauffassung would scarcely qualify as such, nor would hypotheses about a scientific world view. The Wissenschaftlichkeit ofphysicalism, logical behaviorism,logical syntax, unity of science, were hypothetical at best, and in my opinion should not be identified with the total philosophical enterprise of the Vienna Circle. To its strictly speaking philosophical enterprise I attribute a certain kind of scientific or research attitude and clarity as much as any set of philosophical opinion of a substantial sort.