PHIL 308
Analytic & Linguistic Philosophy
Whitman College - Spring 2003
Mitch Clearfield
What is now called 'analytic philosophy' originated around the turn of the last century with the work of Gottlob Frege, G.E. Moore, Bertrand Russell, and Ludwig Wittgenstein. One of the central ideas shared by those thinkers is that one must attend to the nature of language and meaning in addressing any philosophical issue. For example, Moore rejected the neo-Hegelian idealism that was widespread at the time by arguing that once the idealist's central claims were analyzed and their meanings clearly understood, they could be seen to be patently false. The early Wittgenstein and the logical positivists who followed him extended this idea, claiming that all speculative metaphysics was nonsense - that because of language's roots in experience, such statements literally lacked meaning. The later Wittgenstein took a different view of the nature of language, emphasizing the ordinary uses of language in everyday contexts, rather than philosophical or logical analysis. According to this view, an idealist's claim that Reality is One might be quite meaningful, and perhaps even true, but doesn't thereby reflect anything like The Ultimate Structure of the Universe.
Not all subsequent analytic philosophers have accepted the centrality of language and meaning for all philosophical inquiry; surely only a small minority today would wholeheartedly accept that approach. In fact, there is no doctrine that all contemporary analytic philosophers share. And while there are certain typical styles, approaches, and issues (not to mention academic conferences and journals), what truly unifies analytic philosophy is simply participation in a philosophical dialog that began with Frege, Moore, Russell, and Wittgenstein, and has continued to the present.
In this class, we will investigate the origins of analytic philosophy, and then trace their development through some seminal work in the middle of the century and ultimately into current thinking. We will focus primarily on issues in the philosophy of language and metaphysics, like those described above.
In the first part of the course (8 weeks or so), we will examine works by the following (click on the name to find out more about each):
The content of the remainder of the course will largely be determined by student interest. However, I would expect to consider at least some of the following:
This class will be a seminar for advanced and motivated intermediate students of philosophy. Although no particular background will be presupposed, students will be expected to engage difficult works in recent and contemporary philosophy, and to carry on a certain amount of self-determined inquiry.
If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to send me an e-mail or to come talk to me!
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