MACMILLAN Friedrich Waismann: The Open Texture of Analytic Philosophy

This edited collection covers Friedrich Waismann's most influential contributions to twentieth-century philosophy of language: his concepts of open texture and language strata, his early criticism of verificationism and the analytic-synthetic distinction, as well as their significance for experimental and legal philosophy. In addition, Waismann's original papers in ethics, metaphysics, epistemology and the philosophy of mathematics are here evaluated. They introduce Waismann's theory of action along with his groundbreaking work on fiction, proper names and Kafka's Trial. Waismann is known as the voice of Ludwig Wittgenstein in the Vienna Circle. At the same time we find in his works a determined critic of logical positivism and ordinary language philosophy, who anticipated much later developments in the analytic tradition and devised his very own vision for its future.  Review “Here, for the first time, the astonishing breadth and subtlety of Friedrich Waismann’s important philosophical views are on display. His work, so long neglected, has at last found a voice. As the essays in this collection make plain, we need to broaden our histories of analytic philosophy in the middle third of the twentieth century to include Waismann as a significant figure. But more than that, this volume also shows that even in the twenty first century we can profit from what he thought and wrote.” (Richard Creath, Arizona State University, USA) “A pioneering, insightful, and comprehensive volume showing how the full body of Friedrich Waismann’s writing forms an exemplary, accessible, and original development of the legacy of the Vienna Circle and Wittgenstein.” (Juliet Floyd, Boston University, USA) From the Back Cover This edited collection covers Friedrich Waismann's most influential contributions to twentieth-century philosophy of language: his concepts of open texture and language strata, his early criticism of verificationism and the analytic-synthetic distinction, as well as their significance for experimental and legal philosophy. In addition, Waismann's original papers in ethics, metaphysics, epistemology and the philosophy of mathematics are here evaluated. They introduce Waismann's theory of action along with his groundbreaking work on fiction, proper names and Kafka's Trial. Waismann is known as the voice of Ludwig Wittgenstein in the Vienna Circle. At the same time we find in his works a determined critic of logical positivism and ordinary language philosophy, who anticipated much later developments in the analytic tradition and devised his very own vision for its future.  About the Author Dejan Makovec is a doctoral student in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh, USA. He has taught philosophy at the University of Klagenfurt and the University of Vienna, Austria, and is one of the founders of the Vienna Forum for Analytic Philosophy. Stewart Shapiro is the O’Donnell Professor of Philosophy at Ohio State University, USA. He is also a Professorial Fellow at the University of Oslo, Norway, a Distinguished Visiting Professor at the University of Connecticut, USA, and a Presidential Fellow at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel.