On Mon, 31 Mar 2008 15:22:21 -0400 "Charles Brown" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > > rasherrs rasherrs > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------- > > The argument between the Vienna Circle and Karl Popper on the > matter of > the verification principle. Popper susbtituted the falsficaion > principle for > the verification principle. I believe that this and related issues > have > been > at best neglected by marxism. Yet is a matter of signifcance. > The problem of the entire relationship between the physical > sciences, the > human sciences and what is known as everyday common sense is one > that > needs > badly to be solved. Without a solution to it communism stands on > weak > and > unconvincing ground. > Perhaps it should be recalled that the Vienna Circle contained > socialists > and was not a right wing intellectual circle. Even Popper had been > associated with marxism in his youth. He was later to become a > liberal. > These people as marxism often suggests were not extreme right wing > ideologues. Bertrand Russell exercised an enormous influence on the > Vienna > Circle and on Popper. Yet it cannot be said that he was politically > > reactionary. > > ^^^^^ > CB: Yea, Russell was a liberal. > > Jim F. can tell you who was a Marxist and who not in the Vienna > Circle > , and among the logical positivists. The name of the Marxist among > them > will come to me in a minute. > > _______________________________________________
Among the Vienna Circle, Otto Neurath was an avowed Marxist. He was by training a mathematician, an economist and a sociologist. At the time of the 1919 revolution in Germany, he was appointed by the Social Democratic government in Bavaria to run a commission for overseeing the socialization of the economy. Not long after that, the Social Democrats were displaced by a radical left government comprised of Communists, left Social Democrats and anarchists. They kept Neurath in his post. Later after the 1919 revolution was suppressed, Neurath was arrested and put on trial for treason. The treason charges against him were eventually dropped after protests from the Austrian government and the intercession of prominent academics in Germany, including his old teacher Max Weber. After that, he returned to his native Austria, where he remained active in the Austrian SPD and became very much involved in worker education. As an admirer of Ernst Mach, Neurath fell in with a loosely knit group of scientifically minded philosophers and philosophically minded scientists who were concerned with updating Mach's philosophy in light of then recent developments in science and mathematical logic. This group became known as the Vienna Circle and although Moritz Schlick was its titular head. Otto Neurath and Rudolf Carnap were its dominant figures. It was Neurath and Carnap who drew up the group's manifesto, "The Scientific Conception of the World; The Vienna Circle." In that document, Neurath and Carnap emphasized the broader concerns of the circle which extended beyond logic and the philosophy of science to encompass issues in culture, education and politics. They made clear their orientation to socialism and they included Karl Marx in their list of thinkers who considered to be progenitors of the scientific conception of the world. Politically, most of the Vienna Circle were left social democrats. However, there were a few members like Schlick, and Richard von Mises (the brother of economist Ludwig von Mises) who were not all socialists or social democrats but were liberals in the continental European senses (that is they were they were free marketeers). > _______________________________________________ Marxism-Thaxis mailing list Marxism-Thaxis@lists.econ.utah.edu To change your options or unsubscribe go to: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism-thaxis
