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Cambridge University Moral Sciences Club

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The Cambridge University Moral Sciences Club , founded in October 1878, is a philosophy discussion group that meets weekly at the University of Cambridge during term time. Speakers are invited to present a paper with a strict upper time limit of 45 minutes, after which there is discussion for an hour. Several Colleges have hosted the Club: Trinity College , King's College , Clare College , Darwin College , St John's College , and from 2014 Newnham College .

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66-445: The club has been highly influential in analytic philosophy because of the concentration of philosophers at Cambridge. Members have included many of British philosophy's top names, such as Henry Sidgwick , J.M.E. McTaggart , Bertrand Russell , G.E. Moore , and Ludwig Wittgenstein , and several papers regarded as founding documents of various schools of thoughts had their first airing at a club meeting. Moore's "The Nature of Judgment"

132-444: A mediated reference theory . His paper " The Thought: A Logical Inquiry " (1918) reflects both his anti-idealism or anti-psychologism and his interest in language. In the paper, he argues for a Platonist account of propositions or thoughts. British philosophy in the 19th century had seen a revival of logic started by Richard Whately , in reaction to the anti-logical tradition of British empiricism . The major figure of this period

198-448: A criticism of Russell's theory of descriptions explained in the latter's famous "On Denoting" article. In his book Individuals (1959), Strawson examines our conceptions of basic particulars . Austin, in the posthumously published How to Do Things with Words (1962), emphasized the theory of speech acts and the ability of words to do things (e. g. "I promise") and not just say things. This influenced several fields to undertake what

264-455: A discussion," "state a philosophical puzzle" etc, which reflected a different view from his own as to what philosophy is. He went on to describe this philosophy and its origins, giving it the label "Linguistic Philosophy" (Wittgenstein and his "school"). He considers the advent of this school an epoch in philosophy, but he would criticize it very strongly on several points. Thus while it occupies itself with "preliminaries" it claims exclusiveness to

330-470: A huff. The minutes make no mention of the poker incident, recording only that, "The meeting was charged to an unusual degree with a spirit of controversy": Second meeting Oct 26th, 1946 In the first part of his paper Dr Popper explained how he chose this topic as a consequence of his astonishment and surprise at the Secretary's letter of invitation*, which made use of such expressions as "a short paper," "open

396-643: A meeting that is now legendary among philosophers. It was on 25 October in Richard Braithwaite 's rooms in the Gibbs building at King's (room three on the first floor of staircase H). A confrontation arose between Wittgenstein, who was chairing the meeting, and the evening's guest speaker, Karl Popper , Reader in Logic and Scientific Method at the London School of Economics . The meeting had been organized by Wasfi Hijab,

462-458: A member of the club in 1912, when he suggested that no paper last more than seven minutes, a rule adopted on 15 November 1912, though soon abandoned. He gave his first paper on 29 November that year, called "What is philosophy?", at a meeting in his rooms at Trinity. Fifteen members were present, including G.E. Moore. The minutes record: Mr Wittgenstein ... read a paper entitled "What is Philosophy?" The paper lasted only about 4 minutes, thus cutting

528-511: A method Russell thought could expose the underlying structure of philosophical problems. Logical form would be made clear by syntax . For example, the English word "is" has three distinct meanings, which predicate logic can express as follows: From about 1910 to 1930, analytic philosophers like Frege, Russell, Moore, and Russell's student Ludwig Wittgenstein emphasized creating an ideal language for philosophical analysis, which would be free from

594-569: A paper on 7 December 1917 about "Mr Russell's Theory of Judgment," which Pitt writes was probably the same paper she had published in Mind in 1919 as On the Nature of Judgment . By 1926, there were woman officers, including Elsie Whetnall , the club secretary, and later G.E.M. (Elizabeth) Anscombe , who continued to speak to the club until at least the 1980s. Wittgenstein arrived in Cambridge in 1911 and became

660-528: A result of his logicist project, Frege developed predicate logic in his book Begriffsschrift (English: Concept-script , 1879), which allowed for a much greater range of sentences to be parsed into logical form than was possible using the ancient Aristotelian logic . An example of this is the problem of multiple generality . Neo-Kantianism dominated the late 19th century in German philosophy. Edmund Husserl's 1891 book Philosophie der Arithmetik argued that

726-555: A series of publications by S. J. Davey, Richard Hodgson and Sidgwick in the Journal for the Society for Psychical Research exposed the slate writing tricks of the medium William Eglinton . Sidgwick regarded Eglinton to be nothing more than a clever conjurer . Due to the critical papers, Stainton Moses and other prominent spiritualist members resigned from the Society for Psychical Research. In 1891, Alfred Russel Wallace requested for

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792-441: A theory of meaning as use . It also contains the private language argument and the notion of family resemblance . The other trend was known as " Oxford philosophy", in contrast to earlier analytic Cambridge philosophers (including the early Wittgenstein) who thought philosophers should avoid the deceptive trappings of natural language by constructing ideal languages. Influenced by Moore's Common Sense and what they perceived as

858-540: Is English mathematician George Boole . Other figures include William Hamilton , Augustus de Morgan , William Stanley Jevons , Alice's Adventures in Wonderland author Lewis Carroll , Hugh MacColl , and American pragmatist Charles Sanders Peirce . British philosophy in the late 19th century was dominated by British idealism , a neo-Hegelian movement, as taught by philosophers such as F. H. Bradley (1846–1924) and T. H. Green (1836–1882). Analytic philosophy in

924-602: Is called Austrian realism in the former state of Austria-Hungary , so much so that Michael Dummett has remarked that analytic philosophy is better characterized as Anglo-Austrian rather than the usual Anglo-American. University of Vienna philosopher and psychologist Franz Brentano —in Psychology from an Empirical Standpoint (1874) and through the subsequent influence of the School of Brentano and its members, such as Edmund Husserl and Alexius Meinong —gave to analytic philosophy

990-641: Is called a performative turn . In Sense and Sensibilia (1962), Austin criticized sense-data theories. The school known as Australian realism began when John Anderson accepted the Challis Chair of Philosophy at the University of Sydney in 1927. His elder brother was William Anderson, Professor of Philosophy at Auckland University College from 1921 to his death in 1955, who was described as "the most dominant figure in New Zealand philosophy." J. N. Findlay

1056-535: Is characterized by a clarity of prose ; rigor in arguments; and making use of formal logic and mathematics, and, to a lesser degree, the natural sciences . It is further characterized by an interest in language and meaning known as the linguistic turn . It has developed several new branches of philosophy and logic, notably philosophy of language , philosophy of mathematics , philosophy of science , modern predicate logic and mathematical logic . The proliferation of analysis in philosophy began around

1122-428: Is mere appearance; we reverted to the opposite extreme, and that everything is real that common sense, uninfluenced by philosophy of theology, supposes real. With a sense of escaping from prison, we allowed ourselves to think that grass is green, that the sun and stars would exist if no one was aware of them, and also that there is a pluralistic timeless world of Platonic ideas." Bertrand Russell, during his early career,

1188-404: Is to be the value of a variable ". He also dubbed the problem of nonexistence Plato's beard . Quine sought to naturalize philosophy and saw philosophy as continuous with science, but instead of logical positivism advocated a kind of semantic holism and ontological relativity , which explained that every term in any statement has its meaning contingent on a vast network of knowledge and belief,

1254-482: The Tractatus . The criticisms of Frank P. Ramsey on color and logical form in the Tractatus led to some of Wittgenstein's first doubts with regard to his early philosophy. Philosophers refer to them like two different philosophers: "early Wittgenstein" and "later Wittgenstein". In his later philosophy, Wittgenstein develops the concept of a " language-game " and, rather than his prior picture theory of meaning, advocates

1320-460: The verification principle , according to which every meaningful statement is either analytic or synthetic. The truths of logic and mathematics were tautologies , and those of science were verifiable empirical claims. These two constituted the entire universe of meaningful judgments; anything else was nonsense. This led the logical positivists to reject many traditional problems of philosophy, especially those of metaphysics , as meaningless. It had

1386-467: The "manifest image" and the "scientific image" of the world. Sellars's goal of a synoptic philosophy that unites the everyday and scientific views of reality is the foundation and archetype of what is sometimes called the Pittsburgh School, whose members include Robert Brandom , John McDowell , and John Haugeland . Also among the developments that resulted in the decline of logical positivism and

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1452-450: The English speaking world to logical positivism. The logical positivists saw their rejection of metaphysics in some ways as a recapitulation of a quote by David Hume : If we take in our hand any volume; of divinity or school metaphysics, for instance; let us ask, Does it contain any abstract reasoning concerning quantity or number? No. Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter of fact and existence? No. Commit it then to

1518-580: The Graz School. It was closely associated with the Warsaw School of Mathematics . Gottlob Frege (1848–1925) was a German geometry professor at the University of Jena who is understood as the father of analytic philosophy. Frege proved influential as a philosopher of mathematics in Germany at the beginning of the 20th century. He advocated logicism , the project of reducing arithmetic to pure logic. As

1584-772: The Second World War has delivered a paper to the club. It was during a meeting of the Moral Sciences Club in October 1946 that Wittgenstein famously waved a poker at Sir Karl Popper during a heated discussion about whether philosophical problems are real or just linguistic games . The club originally emerged from the Grote Society in 1874, but it lasted only two years. In 1878, another group decided to revive it, led by Alfred Caldecott —later professor of logic and mental philosophy at King's College London—when he

1650-544: The additional effect of making (ethical and aesthetic) value judgments (as well as religious statements and beliefs) meaningless. Logical positivists therefore typically considered philosophy as having a minimal function . For them, philosophy concerned the clarification of thoughts, rather than having a distinct subject matter of its own. Several logical positivists were Jewish, such as Neurath, Hans Hahn , Philipp Frank , Friedrich Waissmann , and Reichenbach. Others, like Carnap, were gentiles but socialists or pacifists. With

1716-412: The ambiguities of ordinary language that, in their opinion, often made philosophy invalid. During this phase, they sought to understand language (and hence philosophical problems) by using logic to formalize how philosophical statements are made. An important aspect of Hegelianism and British idealism was logical holism —the opinion that there are aspects of the world that can be known only by knowing

1782-426: The analytic and continental traditions; some philosophers see the differences between the two traditions as being based on institutions, relationships, and ideology, rather than anything of significant philosophical substance. The distinction has also been drawn between "analytic" being academic or technical philosophy and "continental" being literary philosophy. Analytic philosophy was deeply influenced by what

1848-464: The audience included his wife Beatrice Webb and two women from Girton College , a women's college. The first woman to read a paper was Emily Elizabeth Constance Jones , who spoke about James Ward 's Naturalism and Agnosticism on 1 December 1899 in McTaggart's rooms. Sidgwick was in the chair, which Jack Pitt writes was significant, because he had been at the forefront of the campaign to admit women to

1914-555: The audience to be no more than problems in pure maths or Sociology. The meeting was charged to an unusual degree with a spirit of controversy. Prof. Wittgenstein was in the chair. It is the Club's form of invitation. Wasfi Hijab, Secretary Analytic philosophy Analytic philosophy is an analysis focused , broad, contemporary movement or tradition within Western philosophy , especially anglophone philosophy. Analytic philosophy

1980-427: The club secretary, and was attended by 30 philosophers—dons and students—including Peter Geach , Peter Gray-Lucas, A.C. Ewing , Georg Kreisel , Peter Munz , Stephen Plaister, Bertrand Russell , Stephen Toulmin , John Vinelott , and Michael Wolff. It was reportedly the only time Popper, Russell, and Wittgenstein—three of the world's most eminent philosophers at the time; were ever together. Popper

2046-542: The club, including G.E. Moore and Ludwig Wittgenstein . Women were never formally restricted from membership, but because women were not allowed to take the tripos examinations until 1881 and were not granted full membership of the university with the right to obtain degrees until 1947, the club was mostly a male affair in its early days. The first record of women even listening to papers was in Michaelmas 1894, when Sidney Webb read "The Economic Basis of Trade Unionism," and

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2112-565: The coming to power of Adolf Hitler and Nazism in 1933, many members of the Vienna and Berlin Circles fled to Britain and the United States, which helped to reinforce the dominance of logical positivism and analytic philosophy in anglophone countries. In 1936, Schlick was murdered in Vienna by his former student Hans Nelböck . The same year, A. J. Ayer 's work Language Truth and Logic introduced

2178-553: The concept of the cardinal number derived from psychical acts of grouping objects and counting them. In contrast to this " psychologism ", Frege in The Foundations of Arithmetic (1884) and The Basic Laws of Arithmetic (German: Grundgesetze der Arithmetik , 1893–1903), argued similarly to Plato or Bolzano that mathematics and logic have their own public objects, independent of the private judgments or mental states of individual mathematicians and logicians. Following Frege,

2244-625: The debates remains active. The rise of metaphysics mirrored the decline of logical positivism, first challenged by the later Wittgenstein. Wilfred Sellars 's criticism of the "Myth of the Given", in Empiricism and the Philosophy of Mind (1956), challenged logical positivism by arguing against sense-data theories. In his "Philosophy and the Scientific Image of Man" (1962), Sellars distinguishes between

2310-401: The decline of logical positivism, Saul Kripke , David Lewis , and others led a revival in metaphysics . Analytic philosophy is often contrasted with continental philosophy , which was coined as a catch-all term for other methods that were prominent in continental Europe , most notably existentialism , phenomenology , and Hegelianism . There is widespread influence and debate between

2376-504: The early Russell claimed that the problems of philosophy can be solved by showing the simple constituents of complex notions. Wittgenstein developed a comprehensive system of logical atomism with a picture theory of meaning in his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus ( German : Logisch-Philosophische Abhandlung , 1921) sometimes known as simply the Tractatus . He claimed the universe is the totality of actual states of affairs and that these states of affairs can be expressed and mirrored by

2442-455: The economist Mary Paley Marshall , the classicist Margaret Verrall , the Irish-born sugffragist Mary Ward , former Newnham lecturer Ellen Wordsworth Darwin , the mental health campaigner Ida Darwin , Baroness Eliza von Hügel and the U.S. socialites Caroline Jebb and Maud Darwin . Eleanor and her husband resided at Newnham until 1900, the year of Henry Sidgwick's death. In 1894 Sidgwick

2508-440: The evening, with membership restricted to those who had taken or were reading for the moral sciences tripos . The first recorded club paper was "Development Theories of Conscience," read by T.E. Scrutton of Trinity College on 26 October that year. Jack Pitt infers from the decision to meet on Saturdays that none of the original members were Apostles, the secret Cambridge debating society that had been meeting on Saturdays since it

2574-505: The first students at Newnham College in Cambridge, in 1876 she married (and became converted to feminism by) the philosopher Henry Sidgwick . In 1880 she became Vice-Principal of Newnham under the founding Principal Anne Clough , succeeding as principal on Clough's death in 1892. In 1890 Sidgwick was elected to the Ladies Dining Society that had been founded by Louise Creighton and Kathleen Lyttleton . Other members included

2640-474: The flames: for it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion. After World War II , from the late 1940s to the 1950s, analytic philosophy became involved with ordinary-language analysis. This resulted in two main trends. One strain of language analysis continued Wittgenstein's later philosophy, from the Philosophical Investigations (1953), which differed dramatically from his early work of

2706-447: The language of first-order predicate logic. Thus a picture of the universe can be constructed by expressing facts in the form of atomic propositions and linking them using logical operators . Wittgenstein thought he had solved all the problems of philosophy with the Tractatus . The work further ultimately concludes that all of its propositions are meaningless, illustrated with a ladder one must toss away after climbing up it. During

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2772-722: The late 1920s to 1940s, a group of philosophers known as the Vienna Circle , and another one known as the Berlin Circle , developed Russell and Wittgenstein's philosophy into a doctrine known as " logical positivism " (or logical empiricism). The Vienna Circle was led by Moritz Schlick and included Rudolf Carnap and Otto Neurath . The Berlin Circle was led by Hans Reichenbach and included Carl Hempel and mathematician David Hilbert . Logical positivists used formal logical methods to develop an empiricist account of knowledge. They adopted

2838-501: The later Wittgenstein's quietism , the Oxford philosophers claimed that ordinary language already represents many subtle distinctions not recognized in the formulation of traditional philosophical theories or problems. While schools such as logical positivism emphasize logical terms, which are supposed to be universal and separate from contingent factors (such as culture, language, historical conditions), ordinary-language philosophy emphasizes

2904-403: The logicists tended to advocate a kind of mathematical Platonism . Frege also proved influential in the philosophy of language and analytic philosophy's interest in meaning . Michael Dummett traces the linguistic turn to Frege's Foundations of Arithmetic and his context principle . Frege's paper " On Sense and Reference " (1892) is seminal, containing Frege's puzzles and providing

2970-483: The narrower sense of 20th and 21st century anglophone philosophy is usually thought to begin with Cambridge philosophers Bertrand Russell and G. E. Moore's rejection of Hegelianism for being obscure; or the "revolt against idealism"—see for example Moore's " A Defence of Common Sense ". Russell summed up Moore's influence: "G. E. Moore...took the lead in rebellion, and I followed, with a sense of emancipation. Bradley had argued that everything common sense believes in

3036-580: The previous record established by Mr Tye by nearly two minutes. Philosophy was defined as all those primitive propositions which are assumed as true without proof by the various sciences. This defn. was much discussed but there was no general disposition to adopt it. The discussion was kept very well to the point, and the Chairman did not find it necessary to intervene much. He left Cambridge in 1913, but returned in January 1929 and started attended meetings again, but he

3102-431: The problem of intentionality or of aboutness. For Brentano, all mental events have a real, non-mental intentional object, which the thinking is directed at or "about". Meinong is known for his unique ontology of real nonexistent objects as a solution to the problem of empty names . The Graz School followed Meinong. The Polish Lwów–Warsaw school , founded by Kazimierz Twardowski in 1895, grew as an offshoot of

3168-704: The revival of metaphysical theorizing was Harvard philosopher W. V. O. Quine 's attack on the analytic–synthetic distinction in " Two Dogmas of Empiricism ", published in 1951 in The Philosophical Review and republished in Quine's book From A Logical Point of View (1953), a paper "sometimes regarded as the most important in all of twentieth-century philosophy ". From a Logical Point of View also contains Quine's essay " On What There Is " (1948), which elucidates Russell's theory of descriptions and contains Quine's famous dictum of ontological commitment , "To be

3234-508: The seminal text of classical logic and of the logicist project, encouraged many philosophers to renew their interest in the development of symbolic logic . It used a notation from Italian logician Giuseppe Peano , and it uses a theory of types to avoid the pitfalls of Russell's paradox. Whitehead developed process metaphysics in Process and Reality . Additionally, Russell adopted Frege's predicate logic as his primary philosophical method,

3300-425: The speaker's conception of the entire world. In his magnum opus Word and Object (1960), Quine introduces the idea of radical translation , an introduction to his theory of the indeterminacy of translation , and specifically to prove the inscrutability of reference . Important also for the revival of metaphysics was the further development of modal logic , first introduced by pragmatist C. I. Lewis , especially

3366-510: The title of "philosophy" and never goes beyond these "preliminaries" to the more important problems of philosophy. After all, one knows what he means by his philosophical question and the important thing is to provide the "true answer" for it. It also cultivates "esotericism." In discussion, however, it turned out that to give an example of the "beyond the preliminaries" problem is a difficult task which calls for both labour and time. The examples which Dr Popper eventually suggested seemed to some of

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3432-430: The turn of the 20th century and has been dominant since the latter half of the 20th century. Central figures in its historical development are Gottlob Frege , Bertrand Russell , G. E. Moore , and Ludwig Wittgenstein . Other important figures in its history include Franz Brentano , the logical positivists (particularly Rudolf Carnap ), the ordinary language philosophers , W. V. O. Quine , and Karl Popper . After

3498-494: The university, and his wife, Eleanor Mildred Balfour , had become president of Newnham College , another women's college, in 1892. In 1906, the club minutes make clear that women were still not fully accepted at the club for at least some time: "after the lady visitors departed the following were elected members of the Club," and no women were among those listed. There were five women members from Newnham in 1908 and in 1912 six from Newnham and five from Girton. Dorothy Wrinch read

3564-608: The use of language by ordinary people. The most prominent ordinary-language philosophers during the 1950s were P. F. Strawson , J. L. Austin , and Gilbert Ryle . Ordinary-language philosophers often sought to resolve philosophical problems by showing them to be the result of misunderstanding ordinary language. Ryle, in The Concept of Mind (1949), criticized Cartesian dualism , arguing in favor of disposing of " Descartes' myth " via recognizing " category errors ". Strawson first became well known with his article "On Referring" (1950),

3630-427: The whole world. This is closely related to the doctrine of internal relations , the opinion that relations between items are internal relations , that is, essential properties of the nature of those items. Russell and Moore in response promulgated logical atomism and the doctrine of external relations —the belief that the world consists of independent facts. Inspired by developments in modern formal logic ,

3696-484: The work of Saul Kripke and his Naming and Necessity (1980). Eleanor Mildred Sidgwick Eleanor Mildred Sidgwick (née Balfour ; 11 March 1845 – 10 February 1936) was a physics researcher assisting Lord Rayleigh , an activist for the higher education of women, Principal of Newnham College of the University of Cambridge , and a leading figure in the Society for Psychical Research . Eleanor Mildred Balfour

3762-534: Was a student of Ernst Mally of the Austrian realists and taught at the University of Otago . The Finnish Georg Henrik von Wright succeeded Wittgenstein at Cambridge in 1948. One striking difference with respect to early analytic philosophy was the revival of metaphysical theorizing during the second half of the 20th century, and metaphysics remains a fertile topic of research. Although many discussions are continuations of old ones from previous decades and centuries,

3828-469: Was a third-year undergraduate at John's. They used the same name, and regular meetings began on 19 October 1878, consisting of Caldecott; Joseph Jacobs , later founder of the Jewish Historical Society and a friend of George Eliot ; and Alfred Momerie, who also became a professor of logic at King's College London. It was decided that meetings would take place each Saturday in term time at nine in

3894-460: Was an intense man and was accused of dominating discussion, which led him to break off his relationship with the club for a few years in 1931. Another member, Fania Pascal, wrote that he was the disturbing centre of the evenings. "He would talk for long periods without interruption, using similes and allegories, stalking about the room and gesticulating. He cast a spell." His dominance of the Moral Sciences Club reached its height in October 1946 during

3960-489: Was awarded honorary degrees by the universities of Manchester , Edinburgh , St Andrews and Birmingham . Most of her writings related to psychical research, and are contained in the Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research . However, some related to educational matters, and a couple of essays dealt with the morality of international affairs. Sidgwick was highly critical of physical mediumship . In 1886 and 1887

4026-455: Was born in East Lothian , daughter of James Maitland Balfour and Lady Blanche Harriet. She was born into perhaps the most prominent political clan in 19th-century Britain, the 'Hotel Cecil': her brother Arthur would eventually himself become prime minister. Her sister was biologist Alice Blanche Balfour . Another brother, Frank , also a biologist, died young in a climbing accident. One of

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4092-539: Was first read to the club on 21 October 1898. "Knowledge by acquaintance and knowledge by description" was presented to a meeting in 1911, and in 1926 what became Frank Ramsey ’s Truth and Probability . Russell's "Limits of Empiricism" was read in the Michaelmas term of 1935, Friedrich Hayek 's "The Facts of the Social Sciences" was read in the Michaelmas term of 1942, and Moore's paradox was first read in Michaelmas 1944. Almost every major anglophone philosopher since

4158-653: Was formed in 1820. The day of the club meeting was changed to Friday in 1885, when Henry Sidgwick was president, which allowed the Apostles to attend club meetings, and vice versa. Sidgwick was already an Apostle and J.M.E. McTaggart became both club secretary and an Apostle in 1886. Several other Apostles joined the club over the years—including Bertrand Russell , John Maynard Keynes , A.N. Whitehead , G. Lowes Dickinson , G.H. Hardy , Crompton Llewelyn Davies, C.P. Sanger, A.E.A.W. Smyth, and H.T. Norton—and several Apostles after Sidgwick and McTaggart became officers of

4224-1012: Was much influenced by Frege. Russell famously discovered the paradox in Basic Law V which undermined Frege's logicist project. However, like Frege, Russell argued that mathematics is reducible to logical fundamentals, in The Principles of Mathematics (1903). He also argued for Meinongianism . Russell sought to resolve various philosophical problems by applying Frege's new logical apparatus, most famously in his theory of definite descriptions in " On Denoting ", published in Mind in 1905. Russell here argues against Meinongianism. He argues all names (aside from demonstratives like "this" or "that") are disguised definite descriptions, using this to solve ascriptions of nonexistence. This position came to be called descriptivism . Later, his book written with Alfred North Whitehead , Principia Mathematica (1910–1913),

4290-659: Was one of the first three women to serve on a royal commission , the Bryce commission on Secondary Education. As a young woman, Eleanor had helped Rayleigh improve the accuracy of experimental measurement of electrical resistance; she subsequently turned her careful experimental mind to the question of testing the veracity of claims for psychical phenomena. She was elected President of the Society for Psychical Research in 1908 and named President of Honour in 1932. In 1916 Sidgwick left Cambridge to live with one of her brothers near Woking , where she remained until her death in 1936. She

4356-503: Was reading "Are there philosophical problems?" and an argument broke out about the nature of philosophy: whether philosophical problems were real, which was Popper's position, or just linguistic puzzles, which was Wittgenstein's. The pair almost came to blows, with Wittgenstein pointing Braithwaite's reportedly red-hot poker at Popper, demanding that he give an example of a moral rule. Popper offered one: "Not to threaten visiting speakers with pokers," at which point Wittgenstein stormed out in

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