Ludwig Wittgenstein is universally recognized as one of the most original and influential philosophers of his age and as a personality of great magnetism and power. Not all who recognize his importance admire him or approve of it; his life and work are both surrounded by controversy. In this welcome reissue of his classic biographical study, complete with a brand-new Preface, Brian McGuinness traces the early years of this fascinating figure and examines the formative influences which shaped his extraordinary life.

Approaches to Wittgenstein brings together for the first time the many varied aspects of Wittgenstein's life, philosophy, and aesthetic attitudes.

Approaches to Wittgenstein brings together for the first time the many varied aspects of Wittgenstein's life, philosophy, and aesthetic attitudes.

Karl Menger was born in Vienna on January 13, 1902, the only child of two gifted parents. His mother Hermione, nee Andermann (1870-1922), in addition to her musical abilities, wrote and published short stories and novelettes, while his father Carl (1840-1921) was the noted Austrian economist, one of the founders of marginal utility theory. A highly cultured man, and a liberal rationalist in the nine teenth century sense, the elder Menger had witnessed the defeat and humiliation of the old Austrian empire by Bismarck's Prussia, and the subsequent establishment under Prussian leadership of a...

The present collection of papers derives from a philosophy conference organised in the Sicilian town of M ussomeli in September 1991. The con ference aimed at providing an analysis of certain aspects of the thought of Michael Dummett, whose contributions have been very influential in several aspects of the philosophical debate continuing within the analyt ical tradition. Logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the interpretation of Frege's philosophy, and metaphysics are only some of the areas within which Dummett's ideas have been fruitful over the years. The papers contained in this book, and...

Karl Menger was born in Vienna on January 13, 1902, the only child of two gifted parents. His mother Hermione, nee Andermann (1870-1922), in addition to her musical abilities, wrote and published short stories and novelettes, while his father Carl (1840-1921) was the noted Austrian economist, one of the founders of marginal utility theory. A highly cultured man, and a liberal rationalist in the nine teenth century sense, the elder Menger had witnessed the defeat and humiliation of the old Austrian empire by Bismarck's Prussia, and the subsequent establishment under Prussian leadership of a...

This volume collects the most substantial correspondence and documents relating to Wittgenstein's long association with Cambridge between the years 1911 and his death in 1951, including the letters he exchanged with his most illustrious Cambridge contemporaries Russell, Keynes, Moore, and Ramsey (and previously published as Cambridge Letters).

• Now expanded to include 200 previously unpublished letters and documents, including correspondence between Wittgenstein and the economist Piero Sraffa, and between Wittgenstein and his pupils
• Includes extensive editorial...

l. The work of Ludwig Boltzmann (1844-1906) consists of two kinds of writings: in the first part of his active life he devoted himself entirely to problems of physics, while in the second part he tried to find a philosoph- 1 ical background for his activities in and around the natural sciences. Most scientists are much more aware of his creative work in physics than of his digressions on the meaning and structure of science. I think in the present case the reason is not so much that most scientists are usually almost entirely occupied with their trade, because Boltzmann's philosophical work...

The main item in the present volume was published in 1930 under the title Das Unendliche in der Mathematik und seine Ausschaltung. It was at that time the fullest systematic account from the standpoint of Husserl's phenomenology of what is known as 'finitism' (also as 'intuitionism' and 'constructivism') in mathematics. Since then, important changes have been required in philosophies of mathematics, in part because of Kurt Godel's epoch-making paper of 1931 which established the essential in completeness of arithmetic. In the light of that finding, a number of the claims made in the book (and...

The role Hans Hahn played in the Vienna Circle has not always been sufficiently appreciated. It was important in several ways. In the ftrst place, Hahn belonged to the trio of the original planners of the Circle. As students at the University of Vienna and throughout the fIrst decade of this century, he and his friends, Philipp Frank and Otto Neurath, met more or less regularly to discuss philosophical questions. When Hahn accepted his fIrSt professorial position, at the University of Czernowitz in the north- east of the Austrian empire, and the paths of the three friends parted, they decided...