Ready to explore the nature of reality?
Am Neuen Palais 10, 14469 Potsdam
Alice van’t Hoff (University of Vienna)
Friederike Janssen-Lauret (University of Manchester)
Naomi Thompson (University of Bristol)
The history of analytic philosophy is essentially told as a history of the development and application of logic on the one hand, and as a continuous discussion of the question of the possibility of metaphysics on the other hand. While logical empiricism believed that metaphysical questions could be exposed as pseudo-problems using the tools of formal logic, developments in modal logic and model theory were partly responsible for the renaissance of metaphysics that we can still observe today. In short, since formal logic is an essential tool and distinguishing feature of analytic philosophy, logic is also crucial in the historical and contemporary discourse on the possibility of metaphysics. In this context, the question arises as to what functions logic fulfills in metaphysics and what questions it enables or prevents.
The aim of the conference is to shed light on the relationship between analytic metaphysics and its logical toolkit and to trace the historical development of analytic philosophy from a fundamentally anti-metaphysical to a philosophical movement, which is decidedly open towards metaphysics. An examination of the second area of interest is closely linked to the role that logic plays in the dissolution and reformulation of metaphysical problems. This may take the form of systematic contributions to current debates or reviews of historical positions.
Universität Potsdam
Am Neuen Palais 10
14469 Potsdam
Room: 1.08.0.58