Efforts to trace the influence of fin de siècle neo-Kantianism on early 20th Century philosophy of science have led scholars to recognize the powerful influence on Moritz Schlick of Hermann von Helmholtz, the doyen of 19th Century physics and a leader of the zurȕck zu Kant movement. But Michael Friedman thinks that Schlick misunderstood Helmholtz' signature philosophical doctrine, the sign-theory of perception. Indeed, Friedman has argued that Schlick transformed Helmholtz' Kantian view of spatial intuition into an empiricist version of the causal theory of perception. However, it will be argued that, despite the key role the sign-theory played in his epistemology, Schlick thought the Kantianism in Helmholtz' thought was deeply flawed, rendered obsolete by philosophical insights which emerged from recent scientific developments. So even though Schlick embraced the sign-theory, he rejected Helmholtz' ideas about spatial intuition. In fact, like his teacher, Max Planck, Schlick generalized the sign-theory into a form of structural realism. At the same time, Schlick borrowed the method of concept-formation developed by the formalist mathematicians, Moritz Pasch and David Hilbert, and combined it with the conventionalism of Henri Poincaré. Then, to link formally defined concepts with experience, Schlick's introduced his ‘method of coincidences’, similar to the ‘point-coincidences’ featured in Einstein's physics. The result was an original scientific philosophy, which owed much to contemporary scientific thinkers, but little to Kant or Kantianism.
...MoreSimilar Citations
Article
Neubera, Matthias;
(2012)
Helmholtz's Theory of Space and Its Significance for Schlick
(/isis/citation/CBB001211012/)
Article
McDonald, Patrick Joseph;
(2003)
Demonstration by Simulation: The Philosophical Significance of Experiment in Helmholtz's Theory of Perception
(/isis/citation/CBB000502673/)
Article
Pesic, Peter;
(2013)
Helmholtz, Riemann, and the Sirens: Sound, Color, and the “Problem of Space”
(/isis/citation/CBB001320409/)
Article
Stöltzner, Michael;
(2003)
The Principle of Least Action as the Logical Empiricist's Shibboleth
(/isis/citation/CBB000340849/)
Article
Gower, Barry;
(2000)
Cassirer, Schlick and “Structural” Realism: The Philosophy of the Exact Sciences in the Background to Early Logical Empiricism
(/isis/citation/CBB000110776/)
Article
Heidelberger, Michael;
(2007)
From Neo-Kantianism to Critical Realism: Space and the Mind-Body Problem in Riehl and Schlick
(/isis/citation/CBB000720291/)
Chapter
Zanarini, Gianni;
(2001)
Hermann von Helmholtz and Ernst Mach on Musical Consonance
(/isis/citation/CBB000102702/)
Article
Nicholas J. Wade;
(2021)
The vision of Helmholtz
(/isis/citation/CBB554132905/)
Article
Hui, A. E.;
(2011)
Instruments of Music, Instruments of Science: Hermann von Helmholtz's Musical Practices, His Classicism, and His Beethoven Sonata
(/isis/citation/CBB001033821/)
Article
Cassedy, Steven;
(2008)
A History of the Concept of the Stimulus and the Role It Played in the Neurosciences
(/isis/citation/CBB000930683/)
Chapter
Lenoir, Timothy;
(2006)
Operationalizing Kant: Manifolds, Models, and Mathematics in Helmholtz's Theories of Perception
(/isis/citation/CBB000741570/)
Book
Helmholtz, Hermann von;
(1998)
Schriften zur Erkenntnistheorie. Kommentiert von Moritz Schlick and Paul Hertz. Hrsg. von Bonk, Ecke
(/isis/citation/CBB000082338/)
Book
Brock, Steen;
(2003)
Niels Bohr's Philosophy of Quantum Physics in the Light of the Helmholtzian Tradition of Theoretical Physics
(/isis/citation/CBB000500169/)
Article
Jurkowitz, Edward;
(2002)
Helmholtz and the Liberal Unification of Science
(/isis/citation/CBB000202614/)
Article
Jurkowitz, Edward;
(2010)
Helmholtz's Early Empiricism and the Erhaltung der Kraft
(/isis/citation/CBB000953438/)
Thesis
Oldham, Kalil T. Swain;
(2008)
The Doctrine of Description: Gustav Kirchhoff, Classical Physics, and the “Purpose of All Science” in 19th-Century Germany
(/isis/citation/CBB001561193/)
Article
Schiemann, Gregor;
(2002)
Hipotetyzacja Machanicyzmy u Hermanna von Helmholtza o Zmianie Wizji Nauki i Przyrody w XIX wieku
(/isis/citation/CBB000300588/)
Article
Darrigol, Olivier;
(2007)
A Helmholtzian Approach to Space and Time
(/isis/citation/CBB000701061/)
Book
Schroeder, Severin.;
(2000)
Wittgenstein and Contemporary Philosophy of Mind
(/isis/citation/CBB000102193/)
Book
Blackmore, J.;
Itagaki, R.;
Tanaka, S.;
(2001)
Ernst Mach's Vienna 1895-1930, Or Phenomenalism as Philosophy of Science
(/isis/citation/CBB000101429/)
Journal of the History of the Neurosciences
British Journal for the History of Philosophy
Annals of Science: The History of Science and Technology
Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part B: Studies in History and Philosophy of Modern Physics
Studies in History and Philosophy of Science
Be the first to comment!