Philosophy in the modern world a new history of western philosophy, volume 4 (new history of western philosophy) ( PDFDrive ) (1) 76

PEIRCE TO STRAWSON the great weapon in the attack on metaphysics If two metaphysicians disputed over the nature of the Absolute, or the purpose of the universe, they could be silenced by the question, ‘What possible experience would settle the issue between you?’ Disputes quickly broke out about the status and formulation of the verification principle Was it itself a tautology? Was it verifiable by experience? Neither answer seemed satisfactory Moreover, general laws of science, no less than metaphysical dogmas, seemed incapable of conclusive verification Still, they were capable of falsification, and that would be sufficient to give them significance Shall we then replace the verification principle with a falsification principle? But if we do, it is hard to see how assertions of existence are significant, since only an exhaustive tour of the universe could conclusively falsify them It seemed prudent to reformulate the criterion of significance in a weaker form that laid down that a proposition was meaningful only if there were some observations that would be relevant to its truth or falsity Wittgenstein gave only qualified assent to the verification principle, but at this time he frequently defended its a priori analogue that the sense of a mathematical proposition is the method of its proof The true task of philosophy, the positivists thought, was not so much to lay down universal philosophical propositions as to clarify non-philosophical statements, and in this they were at one with Wittgenstein Their chosen method of such clarification was to show how empirical statements were built up truth-functionally from elementary, or ‘protocol’, statements that were direct records of experience The words occurring in protocol statements derived their meaning from ostensive definition—that is to say, from a gesture that would point to the feature of experience for which the word stood This programme came up against a massive obstacle The experiences recorded by protocols appear to be private to each individual If meaning depends on verification, and each of us carries out verification by a process to which no one else has access, how can anyone ever understand anyone else’s meaning? Schlick tried to answer this by a distinction between form and content The content of my experience is what I enjoy or live through when, for example, I see something red or see something green This is private and incommunicable But the form, or structure, of experience may be common to many When I see a tree or a sunset I cannot know whether other people have the same experiences—perhaps, when they 59