Analytical Philosophy

ANALYTICAL
PHILOSOPHY
Analytic Philosophy (or sometimes Analytical
Philosophy)
…is a 20th Century movement in philosophy which holds that
philosophy should apply logical techniques in order to
attain conceptual clarity, and that philosophy should be
consistent with the success of modern science.
…For many Analytic Philosophers, language is
the principal (perhaps the only) tool, and philosophy consists in
clarifying how language can be used.
Analytic Philosophy
…is also used as a catch-all phrase to include all (mainly Anglophone)

branches of contemporary philosophy not included under the label
Continental Philosophy, such as Logical Positivism, Logicism and
Ordinary Language Philosophy.
…To some extent, these various schools all derive from pioneering work
at Cambridge University in the early 20th Century and then at Oxford
University after World War II, although many contributors were in fact
originally from Continental Europe.
Analytic Philosophy
…as a specific movement was led by Bertrand Russell,

Alfred North Whitehead, G. E. Moore and Ludwig Wittgenstein.
…Turning away from then-dominant forms of Hegelianism,

(particularly objecting to its Idealism and its almost deliberate
obscurity), they began to develop a new sort of conceptual
analysis based on new developments in Logic, and succeeded in
making substantial contributions to philosophical Logic over the first
half of the 20th Century.
The three main foundational planks of Analytical
Philosophy are:
•that there are no specifically philosophical truths and that

the object of philosophy is the logical clarification of thoughts.
•that the logical clarification of thoughts can only be achieved by

analysis of the logical form of philosophical propositions, such as by
using the formal grammar and symbolism of a logical system.
•a rejection of sweeping philosophical systems and grand theories in

favor of close attention to detail, as well as a defense of common
sense and ordinary language against the pretensions of traditional
Metaphysics and Ethics.
Early developments in Analytic Philosophy
…arose out of the work of the German mathematician and

logician Gottlob Frege (widely regarded as
the father of modern philosophical logic), and his
development of Predicate Logic.
…Bertrand Russell and Alfred North Whitehead, particularly

in their groundbreaking "Principia Mathematica" (1910-
1913) and their development of Symbolic Logic, attempted to
show that mathematics is reducible to fundamental logical
principles.
From about 1910 to 1930…
Analytic Philosophers like Russell and Wittgenstein focused on creating an ideal

language for philosophical analysis (known as Ideal Language
Analysis or Formalism), which would be free from the ambiguities of ordinary
language that, in their view, often got philosophers into trouble.
In his "Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus" of 1921, Wittgenstein suggested that the

world is merely the existence of certain states of affairs which can be expressed in
the language of first-order predicate logic, so that a picture of the world can be built
up by expressing atomic facts in atomic propositions, and linking them using logical
operators, a theory sometimes referred to as Logical Atomism.
G. E. Moore
…who along with Bertrand Russell had been
a pioneer in his opposition to the dominant
Hegelianism (and its belief in Hegel's Absolute
Idealism) in the British universities of the early 20th
Century, developed his epistemological Commonsense
Philosophy, attempting to defend the "commonsense"
view of the world against both Skepticism and
Idealism.
In the late 1920s, 1930s and 1940s…
Russell and Wittgenstein's Formalism was picked up by the Vienna

Circle and Berlin Circle which developed into the
Logical Positivism movement, which focused on universal logical
terms, supposedly separate from contingent factors such as culture,
language, historical conditions. In the late 1940s and 1950s,
following Wittgenstein's later philosophy, Analytic Philosophy
took a turn toward Ordinary Language Philosophy, which
emphasized the use of ordinary language by ordinary people.
Following heavy attacks on Analytic Philosophy in the
1950s and 1960s
…both Logical Positivism and Ordinary Language Philosophy

rapidly fell out of fashion.
…However, many philosophers in Britain and America after the 1970's

still considered themselves to be "analytic" philosophers, (generally
characterized by precision and thoroughness about a narrow topic),
although less emphasis on linguistics and an
increased eclecticism or pluralism characteristic of Post-Modernism is
also evident.
Analytic Philosophy in Education
Analytic Philosophy has yet to be applied to

question about education on a large scale.
Articles are beginning to appear, however

characterized more by their methodology and
presupposition by consistent Pattern of
conclusions.
Aim of Education-
As might be expected, the analysis’s deny that the goals of

schooling can be reduced from any reduced from any mystical
or rationalistic source.
Some one captained that philosophy promises truth and delivers

only some quibbles about its definition.
Similarly, the linguist concentrate on asking us what we ‘mean’

when we talk about aims and objectives ‘ought to be’.
Gotesky differentiates means, ends-in-view, anticipations, and
outcomes.
Perkinson argues that educational aims are hypothetical rather than

categorical and that they are empirically testable when a sufficient
context is supplied.
Peters even holds that it is irrelevant for the teacher to have aims, since
this concept does not apply to what happens in teaching, as the aims are
not always in plain sight.
Specific aims such as life adjustment equality, intellectual growth

and mental health, have been analysed linguistically in articles, by
Ballenger, Blackings ton, Broody, Cooing, Konica, Lieberman, O’Conner
and others.
The Student-
The analysis’s have not had much to say yet about who is entitled to how
much education and why.
They have of course, suggested a mythology for resolving this and all
questions, as shuffler points out.
It seems probable that this methodology will lead at last to the

conclusion suggested by Plato, and so often studiously ignored in the
name of ‘democracy’ that each person should receive the amount
and kind of schooling from which he proves able to profit.
The question that should be educated would appear to be a
rather simple one for Analysis’s.
One might accept him to answer that anyone who so desires

should be given all the education he wants.
This response is probably correct as far as education in general

is concerned, since the broad meaning of education
includes more than schooling.
In other words, a person can educate himself in many ways such

as by reading, by working, and perhaps most
important, by living-by willing and acting.
However like existentialists some Analysis’s have been
quite clear in advocating a culture an education for the
elite.
Nietzsche was very outspoken in his scorn of ‘equality of

opportunity’ of all the children of all the people.
He felt that public education, which attempted to

educate the masses, was bound to fall short of the
aim of true education simply because the
masses were involved.
George Kneller does not object to universal education at
least at lower level.
But he does point to the grave danger that compulsory

public education might well engulf the individual in
the sea of complete, depersonalized anonymity.
Also the ‘compulsory’ aspect of public education seems to cause

him concern since it removes completely the individual’s
freedom of choice in education matters.
Role of Teacher-
The goal of education for an analytic philosopher is making individual aware of the meaning of homeless, of
being at home, and of the ways of returning.
In the strict sense the teacher is concerned principally with open ended education.
Freedom to his students from his isolation and his anonymity, freeing him seeing his situations and powers.
So much so that the role of teacher seems similar with psychiatric therapy.
No educationist today is more concerned with education in this sense than an Analysis teacher.
Every analysis philosopher is a doctor and its missionary… for the purpose of encouraging individuals of all
kinds and conditions to understand their situations and themselves.
All analysis’s start with the individual who chooses his course and who dies in disquietude or anxiety.
And all of them protect against the forces within man and his contemporary situation that discourage him from being
at home, or, worse from seeing himself as both mortal and responsible.
According to analysis, the teacher shows by his example
…that education is a concentration on personal freedom-one which encourages

the student to accept the facts and beliefs which have relevance for him.
Nietzsche for criticizing the role of teacher in relation to traditional method (historic-
scholastic method) of teaching of mother tongue:
People deal with it as if it were a dead Language and as if the present and the future were
under no obligation to it what so ever.
The historical method had become so universal in our time that even the living body of
language is sacrificed for the sake of anatomical study…
The historical method may certainly be a considerable easier and more comfortable one for
the teacher; it also seems to be compatible with a smaller display of energy and will a part.
But we shall find that this observation hold good in every department Pedagogical life.
Nietzsche than goes on to tell what the typical teacher in the public school
does with the pupil’s first attempt at expressing his individuality in
composition.
What does he (The Teacher) hold most reprehensible in this class of work?
What does he call fail’s attention to?
To all excesses in form or characteristics of the individual…in short, their

individuality is reproved a rejected by the teacher in favor of an unoriginal
decent average.
On the other hand, uniform mediocrity gets peevish praise.

The Curriculum
Henderson has discerned diverse meaning of ‘subject-matter’ and proposed a

classification system.
Mc.-Clellan has claimed deficiencies in the concepts of knowledge in major curriculum

theories.
Parkinson and several other authors have questioned certain ambiguities in ‘needs’ as
related to the curriculum.
R.G.Jones has tried to show how a theory of philosophical analysis and a concept of unity
can serve as a basis for liberal education.
Nordberg has asked weather a curriculum is a Kilpatrick suggested “experience” Again

however the bulk of the possibilities has not been developed.
There are many equivocations and obscurities enveloped in the motion of subject curricular
integration teaching units and the like.
Comte’s concepts of curriculum is quite interesting.
…He was deeply enmeshed in the sciences
…He regarded mathematics as the basis of all sciences.
The whole range of scientific discipline he broke down into six distinct
sciences (Inorganic Science, astronomy, Physics, Chemistry,
Physiology and Sociology).
The first four of these he grouped together as dealing with the organic.
The order in which they are listed indicates a dependence between the sciences..
…for example sociology, the last named and in many ways the most significant Science,
for Comte cannot be fully understood unless the student knows physiology, physiology
depends on knowledge of Chemistry, chemistry depends on Physics, and so back work
in regression.
Instructional Methodology –
Problems about instructional methodology have also been tackled by the analytic
philosophers.
Boxberger distinguished a performance sense of explaining from a text book sense.
Brown has argued that a student can learn testing should concern both.
Green has distinguished among a family intelligent performance.
Of course some of those who in effect make linguistic analysis of educational problems do
not accept the basic premises of Analytic philosophy.
Since the resolution of semantic differences is itself a method.
One may presume that the analyst would recommend it to the

classroom teacher.
For example the elementary teacher whose charges readily

understand the assignment? “Write a story with 500 words” might
stimulate thought by asking them “What is a word?”
Like most notions which seem plain and uncomplicated, this one
dissolves into mistakes of obscurity at some point.

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ANALYTICAL

…is also used as a catch-all phrase to include all (mainly Anglophone)

…as a specific movement was led by Bertrand Russell,

…Turning away from then-dominant forms of Hegelianism,

•that there are no specifically philosophical truths and that

•that the logical clarification of thoughts can only be achieved by

•a rejection of sweeping philosophical systems and grand theories in

…arose out of the work of the German mathematician and

…Bertrand Russell and Alfred North Whitehead, particularly

Analytic Philosophers like Russell and Wittgenstein focused on creating an ideal

In his "Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus" of 1921, Wittgenstein suggested that the

Russell and Wittgenstein's Formalism was picked up by the Vienna

…both Logical Positivism and Ordinary Language Philosophy

…However, many philosophers in Britain and America after the 1970's

Analytic Philosophy has yet to be applied to

Articles are beginning to appear, however

As might be expected, the analysis’s deny that the goals of

Some one captained that philosophy promises truth and delivers

Similarly, the linguist concentrate on asking us what we ‘mean’

Perkinson argues that educational aims are hypothetical rather than

Specific aims such as life adjustment equality, intellectual growth

It seems probable that this methodology will lead at last to the

One might accept him to answer that anyone who so desires

This response is probably correct as far as education in general

In other words, a person can educate himself in many ways such

Nietzsche was very outspoken in his scorn of ‘equality of

He felt that public education, which attempted to

But he does point to the grave danger that compulsory

Also the ‘compulsory’ aspect of public education seems to cause

…that education is a concentration on personal freedom-one which encourages

What does he call fail’s attention to?

To all excesses in form or characteristics of the individual…in short, their

On the other hand, uniform mediocrity gets peevish praise.

Henderson has discerned diverse meaning of ‘subject-matter’ and proposed a

Mc.-Clellan has claimed deficiencies in the concepts of knowledge in major curriculum

Nordberg has asked weather a curriculum is a Kilpatrick suggested “experience” Again

Boxberger distinguished a performance sense of explaining from a text book sense.

Green has distinguished among a family intelligent performance.

One may presume that the analyst would recommend it to the

For example the elementary teacher whose charges readily

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