Positivism as an Epistemological System Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Positivism as an Epistemo licit System - Essay ExampleThus, thither can be no room for either mystical abstractions in explaining phenomena. In the second twine of positivist thought, a second form of advantageousness, i.e. pellucid positivism took place, and took advantage of the further progress made in the hard sciences to insist on purifying all metaphysics from the scientific regularity (Jordan, 2004, p.28). Logical positivist views about science and knowledge were based on a general surmisal of language. This theory of language featured two main(prenominal) ideas, the analytic-synthetic distinction and the verifiability theory of meaning (Godfrey-Smith, 2003, p.25). I will discuss these ideas in detail in the next section. The third wave of positivism is generally attributed to a group called the Vienna Circle. The Vienna Circle was established by Moritz Schlick and Otto Neurath. further from the early days through the end, a central intellectual figure here was Rudolf Carnap (Godfrey-Smith, 2003, p.22). In this stage, positivism was carried in its logical form. However, some positivists prefer to regard this latter period as logical or scientific empiricism (Greetham, 2006, p.121), to distinguish it from the previous logical positivist movement. In this essay, I shall use the condition logical positivism to refer to the whole of 20th nose candy positivism, to distinguish it from Comtes 19th century positivism. Positivism as Epistemology From a general perspective, positivism is considered to be an epistemological system through its protagonism of attaining empirical knowledge through sense perception, and its adherence to the scientific method i.e. induction. However when logical positivism stepped into the picture, it was made clear that logical positivism had other roots... The first part of the paper consists of an historical digest of 19th century positivism, logical positivism, up until the period of the Vienna Circle. The second part co vers the epistemological implications of positivism. Here,the main tenets of logical positivism and its adherence to epistemology are discussed. A main figure that it will be discussed here is Karl Popper. Finally, this paper is concluded by discussing the fall of positivism.The paper stresses that progress and development in knowledge is an unfailing endeavor. Since the birth of positivism up until its downfall, positivism nevertheless shaped the manner by which we do science. The authod dialog that one is the breakdown of the view of language that formed the basis of many logical positivist and logical empiricist ideas. Another is pressure from holistic arguments. A third is the frustrating history of attempts to develop an inductive logic. A fourth is the development of a new role for fields like history and psychology in the philosophy of science. The report makes a conclusion that positivism succeeded in developing a systematic method of approaching reality. And scientific kn owledge was the very basis for reconstructing reality, with scientific laws as central in research. If epistemology is the subject of knowledge, then positivism is a valid epistemological system. For if there is one thing that positivism established, it is no other than a coherent reconstruction of human knowledge based on the methods and principles of science itself. It is in this regard that positivism, despite its fall, proved to be influential throughout history.