Juha Manninen – författare

Finnish philosopher Eino Kaila wrote a classic statement of logical empiricism. Having experienced the foundational debates of the Vienna Circle in 1929, Kaila was a keen follower of the further developments of the Circle. His synoptic presentation and analysis of the basic themes, or "theses," of the movement was based on his lectures as professor of theoretical philosophy at the University of Helsinki. The work appeared as a book in Finnish in 1939 and a Swedish translation by Georg Henrik von Wright followed immediately. Earlier, a translation of his philosophical essays from the original German, entitled Reality and Experience, appeared in 1979. However, this is the first translation of Kaila's major epistemological work, which remains a source for re-evaluations of Logical Empiricism.

The first regular chair of English Studies on the Continent was established in 1872 at the University of Strasbourg, re-founded by Germany after its victory of 1870-71. This institutionalisation, which decisively influenced the development of the discipline in Europe and beyond, can be explained by the general and academic history of the two countries and the special geopolitical situation of Alsace. La première chaire d’études anglaises continentales a été créée en 1872 à l’Université de Strasbourg, réinstallée par l’Allemagne après sa victoire de 1870-71. Cette création, qui allait marquer l’évolution de la discipline en Europe et au-delà, s’explique par l’histoire et les évolutions académiques des deux pays et la situation géopolitique particulière de l’Alsace.Der erste reguläre Anglistiklehrstuhl auf dem Kontinent wurde 1872 an der Universität Straßburg, die von Deutschland nach dem Sieg von 1870-71 wiederbegründet worden war, geschaffen. Diese Etablierung, die die Entwicklung der Disziplin in Europa und darüber hinaus prägte, erklärt sich aus der allgemeinen und Wissenschaftsgeschichte der beiden Länder und der besonderen geopolitischen Lage des Elsass.

The rise of scientific (analytic) philosophy since the turn of the twentieth century is linked to the philosophical interaction between, on the one hand, Ernst Mach, the Vienna Circle around Moritz Schlick and Otto Neurath, the Berlin Group (Hans Reichenbach, Carl G. Hempel), and the Prague Group (Rudolf Carnap, Philipp Frank), and, on the other, philosophers and scientists in Denmark (Niels Bohr, Joergen Joergensen), Finland (Eino Kaila, Georg Henrik von Wright and their disciples), Norway (Arne Næss and his students), and Sweden (Åke Petzäll, the journal Theoria and a younger generation of philosophers in Uppsala). In addition, the pure theory of law of Hans Kelsen achieved wide dissemination in the Nordic countries (through, for example, Alf Ross). One of the key events in the relations between the Central European philosophers and those of the Nordic countries was the Second International Congress for the Unity of Science which was arranged in Copenhagen in 1936.Besides considering the interactions of these groups, the book also pays special attention to their interactions, in the context of the Cold War period following the Second World War, with the so-called Third Vienna Circle and with the Forum Alpbach/Austrian College around Viktor Kraft and Bela Juhos (along with Ludwig Wittgenstein and Paul Feyerabend), where the issues of (philosophical and scientific) realism and "psychologism"—the relationship between psychology and philosophy—were matters of controversy.By comparison with the more extensively investigated and better known transatlantic transfer and transformation of "positivism" and logical empiricism, the developments outlined above remain neglected and marginalized topics in historiography. The symposium aims to reveal the remarkable continuity of the philosophical enlightened "Nordic Connection". We intend to shed light on this forgotten communication and to reconstruct these hidden scholarly networks from anhistorical and logical point of view, thereby evaluating their significance for today’s research.

The rise of scientific (analytic) philosophy since the turn of the twentieth century is linked to the philosophical interaction between, on the one hand, Ernst Mach, the Vienna Circle around Moritz Schlick and Otto Neurath, the Berlin Group (Hans Reichenbach, Carl G. Hempel), and the Prague Group (Rudolf Carnap, Philipp Frank), and, on the other, philosophers and scientists in Denmark (Niels Bohr, Joergen Joergensen), Finland (Eino Kaila, Georg Henrik von Wright and their disciples), Norway (Arne Næss and his students), and Sweden (Åke Petzäll, the journal Theoria and a younger generation of philosophers in Uppsala). In addition, the pure theory of law of Hans Kelsen achieved wide dissemination in the Nordic countries (through, for example, Alf Ross). One of the key events in the relations between the Central European philosophers and those of the Nordic countries was the Second International Congress for the Unity of Science which was arranged in Copenhagen in 1936.Besides considering the interactions of these groups, the book also pays special attention to their interactions, in the context of the Cold War period following the Second World War, with the so-called Third Vienna Circle and with the Forum Alpbach/Austrian College around Viktor Kraft and Bela Juhos (along with Ludwig Wittgenstein and Paul Feyerabend), where the issues of (philosophical and scientific) realism and "psychologism"—the relationship between psychology and philosophy—were matters of controversy.By comparison with the more extensively investigated and better known transatlantic transfer and transformation of "positivism" and logical empiricism, the developments outlined above remain neglected and marginalized topics in historiography. The symposium aims to reveal the remarkable continuity of the philosophical enlightened "Nordic Connection". We intend to shed light on this forgotten communication and to reconstruct these hidden scholarly networks from anhistorical and logical point of view, thereby evaluating their significance for today’s research.