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Reviewed Work(s): A Parting of the Ways: Carnap, Cassirer, and Heidegger by Michael
Friedman
Review by: Gottfried Gabriel
Source: Erkenntnis (1975-), Vol. 59, No. 1 (Jul., 2003), pp. 125-128
Published by: Springer
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/20013214
Accessed: 11-08-2019 20:34 UTC
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BOOK REVIEWS
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126 BOOK REVIEWS
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BOOK REVIEWS 127
some ways, more emphatic than that of Heidegger, who only protested the
notion to identify philosophy with logic and philosophy of science.
To gain a complete picture of the opposition, more research will have to
ensue, for which Friedman cleared the path and set the standard. His work,
which, on the basis of a systematic appreciation of the problem and in best
hermeneutic practice, develops a historical understanding, is evidence that
continental wit and analytic acumen can be fruitfully combined. On such
a basis, the hope for a re-unification of both traditions does not seem to be
unjustified. Friedman himself sees that chance, primarily in thinking back
to the philosophical virtues of a comprehensive, rational Kantianism, as
Cassirer theoretically and personally represented it (p. 159, final remark).
In view of the present differences between the analytic method and con?
tinental deconstruction, which particularly refers to Nietzsche, bridging
the gap will be difficult. In this regard, it is worth noticing that, of all
philosophers, it is Nietzsche who, by name, is spared in Carnap's criticism
of metaphysics.
Starting with Nietzsche life-philosophy developed in competition to
neo-Kantianism at the beginning of the 20th century. It not only had a
great impact on Heidegger (explicitly), but also on Carnap (implicitly).
Both Heidegger's and Carnap's thinking is a product of an inter-breeding
between neo-Kantianism and life-philosophy, with opposite conclusions
for the method of philosophy. This fact has not been appreciated suf?
ficiently until now. Friedman, at least, mentions it (pp. 150ff). I permit
myself some supplementary remarks.
The final section of Carnap's "The Elimination of Metaphysics", en?
titled "Metaphysics as Expression of an Attitude Towards Life (Lebensge
fuhl)", provides important clues here. The expression "Lebensgefahr is a
central term for W. Dilthey. Presumably, Carnap adopted the term, not di?
rectly from Dilthey, but from his student Herman Nohl, whom Carnap had
heard in Jena. (The influence of Dilthey on Carnap was first pointed out by
A. Naess: Four Modern Philosophers: Carnap, Wittgenstein, Heidegger,
Sartre, Chicago and London 1968, 41-48.) It is revealing that, apart from
Bauch and Frege, Nohl is the only one of his teachers in Jena that Carnap
mentions by name in his Intellectual Autobiography.
Carnap in no way fails to recognize that something important can be
addressed in metaphysics. He disputes, however, that it can be represen?
ted in the form of meaningful statements. Apart from this, Carnap admits
that language still has functions other than making statements. Alongside
a cognitive function, it assumes an emotive one. This serves to give ex?
pression of the attitude towards life (Ausdruck des Lebensgef?hls). It is in
precisely this function that Carnap sees metaphysics, which however, at
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128 BOOK REVIEWS
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