Georg Henrik von Wright

Georg Henrik von Wright (ˈjěːɔrj ˈhɛ̌nːrɪk fɔn ˈvrɪkːt; 14 June 1916 – 16 June 2003) was a Finnish philosopher. G. H. von Wright was born in Helsinki on 14 June 1916 to Tor von Wright and his wife Ragni Elisabeth Alfthan. On the retirement of Ludwig Wittgenstein as professor at the University of Cambridge in 1948, von Wright was elected to his chair at the age of 32. He published in English, Finnish, German, and Swedish, belonging to the Swedish-speaking minority of Finland. Von Wright was of both Finnish and 17th-century Scottish ancestry, and the family was raised to nobility in 1772. Von Wright's writings come under two broad categories. The first is analytic philosophy and philosophical logic in the Anglo-American vein. His 1951 texts An Essay in Modal Logic and "Deontic Logic" were landmarks in the postwar rise of formal modal logic and its deontic version. He was an authority on Wittgenstein, editing his later works. He was the leading figure in the Finnish philosophy of his time, specializing in philosophical logic, philosophical analysis, philosophy of action, philosophy of language, epistemology, and the close study of Charles Sanders Peirce. The other vein in von Wright's writings is moralist and pessimist. During the last twenty years of his life, under the influence of Oswald Spengler, Jürgen Habermas and the Frankfurt School's reflections about modern rationality, he wrote prolifically. His best known article from this period is entitled "The Myth of Progress" (1993), and it questions whether our apparent material and technological progress can really be considered "progress" (see Myth of Progress). In the last year of his life, he was awarded several honorary degrees, including one by the University of Bergen. He also was awarded the Swedish Academy Finland Prize in 1968. The Logical Problem of Induction, PhD thesis, 31 May 1941 Den logiska empirismen (Logical Empirism), in Swedish, 1945 Über Wahrscheinlichkeit (On Chance), in German, 1945 An Essay in Modal Logic, (Studies in Logic and the Foundations of Mathematics: Volume V), L.

About this result

This page is automatically generated and may contain information that is not correct, complete, up-to-date, or relevant to your search query. The same applies to every other page on this website. Please make sure to verify the information with EPFL's official sources.

Related concepts (8)

Philosophy of language

In analytic philosophy, philosophy of language investigates the nature of language and the relations between language, language users, and the world. Investigations may include inquiry into the nature of meaning, intentionality, reference, the constitution of sentences, concepts, learning, and thought. Gottlob Frege and Bertrand Russell were pivotal figures in analytic philosophy's "linguistic turn". These writers were followed by Ludwig Wittgenstein (Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus), the Vienna Circle, logical positivists, and Willard Van Orman Quine.

Western philosophy

Western philosophy encompasses the philosophical thought and work of the Western world. Historically, the term refers to the philosophical thinking of Western culture, beginning with the ancient Greek philosophy of the pre-Socratics. The word philosophy itself originated from the Ancient Greek (φιλοσοφία), literally, "the love of wisdom" φιλεῖν , "to love" and σοφία sophía, "wisdom").