For Students
Logical positivism, essentially the doctrine of the Vienna Circle, underwent a number of important changes and innovations in the middle third of the century, which suggested the need for a new name. The designation positivism had been strongly connected with the Comte-Mach tradition of instrumentalism and phenomenalism. The emphasis that this tradition had placed, however, on the positive facts of observation and their negative attitude toward the atomic theory and the existence of theoretical entities in general were no longer in keeping with the spirit of modern science. Nevertheless, the requirement that hypotheses and theories be empirically testable, though it ...(100 of 7460 words)