Philosophical analysis

Analysis (Greek: analysis ) and in philosophy generally means the dissection of a whole into its parts, its antonym is the synthesis. The method of analysis was a total and self- perceived differently in the history of philosophy in analytic philosophy and applied. Accordingly, the term is ambiguous.

Conceptual history

In the following, a conceptual historical outline is given.

Antiquity

A first analysis as described method was developed in Greek geometry. This influenced not only Socrates, at least as represented by Plato, but Aristotle. Your classic form was the analytical method of the Greek geometry, however, until later in the elements of Euclid. In the classical formulation, we find the analytical method in the Mathematical Collection of Pappus formulated.

In Plato and Aristotle, the analysis may refer to concepts, judgments and conclusions. Plato developed as a conceptual analytical method, the dissection ( Dihairesis ). Aristotle has methodically and systematically applied the method of analysis in the First and Second analytics.

Medieval and Renaissance

The Early Middle Ages is characterized by an eclectic reception of Greek antiquity with poor source material. In the later medieval philosophy it comes to self- concepts that anticipate some basic concepts of analytic philosophy. As an example, John Buridan can be cited, the difference between divisio, definitio and demonstratio ( Begriffszergliederung, term definition, proof ), which corresponds to a dissecting, interpretive and regressive analysis.

However, in the Renaissance, there is a break with the tradition of scholasticism in favor of new or explicitly again relating to at de ancient sources approaches. A further reception is from first.

Early Modern Times

In the 16-17. Century experiences the analysis an appreciation. Galileo Galilei is based on the geometric method. Thomas Hobbes applies it to society and to the people. For the British empiricists, the human mind is composed of simple ingredients whole. René Descartes, inspired by the contemporary geometric- mathematical analysis, tried with the help of philosophical analysis to find absolute certainties. He developed in the Discours de la méthode a general analytical method and proposes the systematic decomposition of concepts and problems in their smallest parts ever. Inspired by Descartes logic of Port -Royal was a formative.

Early Modern

Immanuel Kant stands for a specific analysis. His transcendental analytic is an analysis of the terms. He examines the elements of the mind that are given to him and which he calls a priori categories. It's about the " analysis of our entire cognition a priori into the elements of the pure cognition of the understanding ." Kant transfers the transcendental analytic on the ethics ( analysis of practical reason ), aesthetics ( Analytic of the Beautiful and Sublime ) and teleology ( Analytic of Teleological Judgment ).

In German Idealism and Romanticism in the one encountered the analytical thinking, because life and soul destroying critical. In the early modern total are critical include: Friedrich Schiller; Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin; Francis Herbert Bradley and Henri Bergson.

Further developments and modifications learned the analytical method in the neo-Kantians, especially at Ernst Cassirer, and by the phenomenological analysis.

Analysis in analytic philosophy

In analytic philosophy to attain the analysis to a new importance. Method and aim differ greatly between representatives of the philosophy of natural language and the representatives of formal linguistic approaches. While the latter want to rid the language of internal contradictions, devoid of meaning expressions and deceptions by logical errors and emotional connotations by logical analysis, it is another matter, tap out the language in the language on their actual belief content. The logic of the analysis is fundamentally criticized by the later Wittgenstein; the attacks of Willard Van Orman Quine on the concept of analytic judgments, the opposite occurred under Andren Peter Strawson, presented the objectivity of possible analyzes in question.

It is, inter alia, the paradox of analysis posed: either to be analyzed ( analysandum ) and analyzed ( analysans ) are synonymous: Then the analysis is uninformative. Or there is no synonymy: Then the analysis is inadequate. It is proposed, inter alia, To solve the paradox in that no strict synonymy is required and a distinction between implicit and explicit knowledge of the meaning of the terms.