Analytical philosophy as part of Western culture of the 20th century

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Analytical philosophy is aoriginated in the early 20th century in Western countries, a new philosophical direction, implying rigor in the use of certain terminology, focusing on the process of argumentation, distrust of speculative reasoning. This type of thinking was particularly widespread in countries such as England, Australia, and the United States. In the Russian literature, the analytical trend in philosophy appeared relatively recently, only in the 80s of the twentieth century.

The founders of this philosophical trend are believed to be George Moore and Bertrand Russell, its ideological inspiration - the author of the well-known "Logico-philosophical treatise" Ludwig Wittgenstein.

The three main features of analytical philosophy are:

linguistic reductionism, consisting in the reduction of all existing problems of philosophy to the problems of language;
methodological bias, which implies the opposition of the analytical method to all current trends of philosophical thought before the 20th century;
a semantic emphasis, that is, a focus on the problem of meaning.

Analytical philosophy of the 20th century is the firstturn the philosophy of language. Misunderstanding due to language imperfections, the ambiguity of expressions and word forms, according to analysts - followers of a new philosophical outlook, are the main reason for the emergence and development of the "old" philosophy. According to Wittgenstein, the main task of philosophy is to build such an ideal in the sense of understanding language that would help to resolve the centuries-old philosophical debates about consciousness and being, ethics and freedom of will. That is why analytical philosophy at the stage of its origin was reduced to the formalization of the language and the perfection of its logical symbols. The solution to this problem was done by followers of Wittgenstein: Rudolf Carnap, Otto Neurath, Moritz Schlick. It should be noted that the idea of bringing the language to its perfection very quickly exhausted itself, and philosophers recognized that the existence of a perfect language, although it is permissible, is not always expedient. For example, a strict mathematical language is unacceptable in everyday communication, and even more so when writing unscientific fiction, primarily poetry.

The thirties of the 20th century are considered to be a turning pointperiod of analytical philosophical science. It was at this time that Ludwig Wittgenstein returned from voluntary exile (for 6 years he worked for ordinary rural teachers in the Alps) to Cambridge. Here around him a circle of young followers of the theory of analytical thinking quickly formed. New ideas were embodied in a book called "Philosophical Studies". This work was the final work of the life of the philosopher, he worked on it until his death in 1951.

Its further development is analytical philosophyreceived in the writings of Gilbert Ryle, the author of "Philosophical arguments", "Categories" and many others. The main problem raised by the author in his books is the simple question: "What makes the philosophical question philosophical?" The answer lies in the fact that the main purpose of philosophy as a science is to "unravel" categorical errors and some kind of intellectual knots. The resulting misunderstandings can be resolved by highlighting different logical categories of concepts and terms.

Analytical philosophy and its ideas havea noticeable influence on the development of philosophy as a whole in many countries of the world. Over time, this trend of philosophical thought has turned into a broad cultural trend, the main positions of which are still strong in many English-speaking countries.