Otto Neurath
1882–1945 · Philosophy of Language · Known
Neurath was an Austrian member of the Vienna Circle and a socialist economist who wanted an economy planned in goods rather than in money. He wanted the sciences speaking one language too: every genuine claim can be stated in the language of physical things, and metaphysics states nothing. Knowledge is a boat you repair plank by plank at sea. With Gerd Arntz he built the stick-figure picture statistic.
Signature
The position Neurath is most identified with in the Profiler:
- Conviction
- strongly leans Uncertain
- Economy
- State Socialism
Positions on the 11 axes the sources answer
- Natural Processes
- strongly leans Mechanistic (9 on a 0–100 scale from Mechanistic to Purposeful)
- Society
- mildly leans Collectivism (32 on a 0–100 scale from Collectivism to Individualism)
- Mind
- strongly leans Brain Only (7 on a 0–100 scale from Brain Only to Beyond Brain)
- Universals
- leans Nominalism (75 on a 0–100 scale from Realism to Nominalism)
- Meaning
- leans Constructed (25 on a 0–100 scale from Constructed to Inherent)
- Order
- mildly between Vertical and Horizontal (50 on a 0–100 scale from Vertical to Horizontal)
- Ground of Being
- strongly leans Immanence (9 on a 0–100 scale from Immanence to Transcendence)
- Nature
- leans Mastery (25 on a 0–100 scale from Mastery to Harmony)
- Ethics
- leans Ends (25 on a 0–100 scale from Ends to Means)
- Conviction
- strongly leans Uncertain (3 on a 0–100 scale from Uncertain to Certain)
- Allegiance
- leans Global (79 on a 0–100 scale from Local to Global)
9 of 20 axes are left blank: the sources do not answer them, or Neurath refused the framing. Nothing is imputed; a blank is not a middling score.
Foundational questions
- Theology
- Atheism
What is your position on the existence and nature of God or gods? - Government
- Representative Democracy / Technocracy
What is your ideal form of government? - End of Things
- Open Future
What is the ultimate end of all things? - Knowledge
- Sense Experience / Coherence
What is the ultimate foundation of knowledge? - Ethics Basis
- Other
What is the ultimate basis of ethics? - Economy
- State Socialism
What is the ideal organization of economic life? - Authority
- Rational Expertise / Collective Will
What is the legitimate source of authority? - Language
- Representation / Conventional
What is the fundamental nature of language? - Paradox
- Pragmatic Tolerance
What is the status of paradox? - Death
- Annihilation
What happens at death? - Human Nature
- Evolved Animal / Socially Constructed
What is human nature? - Primary Bond
- Humanity / Class
What is your primary bond and loyalty?