Kazimierz Twardowski (1866-1938) is the founder of the Lvov-Warsaw School with its strong tradition in logic and its scientific approach to philosophy. Twardowski’s unique way of doing philosophy, his method, is of central importance for understanding his impact as a teacher. This method can be understood as a philosophical grammar, which is also how Leibniz conceived his universal language of thought. Analytic philosophy in the twentieth century can be characterized by its opposition to psychologism, on the one hand, and its opposition to metaphysics, on the other. This is changing now, as questions within the philosophy of mind and metaphysics are raised by analytic philosophers today. Maria van der Schaar shows in her book that we can improve our analytic methods by making use of Twardowski’s philosophical grammar. Twardowski’s positive attitude to psychology and metaphysics may also help us to develop an analytic metaphysics and to get a better understanding of the relation between psychology and philosophy.

“The influence of [Kazimierz] Twardowski on modern philosophy in Poland is all-pervasive. Twardowski instilled in his students a passion for clarity [...] and seriousness. He taught them to regard philosophy as a collaborative effort, a matter of disciplined discussion and argument, and he encouraged them to train themselves thoroughly in at least one extra-philosophical discipline and to work together with scientists from other fields, both inside Poland and internationally. This led above all [...] to collaborations with mathematicians, so that the Lvov school of philosophy would gradually evolve into the Warsaw school of logic [...]. Twardowski taught his students, too, to respect and to pursue serious research in the history of philosophy, an aspect of the tradition of philosophy on Polish territory which is illustrated in such disparate works as [Jan] Łukasiewicz’s ground-breaking monograph on the law of non-contradiction in Aristotle and [Władysław] Tatarkiewicz’s highly influential multi-volume histories of philosophy and aesthetics [...] The term ‘Polish philosophy’ is a misnomer [...] for Polish philosophy is philosophy per se; it is part and parcel of the mainstream of world philosophy – simply because [...] it meets international standards of training, rigour, professionalism and specialization.” – Barry Smith (from: “Why Polish Philosophy does Not Exist”)

The Lvov-Warsaw School was one of the most important currents in the 20th-century analytical movement. Kazimierz Twardowski, a student Franz Brentano and a professor of philosophy in Lvov, was the founder and at the same time an outstanding representative of the School. The papers included into the volume present comprehensively Twardowski’s views and indicate what his lasting contribution to philosophy consists of.

Izydora Dąmbska (1904-1982) was a Polish philosopher; a student of Kazimierz Twardowski, and his last assistant. Her output consists of almost 300 publications. The main domains of her research were semiotics, epistemology and broadly understood methodology as well as axiology and history of philosophy. Dąmbska’s approach to philosophical problems reflected tendencies that were characteristic of the Lvov-Warsaw School. She applied high methodological standards but has never limited the domain of analyzed problems in advance. The present volume includes twenty-eight translations of her representative papers. As one of her pupils rightly wrote: “Dąmbska’s works may help everyone [...] to think clearly. Her attitude of an unshaken philosopher may help anyone to hold oneself straight, and, if necessary, to get up after a fall”.

Twardowski's little book - of which I here offer a translation - is one of the most remarkable works in the history of modern philosophy. It is concise, clear, and - in Findlay's words - "amazingly rich in ideas. "l It is therefore a paradigm of what some contemporary philosophers approvingly call "analytic philosophy. " But Twardowski's book is also of considerable historical significance. His views reflect Brentano's ear lier position and thus shed some light on this stage of Brentano's philo sophy. Furthermore, they form a link between this stage, on the one hand, and those two grandiose attempts to propagate rationalism in an age of science, on the other hand, which are known as Meinong's theory of entities and HusserI's phenomenology. Twardowski's views thus point to the future and introduce many of the problems which, through the influence of Meinong, HusserI, Russell, and Moore, have become standard fare in contemporary philosophy. In this introduc tion, I shall call attention to the close connection between some of Twardowski's main ideas and the corresponding thoughts of these four philosophers. 1. IDEAS AND THEIR INTENTIONS Twardowski's main contention is clear. He claims that we must dis tinguish between the act, the content, and the object of a presentation. The crucial German term is 'V orstellung. ' This term has a corresponding verb and allows for such expressions as 'das V orgestellte.

This collection of fourteen original essays addresses the seminal contribution of Franz Brentano and his heirs, to philosophy of language. Despite the great interest provoked by the Brentanian tradition and its multiple connections with early analytic philosophy, precious little is known about the Brentanian contribution to philosophy of language. The aim of this new collection is to fill this gap by providing the reader with a more thorough understanding of the legacy of Brentano and his school, in their pursuit of a unique research programme according to which the analysis of meaning is inseparable from philosophical inquiries into what goes on in the mind and what there is in the world. In three parts, the volume first reconstructs Brentano’s pathbreaking thoughts on meaning and grammatical illusions, exploring their strong connections with the Austro-German tradition and analytic philosophy. It then addresses the multifaceted debates on the objectivity of meaning in the Brentano School and its aftermath (Meinong, Husserl, Ingarden, Twardowski and the Lvov-Warsaw School). Finally, part three explores Brentano’s wider legacy, namely: Husserl’s theory of modification and typicality, Bühler’s theory of linguistic and non-linguistic expressions, and Wittgenstein’s thoughts on guidance and rule-following. The result is a unique collection of essays which shows the significance, originality and timely character of the Brentanian philosophy of language.

This volume brings together papers originally presented at a seminar series on Speculative Grammar, Universal Grammar, and Philosophical Analysis, held at the University of Bologna in 1984. The seminars aimed at considering various aspects of the interplay between linguistic theories on the one hand, and theories of meaning and logic on the other. The point of view was mainly historical, but a theoretical approach was also considered relevant. Theories of grammar and related topics were taken as a focal point of interest; their interaction with philosophical reflections on languages was examined in presentations dealing with different authors and periods, ranging from the Middle Ages to the present day.

Leading authors in their fields present an interdisciplinary panorama of vital themes of the philosophy of language and track their historical origins. This book gives new life to historical ideas and additional depth to current debates.

This volume advances discussion between critics and defenders of the force-content distinction and opens up new ways of thinking about force and speech acts in relation to the unity problem. The force-content dichotomy has shaped the philosophy of language and mind since the time of Frege and Russell. Isn’t it obvious that, for example, the clauses of a conditional are not asserted and must therefore be propositions and propositions the forceless contents of forceful acts? But, others have recently asked in response, how can a proposition be a truth value bearer if it is not unified through the forceful act of a subject that takes a position regarding how things are? Can we not instead think of propositions as being inherently forceful, but of force as being cancelled in certain contexts? And what do assertoric, but also directive and interrogative force indicators mean? Force, Content and the Unity of the Proposition will be of interest to researchers working in philosophy of language, philosophical logic, philosophy of mind and linguistics.

The book discusses Franz Brentano’s impact on Austrian philosophy. It contains both a critical reassessment of Brentano’s place in the development of Austrian philosophy at the turn of the 20th century and a reevaluation of the impact and significance of his philosophy of mind or ‘descriptive psychology’ which was Brentano's most important contribution to contemporary philosophy and to the philosophy in Vienna. In addition, the relation between Brentano, phenomenology, and the Vienna Circle is investigated, together with a related documentation of Brentano's disciple Alfred Kastil (in German). The general part deals with the ongoing discussion of Carnap's "Aufbau" (Vienna Circle Lecture by Alan Chalmers) and the philosophy of mind, with a focus on physicalism as discussed by Carnap and Wittgenstein (Gergely Ambrus). As usual, two reviews of recent publications in the philosophy of mathematics (Paolo Mancosu) and research on Otto Neurath's lifework (Jordi Cat/Adam Tuboly) are included as related research contributions. This book is of interest to students, historians, and philosophers dealing with the history of Austrian and German philosophy in the 19th and 20th century.