Verification Principle and Testability Principle

Abstract

The paper deals with the conception of logical empiricism developed by Eino Kaila. Eino Kaila, being a thinker close to the Vienna Circle, departs from some of the central ideas of logical positivism. He identifies a limited number of problems in metaphysics that are meaningful and need to be solved, but he declares the rest of metaphysics to be a logical fallacy. For Eino Kaila, it is not the principle of verification (as a criterion of meaning) but the principle of testability that plays the most important role. In addition, he revises the principle of translatability, insisting that it is impossible to translate a single sentence into the language of experience, but it is possible to translate the whole theory to which the sentence belongs. This is related to his structuralist position in the philosophy of science and his understanding of scientific theories as ‘rationalisations’ as opposed to simple inductive generalisations. The paper compares Eino Kaila’s views expressed during the period of his active interaction with the Vienna Circle be regarded as a predecessor of later critics of logical positivism (in particular, W.V.O. Quine).