Table Of ContentREALITY AND EXPERIENCE
VIENNA CIRCLE COLLECTION
Editorial Committee
HENK L. MULDER, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
ROBERT S. COHEN, Boston University, Boston, Mass., U.S.A.
BRIAN McGUINNESS, The Queen's College, Oxford, England
Editorial Advisory Board
ALFRED J. A YER, New Col/ege, Oxford, England
ALBERT E. BLUMBERG, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, N.J., U.S.A.
HASKELL B. CURR Y, Pennsylvania State University, Pa., U.S.A.
HERBERT FEIGL, University ofM innesota, Minneapolis, Minn., U.S.A.
ERWIN N. HIEBERT, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass., U.S.A.
J AAKKO HINTIKKA, Academy ofF inland, Helsinki, Finland,
Stanford University, Calif., and Florida State University,
Tallahassee, Fla., U.S.A.
KARL MENGER, Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago, Ill., U.S.A.
GABRIEL NUCHELMANS, University of Leyden, The Netherlands
ANTHONY M. QUINTON, New College, Oxford, England
J.F. STAAL, University of California, Berkeley, Calif., U.S.A.
VOLUME 12
EDITOR: ROBERT S. COHEN
EINO KAlLA (1890 - 1958)
EINO KAlLA
REALITY
AND EXPERIENCE
Four Philosophical Essays
Edited by
ROBERTS. COHEN
with an Introduction by
G.H. VON WRIGHT
D. REIDEL PUBLISHING COMPANY
DORDRECHT: HOLLAND / BOSTON: U. S.A.
LONDON: ENGLAND
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Kaila, Eino, 1890-1958.
Reality and experience.
(Vienna circle collection; v. 12)
"The philosophical and psychological writings of Eino Kaila": p.
Includes index.
CONTENTS: Logistic neopositivism. - On the system of the con
cepts of reality. - On the concept of reality in physical science. - The
perceptual and conceptual components of everyday experience.
1. Reality - Addresses, essays, lectures. 2. Logical positiv-
ism - Addresses, essays, lectures. 3. Experience - Addresses, essays,
lectures. I. Cohen, Robert Sonne. II. Title. III. Series.
BD331.K23 III 78-10460
ISBN-I3: 978-90-277-0919-6 e-ISBN-I3: 978-94-009-9381-5
DOl: 10.1 007/978-94-009-9381-5
Essays 1-4 translated trom the German
by Ann and Peter Kirschenmann
Published by D. Reidel Publishing Company,
P.O. Box 17, Dordrecht, Holland
Sold and distributed in the U.S.A., Canada, and Mexico
by D. Reidel Publishing Company, Inc.
Lincoln Building, 160 Old Derby Street, Hingham,
Mass. 02043, U.S.A.
All Rights Reserved
Copyright © 1979 by D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht, Holland
No part of the material protected by this copyright notice may be reproduced or
utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
including photocopying, recording or by any informational storage and
retrieval system, without written permission from the copyright owner
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction by G.H. von Wright ix
Editorial Preface xliii
Translators' Note xlv
1. Logistic Neopositivism. A critical study
2. On the System of the Concepts of Reality. A contribution to logical
empiricism 59
3. On the Concept of Reality in Physical Science. Second contribution
to logical empiricism 126
4. The Perceptual and Conceptual Components of Everyday Experience 259
The Philosophical and Psychological Writings of Eino Kaila 313
Index of Names 323
vii
INTRODUCTION
Philosophically, there is a book which was a tremendous
experience for me: Eino Kaila's hychology of the Person
ality _ His thesis that man lives strictly according to his
needs - negative and positive - was shattering to me, but
terribly true. And I built on this ground.
Ingmar Bergman J
1. This introductory essay is neither intended to be a full presentation nor to
be a critical evaluation of the contributions to philosophy made by Eino
Kaila. Kaila's work will speak to the reader through the four papers here
published in English translation from the German. They belong in the tra
dition of the Vienna Circle and of logical empiricism. They cover, however,
only one period or sector of Kaila's rich and varied life-work. This is the
sector best integrated into the mainstream of contemporary philosophic
thinking.
The primary aim of this essay is to portray an impressive intellectual
personality and to make a modest contribution to Finnish and Scandinavian
intellectual history. Much of its content may be thought to be of 'local'
relevance only. But considering the position which Kaila held in his country
and considering his decisive influence on the development of philosophy in
Finland, I hope that this local background will also interest an international
circle of readers.
2. Eino Sakari Kaila was born on 9 August 1890, the oldest child in a family
of nine. His father, Erkki Kaila, was at that time vicar of Alajarvi in Western
Finland. Later he was appointed associate professor in the Faculty of Divinity
in the Imperial Alexander University of Finland (later Helsinki University)
and the family moved to Helsinki. After his academic career Erkki Kaila was
bishop and, eventually, archbishop of Finland. An uncle of Erkki Kaila's had
also been a professor of divinity and archbishop. Eino Kaila thus belonged to
a family with distinguished academic and clerical traditions. His own attitude
throughout his mature life was decidedly anti-clerical. According to what he
told me, this began as an early protest against the family atmosphere. Yet, as
we shall see, his own personality had unmistakably religious traits.
ix
x INTRODUCTION
Eino Kalla went to school in Helsinki and was enrolled at the University in
September 1908. He got his Master's degree in an exceptionally short time, at
the age of only 19. He was examined in the two branches of philosophy, viz.
'theoretical' and 'practical', the former being his major subject, and also in
aesthetics, economics, and Scandinavian history. His academic training was
thus exclusively humanistic. Through self-study he later acquired an impress
ive knowledge also in the scientific subjects. But the lack of a proper scientific
training in his early years may have been a hampering factor in his efforts to
penetrate the depths of modern physical and biological theories. - In 1916
he got his doctorate with a dissertation in experimental. psychology, Uber die
Motivation und die Entscheidung [13].
Soon after the First World War two new universities were founded in
Finland, both of them in the country's ancient capital Turku (Abo). The one,
called Abo Academy, had Swedish as its language of instruction. The other
was called the Finnish University of Turku; later the name was simplified to
University of Turku. The professor of philosophy in the former was Edvard
Westermarck. In 1921 Kaila was made the first professor of philosophy at the
latter. It thus happened that these two prominent figures in the history of
Finnish philosophy were active for one decade in two adjacent, small aca
demic communities. But contrary to what might be expected, there was not
much contact between the two men. Kaila had studied with Westermarck
when the latter held the chair in practical philosophy in Helsinki, and he had
great veneration for his colleague and former teacher. Westermarck, however,
showed little interest in and understanding of the new trends in philosophy
and psychology which Kaila soon began to champion. There was also a signifi
cant 'generation gap' separating the two. Westermarck remained throughout
his long life faithful to the 'naturalistic' climate of opinion which in the
Scandinavian countries stamped the 1880's. Darwin was for him the master
scientist. Kaila's intellectual personality had been stamped for life by the
'neo-romanticism' of the 1890's and the early years of the century. (Cf.
below p. xiii.)
In 1930 Kaila was appointed professor of theoretical philosophy in
Helsinki University. The appointment was preceded by controversy - as has
often been the case with chairs in philosophy in Finland. Conservative
elements in the university senate viewed with suspicion the philosophic
'modernist', who was also known for his liberal opinions on political and
social questions of the day. Kaila's captivating brilliance, however, soon
made him one of the leading intellectual figures of the university, indeed
of the country. Even in his lifetime he was very much of a 'legend'. His
INTRODUCTION xi
lectures attracted big audiences, not only among students of humanistic
subjects, but also among young scientists. A new generation of philosophers
and psychologists grew up under his guidance and influence. Kaila's life-curve
reached its peak in the years immediately before and during the Second
World War.
After eighteen years as professor in Helsinki, Kaila was made a member of
the newly founded Academy of Finland. As academician he retained his
teaching rights but was relieved of administrative and teaching obligations
and was free to devote himself exclusively to research. In his later years
he became somewhat isolated. A slight deafness contributed to this. Also,
his paths in philosophy became more and more lonely, away from the main
stream of logical empiricism and analytical philosophy. He had ambitious
plans for a philosophic synthesis on a strict scientific basis. (Cf. below
p. xxxvii.) This work remained a skeleton. Kaila died unexpectedly of a heart
attack on 31 July 1958, shortly before his sixty-eighth birthday.
3. The academic world in which Kaila was reared was in many ways more
isolated and more elitist than is the case in Finland and most other countries
today. The predominant influence in scholarship and science was German. In
the second place it was French. Cultural relations with the English-speaking
countries were little developed; Westermarck was in this regard an exception
and a pioneer. Nor were the personal contacts between Finland and Scan
dinavia as lively as they became after Finland's independence. Yet Scandinavia
including Finland was in certain ways more of a cultural unity than it is
today. The language of the educated class in Finland was still to a large extent
Swedish. The literature of Sweden, Norway, and Denmark was an integral
part of an educated Finn's spiritual inheritance. Kaila's familiarity, for
example, with Swedish poetry, of which he knew a vast amount by heart, was
impressive and would nowadays be considered exceptional.
Kaila's parents' home was bilingual, but the main emphasis was on Finnish.
The same holds true of the family of which he was himself the head. He was
sent to a Finnish school and it was in the country's Finnish-speaking intellec
tual circles that, in the first place, he became a central figure. On the language
issue which divided the educated strata of society, particularly in the decades
between the two world wars, he took a liberal view. He and I always used
Swedish in our conversations and correspondence. It should be mentioned
that when Kaila later in life felt alienated from the Finnish academic bour
geoisie, his orientation to the Swedish language and traditions of the country
grew stronger. The most personal statement of his view of life, the dialogues
xii INTRODUCTION
Tankens oro ('The Disquietude of Thought' [71]) he wrote in Swedish?
Throughout his life, he used German in his scholarly writings - which was
usual in Finland until the Second World War.
During the decade between his graduation and his assumption of the pro
fessorship Kaila was also active as a translator of belles lettres into Finnish.
He translated numerous works from French, German, English, Danish and
Swedish. In the 1930's he produced an excellent translation of Hume's
Inquiry into Finnish. These activities alone testify to Kaila's extraordinary
linguistic abilities.
By modern standards, KaiIa had not travelled much for purposes of study
and research. Before the First World War he visited Paris (1911) and Berlin
(1914); a few years after the war he went to Munich. About the journeys to
Germany I know nothing. In Paris he attended classes held by Bergson, whose
elegance as a lecturer he admired. Kaila was himself a most accomplished
lecturer. Many classes of students, particulary in Helsinki in the 1930's, can
testify to the eloquence and catching enthusiasm of his lectures - on the
psychology of personality, on the epistemology of logical empiricism, or on
Ancient philosophy.
Kalla's by far most important foreign travels had as their destination
Vienna. In 1928, it seems, he sought contact with Carnap and Schlick by
letter and in the following year he paid a first visit to Vienna. He returned
there on Rockefeller grants in 1930,1932, and 1934. He got to know several
members of the Vienna Circle and took part in its meetings. From January
to June 1932 and again for a shorter period in 1934 he carried out exper
imental research in psychology in the city orphanage (Kinderiibemahmestelle
der Gemeinde Wien). The research laboratory attached to the orphanage had
been founded by Charlotte BUhler. She and her husband, Karl BUhler, were
also among Kaila's intellectual Viennese contacts.
In spite of an early orientation to British philosophy - particularly Broad,
Keynes, and Russell - Kaila never visited England. In 1948 he paid his only
visit to the United States. Philosophically it was of little reward. The new
world across the Atlantic estranged him, and he had a presentiment that he
would never again leave Finland.
4. In a public lecture, delivered to the Academy of Finland and published
([90], 1953) under a title which in English would be 'The Place of Qualities
in a World of Quantities', Kaila has described his philosophic awakening and
the monistic vision which was going to guide all his work in philosophy. The
event took place in Kaila's late puberty. he was then sixteen years of age3 -
