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A Parting of the Ways: Carnap, Cassirer and Heidegger
Beginning with a confrontation in 1929 in Switzerland, Michael Friedman examines how the work of three pivotal philosophers evolved and intertwined over several years, ultimately giving rise to two very different schools of thought - analytic philosophy and continental. The author explores the clashes that set them apart as they developed their own radical new ideas.
175 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2000
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About the author
Michael Friedman
10 books18 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name.
Michael Friedman was an American philosopher who was Emeritus Patrick Suppes Professor of Philosophy of Science and Professor, by courtesy, of German Studies at Stanford University. Friedman was best known for his work in the philosophy of science, especially on scientific explanation and the philosophy of physics, and for his historical work on Immanuel Kant. Friedman has done historical work on figures in continental philosophy such as Martin Heidegger and Ernst Cassirer. He also served as the co-director of the Program in History and Philosophy of Science and Technology at Stanford University.
Michael Friedman was an American philosopher who was Emeritus Patrick Suppes Professor of Philosophy of Science and Professor, by courtesy, of German Studies at Stanford University. Friedman was best known for his work in the philosophy of science, especially on scientific explanation and the philosophy of physics, and for his historical work on Immanuel Kant. Friedman has done historical work on figures in continental philosophy such as Martin Heidegger and Ernst Cassirer. He also served as the co-director of the Program in History and Philosophy of Science and Technology at Stanford University.
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
June 9, 2024
The 1929 face-off between Heidegger and Cassirer at the Davos University Conference is taken to be the fork in the road for analytic and continental philosophy.
Both Cassirer and Heidegger were educated in Neo-Kantian schools, which although differing in their approaches took as their founding problem the constitution of experience through some interweaving of a priori structure and perception. Kant had undertaken what he termed a “Copernican revolution” in epistemology, deriving objectivity and the intelligibility of experience from this interaction between perception and the structuring provided by rational beings (us) through those a priori structures.
Kant’s own bridging of the two depended on a crucial role for the “pure intuitions” of space and time to provide the setting, the experiential environment in which structured, perceived objects reside. I’m cutting hundreds of pages of the Critique of Pure Reason into horribly condensed and inevitably misleading terms, but this provides a kind of starting point shared in common by Cassirer and Heidegger. The post-Kantians were not satisfied with Kant's solution, and much of their work was intended to right the Kantian ship.
Cassirer himself became a principal participant in Neo-Kantian philosophy, extending and renovating Kant’s work, principally in his Philosophy of Symbolic Forms. His direction forward from Kant treats knowledge, like other human endeavors such as art and religion, as something of an active construction, an “inspiriting” (taking “Spirit” in the Hegelian sense of the term) of the world. Knowledge is accomplished through an interplay, a dialectic, between “logic” on one side — the role of the a priori in Kant — and reality, or the objective world, on the other. This turn toward, to my mind at least, a more Hegelian project, separates Cassirer from many of his contemporaries in Neo-Kantianism.
One of those contemporaries is a third figure in the split between analytic and continental philosophy. Rudolph Carnap was also a student of Neo-Kantianism, but took a different route, deep into the a priori as the proper subject matter of philosophy. His Logical Construction of the World is exactly what it says — the articulation of the logical structures that provide the scaffolding for intelligible experience. Where Kant’s categories had begun the task of such an articulation, with its concepts of quantity, substance, causality, and others, Carnap, now armed with Frege’s revolution in formal logic, seeks to articulate the entirety of such a structure that both enables and bounds knowledge.
Heidegger’s own radical approach subverts the problem bequeathed by Kant. This is the Heidegger who is fresh off the publication of Being and Time. We do not start the analysis of knowledge, or of “Being”, with a mind making sense of a world outside itself. Dasein, Heidegger’s term for the particular kind of beings that human beings are, is fundamentally, and from the beginning of all analysis, engaged in the world, not as a knower but as a participant in projects, goals, and roles in the world. It is exactly through that participation that Dasein discloses a world, not a world that is foundationally “known” as a scientist knows it but as a participant engages in it.
Friedman’s treatment of Carnap as more or less an equal figure in the face-off rings true. It is Carnap after all who becomes a critical figure in Vienna Circle thought and the development of positivism. Cassirer, despite his continuity with Neo-Kantianism, becomes somewhat of a lesser light.
Friedman also contributes valuable context for the debate and the resulting split. The debate comes just four years before events in Germany overtook and destroyed the flow of communication between what would become disconnected schools of analytical and continental philosophy. Heidegger in 1933 as the Nazis came to power, embraced the Nazi Party and took the Rectorship at Freiburg. Cassirer, Jewish and a supporter of the Weimar Republic, left Germany in that same year and spent a short time teaching at Oxford, which would become a bastion of analytical philosophy. He eventually settled at Columbia University in the United States. Carnap, while not Jewish, was, like many members of the Vienna Circle, socialist-leaning, so also at peril when the Nazis took power. He left for America two years later, in 1935.
While many accounts of the debate at Davos proclaim Heidegger the “winner,” it’s not so clear to me that there were winners or losers. Although the three — including Carnap — maintained at the time a lively and seemingly collegial relationship of disagreements and arguments, within those few years each becomes a line in philosophical development on his own. Cassirer perhaps has been less influential than the other two, but Carnap certainly is a leading figure in the positivist movement and in the methodology-centered philosophy of twentieth century Anglo-American thought. Heidegger’s later philosophical work would grow farther and farther away from the Kantian paradigm and from the place of epistemology in general as the central problem of philosophy.
The “parting of the ways” seems to me to be as much a consequence of the political schisms of twentieth century Europe as of incompatible paths of philosophical thought. Carnap, Heidegger, and Cassirer were engaged in a philosophical dialogue, perhaps not one of convergence but nevertheless one that was cut short by world events after Davos.
Both Cassirer and Heidegger were educated in Neo-Kantian schools, which although differing in their approaches took as their founding problem the constitution of experience through some interweaving of a priori structure and perception. Kant had undertaken what he termed a “Copernican revolution” in epistemology, deriving objectivity and the intelligibility of experience from this interaction between perception and the structuring provided by rational beings (us) through those a priori structures.
Kant’s own bridging of the two depended on a crucial role for the “pure intuitions” of space and time to provide the setting, the experiential environment in which structured, perceived objects reside. I’m cutting hundreds of pages of the Critique of Pure Reason into horribly condensed and inevitably misleading terms, but this provides a kind of starting point shared in common by Cassirer and Heidegger. The post-Kantians were not satisfied with Kant's solution, and much of their work was intended to right the Kantian ship.
Cassirer himself became a principal participant in Neo-Kantian philosophy, extending and renovating Kant’s work, principally in his Philosophy of Symbolic Forms. His direction forward from Kant treats knowledge, like other human endeavors such as art and religion, as something of an active construction, an “inspiriting” (taking “Spirit” in the Hegelian sense of the term) of the world. Knowledge is accomplished through an interplay, a dialectic, between “logic” on one side — the role of the a priori in Kant — and reality, or the objective world, on the other. This turn toward, to my mind at least, a more Hegelian project, separates Cassirer from many of his contemporaries in Neo-Kantianism.
One of those contemporaries is a third figure in the split between analytic and continental philosophy. Rudolph Carnap was also a student of Neo-Kantianism, but took a different route, deep into the a priori as the proper subject matter of philosophy. His Logical Construction of the World is exactly what it says — the articulation of the logical structures that provide the scaffolding for intelligible experience. Where Kant’s categories had begun the task of such an articulation, with its concepts of quantity, substance, causality, and others, Carnap, now armed with Frege’s revolution in formal logic, seeks to articulate the entirety of such a structure that both enables and bounds knowledge.
Heidegger’s own radical approach subverts the problem bequeathed by Kant. This is the Heidegger who is fresh off the publication of Being and Time. We do not start the analysis of knowledge, or of “Being”, with a mind making sense of a world outside itself. Dasein, Heidegger’s term for the particular kind of beings that human beings are, is fundamentally, and from the beginning of all analysis, engaged in the world, not as a knower but as a participant in projects, goals, and roles in the world. It is exactly through that participation that Dasein discloses a world, not a world that is foundationally “known” as a scientist knows it but as a participant engages in it.
Friedman’s treatment of Carnap as more or less an equal figure in the face-off rings true. It is Carnap after all who becomes a critical figure in Vienna Circle thought and the development of positivism. Cassirer, despite his continuity with Neo-Kantianism, becomes somewhat of a lesser light.
Friedman also contributes valuable context for the debate and the resulting split. The debate comes just four years before events in Germany overtook and destroyed the flow of communication between what would become disconnected schools of analytical and continental philosophy. Heidegger in 1933 as the Nazis came to power, embraced the Nazi Party and took the Rectorship at Freiburg. Cassirer, Jewish and a supporter of the Weimar Republic, left Germany in that same year and spent a short time teaching at Oxford, which would become a bastion of analytical philosophy. He eventually settled at Columbia University in the United States. Carnap, while not Jewish, was, like many members of the Vienna Circle, socialist-leaning, so also at peril when the Nazis took power. He left for America two years later, in 1935.
While many accounts of the debate at Davos proclaim Heidegger the “winner,” it’s not so clear to me that there were winners or losers. Although the three — including Carnap — maintained at the time a lively and seemingly collegial relationship of disagreements and arguments, within those few years each becomes a line in philosophical development on his own. Cassirer perhaps has been less influential than the other two, but Carnap certainly is a leading figure in the positivist movement and in the methodology-centered philosophy of twentieth century Anglo-American thought. Heidegger’s later philosophical work would grow farther and farther away from the Kantian paradigm and from the place of epistemology in general as the central problem of philosophy.
The “parting of the ways” seems to me to be as much a consequence of the political schisms of twentieth century Europe as of incompatible paths of philosophical thought. Carnap, Heidegger, and Cassirer were engaged in a philosophical dialogue, perhaps not one of convergence but nevertheless one that was cut short by world events after Davos.
March 27, 2025
Friedman is good on neo-Kantianism. But that focus limits/distorts his discussion of the split between analytic and continental philosophy.
May 17, 2007
I thought that this book was informative and delightful. I paid less attention to the chapters on Cassirer (and post-Kantian philosphy) and benefited more from the discussions on Heidegger & Carnap..........Heidegger and Carnap, it's not too often (if ever) that one hears these two names uttered together. Both were German philosophy students in the early 20th century (contemporaries if you will), and both were students of Germany's most promising working philosophers (Husserl taught Heidegger while Frege - at one point - taught Carnap). Now, why is it doubtful that one would ever hear their names mentioned in the same conversation? Well, there was "a Parting of the Ways" in the philosophical community - the emergence of two, divergent traditions, and the roots of such division and opposition may be found in the intellectual culture of early 20th century Germany.
Friedman relates the philosophical underpinnings of a split that's still with us today by way of examing the philosophies of these two thinkers. Heidegger & Carnap had no "direct" contact, yet they did reference eachother critically in certain published lectures. I think the lack of actual contact & interaction makes this work more successful. This is not some sensationalized account of philosophers waving pokers at one another in the context of unbridled, passionate debate. Instead, this is a subtle yet enlightening analysis of certain fundamental philospical differences that make direct dialogs between such figures a seemingly impossible endeavor. The citations of the philosophers' lectures & comments are invaluable resources for anyone attempting to understand the central reasons for the Continental/Analytic split in current philosophical practice. I fully recommend this book for that reason. On the other hand, this is not the most entertaining read; the prose lacks personality, wit, or any other captivating qualities.
Friedman relates the philosophical underpinnings of a split that's still with us today by way of examing the philosophies of these two thinkers. Heidegger & Carnap had no "direct" contact, yet they did reference eachother critically in certain published lectures. I think the lack of actual contact & interaction makes this work more successful. This is not some sensationalized account of philosophers waving pokers at one another in the context of unbridled, passionate debate. Instead, this is a subtle yet enlightening analysis of certain fundamental philospical differences that make direct dialogs between such figures a seemingly impossible endeavor. The citations of the philosophers' lectures & comments are invaluable resources for anyone attempting to understand the central reasons for the Continental/Analytic split in current philosophical practice. I fully recommend this book for that reason. On the other hand, this is not the most entertaining read; the prose lacks personality, wit, or any other captivating qualities.
October 17, 2019
One thing I do not get about these Neo-Kantians like Cassirer is what drove them to elaborate. They start with a Kantian division of labor between some supposed faculties and trim some, or add muscle in other places. In the end the condition of possibility of some X becomes so inflated in comparison with what they are supposed to be a condition for. Needless to add that Heidegger is a clever prick. He knows how to prick balloons with "finitude".
Take this passage from Heidegger's review of Philosophy of Symbolic forms Vol2 wherein he tries to demonstrate that the "mana-representation" in Cassirer is left indeterminate and is in need of existential analytic
Take note of the two instances the word 'therefore' is used in this passage without any warrant. How therefore so?
Surely this cannot be an improvement. If you too can see it as series of banalities passing for "ontological grounding" then you know how to and who to part with.
Take this passage from Heidegger's review of Philosophy of Symbolic forms Vol2 wherein he tries to demonstrate that the "mana-representation" in Cassirer is left indeterminate and is in need of existential analytic
"In 'throwness' there is a being-delivered-up of Dasein to the world of a kind that such a being-in-the-world is overwhelmed by that to which it is delivered up.
Overpoweringness can only manifest itself as such in general for something that is being-delivered-up
In such being-directed-to the overpowering, Dasein is captivated by it and may therefore experience itself as belonging to and akin to this reality.
In thrownness, therefore, any being that is in any way revealed has the being-character of overpoweringness (mana)"
Take note of the two instances the word 'therefore' is used in this passage without any warrant. How therefore so?
Surely this cannot be an improvement. If you too can see it as series of banalities passing for "ontological grounding" then you know how to and who to part with.
June 15, 2025
brilliant little reminder that the analytic-continental thing doesn't just owe to the forgetfulness of kant, but specific issues encountered in the development of neokantianism, along with all the politics in the background. rip michael friedman
July 15, 2023
This is a good detailed analysis of how continental philosophy and analytic philosophy came to be as divided as they are. I agree that much of it stems from the failure of the neo-Kantian movements to provide a coherent account of how to connect formal logic and the transcendental logic and intuitions of the original Kants ideas.
The problem of course, is that the latter had to be rejected in the light of Einstein's relativity and non-euclidean geometrical reality, and notions of manifolds etc, and there was no replacement for this intuition to guide a coherent reasonable account of the state of affairs. As a result, at one extreme thinkers like Carnap plodded away making the best of a purely formalised logic approach and others like Heidegger went off into expansive realms of being, seeing rightly limitations to the purely formal approach, but then losing sight of being guided by the best physical science in its theories of knowledge and reality.
The one sides becomes focused on the human context and the other focused on a non-human context. The one on unutterable instincts and intuitions of what is right, the other on a complete repudiation of instincts in favor of cold hard "facts". Of course, the problem being how these facts are to be given authority in the absence of guiding intuitions from honest human beings. It is mirrored in our current political polarisations quite clearly. You have the positivist represented by the science believer who is sure of his facts about vaccines regardless of counter evidence and regardless of the feelings of all those who intuit something is not quite right here, who smell a rat.
Regarding one of his other main claims that this rift between continent philosophy and analytic philosophy was exacerbated by the national socialist era in Germany. Although there is clearly some level of connection, I think one could point to many other factors around this time that play a part to the extent that singling out one social event becomes a bit of a mugs game. And doesn't really help us in future efforts in trying to find a way out of this rift. For instance, one could point to the pragmatism of the US compared to old Europes more theoretical approach as another key factor in the rift, as the US became the center of power, as someone like Alexander Unzicker has pointed to. One could point to communism and its influence at this time also as a factor in the obsession of some with a "positivisitic" and "scientistic" approach to everything, as a way to garner social authority in a kind of artificial collectivist manner. It also ignores the French thinkers of this time and their key role in continental philosophy from Bergson to Merleau-Ponty and others, even Poincare, one sees a whole different trend of thought here that was also resistant to analytic philosophy but for a different set of reasons to those of Heidegger, who was perhaps more specifically motivated by the national socialist context.
Nevertheless, on a final point regarding the hope at healing the rift coming through an understanding and appreciation of Ernest Cassirer, who was a thinker at this time who carefully avoided the polarisation. I wholeheartedly agree with this sentiment. It certainly would be a move in the correct direction and away from these traps of thinking that the two extremes can push you into.
The problem of course, is that the latter had to be rejected in the light of Einstein's relativity and non-euclidean geometrical reality, and notions of manifolds etc, and there was no replacement for this intuition to guide a coherent reasonable account of the state of affairs. As a result, at one extreme thinkers like Carnap plodded away making the best of a purely formalised logic approach and others like Heidegger went off into expansive realms of being, seeing rightly limitations to the purely formal approach, but then losing sight of being guided by the best physical science in its theories of knowledge and reality.
The one sides becomes focused on the human context and the other focused on a non-human context. The one on unutterable instincts and intuitions of what is right, the other on a complete repudiation of instincts in favor of cold hard "facts". Of course, the problem being how these facts are to be given authority in the absence of guiding intuitions from honest human beings. It is mirrored in our current political polarisations quite clearly. You have the positivist represented by the science believer who is sure of his facts about vaccines regardless of counter evidence and regardless of the feelings of all those who intuit something is not quite right here, who smell a rat.
Regarding one of his other main claims that this rift between continent philosophy and analytic philosophy was exacerbated by the national socialist era in Germany. Although there is clearly some level of connection, I think one could point to many other factors around this time that play a part to the extent that singling out one social event becomes a bit of a mugs game. And doesn't really help us in future efforts in trying to find a way out of this rift. For instance, one could point to the pragmatism of the US compared to old Europes more theoretical approach as another key factor in the rift, as the US became the center of power, as someone like Alexander Unzicker has pointed to. One could point to communism and its influence at this time also as a factor in the obsession of some with a "positivisitic" and "scientistic" approach to everything, as a way to garner social authority in a kind of artificial collectivist manner. It also ignores the French thinkers of this time and their key role in continental philosophy from Bergson to Merleau-Ponty and others, even Poincare, one sees a whole different trend of thought here that was also resistant to analytic philosophy but for a different set of reasons to those of Heidegger, who was perhaps more specifically motivated by the national socialist context.
Nevertheless, on a final point regarding the hope at healing the rift coming through an understanding and appreciation of Ernest Cassirer, who was a thinker at this time who carefully avoided the polarisation. I wholeheartedly agree with this sentiment. It certainly would be a move in the correct direction and away from these traps of thinking that the two extremes can push you into.
November 3, 2019
Pretty good. A very good case for Ernst Cassirer as a serious philosopher. I ultimately agree with his ‘functionalism’ — the stance of knowledge as an evolving hypothesis tending only asymptotically to absolute truth. But I still find the perspective threadbare. Not sure if that is simply the necessary cast of the genre or the effect of reading too much of the secondary literature. The book is worth re-reading to help navigate weedier waters, when the time comes.
Did not satisfying explain for me Heidegger’s completely anti-logicist approach other presenting it as bald assertion. But that could be my own failing.
Did not satisfying explain for me Heidegger’s completely anti-logicist approach other presenting it as bald assertion. But that could be my own failing.
January 27, 2013
He doesn't quite get Heidegger right. The sections on Cassirer, Carnap, and the meta philosophy of the Analytic/Continental divide are excellent however.
July 27, 2025
An overall superb account of the early 20th century philosophical dispute between Ernst Cassirer and Martin Heidegger. They faced off at Davos in 1929, towards the end of Cassirer's career and at the beginning of Heidegger's ascend. The debate over Kant, however, started much earlier than that and Friedman does an excellent job at describing the influence of Neo-Kantism, and the disputes involved in such influence, over the development of what we now know of as Analytic and Continental philosophy. Friedman includes Rudolf Carnap as he is more or less a main man for the Analytic tradition as Heidegger is for Continental. Carnap wasn't involved in the debate as such at Davos but was responding to, reading, and influenced by Heidegger and Cassirer. A review of the work says that Friedman's history of philosophy functions as a philosophical text of its own and I heartily agree. His analysis, elucidation, and interpretation of Neo-Kantism is superb. His argument is incredibly strong: disputes among the various Neo-Kantian schools spelled the end of philosophical consensus when combined with the volatile political situation of Europe in the mid 20th century.
That being said, I had one major problem with the argument and text. It's one Friedman himself acknowledges. Heidegger, despite his connection to Kant and the various Neo-Kantian schools, is not as indebted to that thinker as Cassier and Carnap. Indeed, his major influences extend far beyond those schools thought. It's Aristotle, not Kant, that Heidegger says one must study for ten years. I understand that this particular instance, this particular time involves Kant, but I would argue that limiting Heidegger to Kant essentially *misses* Heidegger's position. Not to say Heidegger doesn't use Kant - he does as his many texts and sections devoted to the man say - but it is to say that the dispute in Davos and between Analytical Philosophy is rooted in Heidegger's connection to the tradition that Analytical Philosophy sneers upon.
To lay my cards on the table, analytical philosophy has always been slop in my eyes. It's pointless mathematics masquerading as deep thinking with no real analysis. Heidegger, for all his flaws, introduced me to thinking so I have a great respect for him and not for those in the footsteps of Russell and Freige. That being said, Friedman brilliantly defended and expressed the ideas of Cassier and Carnap. With begrudging respect, I understand a little more of the Analytical School and Friedman's arguments are the reason why. This is a brilliant text that one should read if it all interested in modern philosophy.
That being said, I had one major problem with the argument and text. It's one Friedman himself acknowledges. Heidegger, despite his connection to Kant and the various Neo-Kantian schools, is not as indebted to that thinker as Cassier and Carnap. Indeed, his major influences extend far beyond those schools thought. It's Aristotle, not Kant, that Heidegger says one must study for ten years. I understand that this particular instance, this particular time involves Kant, but I would argue that limiting Heidegger to Kant essentially *misses* Heidegger's position. Not to say Heidegger doesn't use Kant - he does as his many texts and sections devoted to the man say - but it is to say that the dispute in Davos and between Analytical Philosophy is rooted in Heidegger's connection to the tradition that Analytical Philosophy sneers upon.
To lay my cards on the table, analytical philosophy has always been slop in my eyes. It's pointless mathematics masquerading as deep thinking with no real analysis. Heidegger, for all his flaws, introduced me to thinking so I have a great respect for him and not for those in the footsteps of Russell and Freige. That being said, Friedman brilliantly defended and expressed the ideas of Cassier and Carnap. With begrudging respect, I understand a little more of the Analytical School and Friedman's arguments are the reason why. This is a brilliant text that one should read if it all interested in modern philosophy.
July 31, 2021
Concise, on point, and dense. Definitely need to read again in future
April 11, 2021
Friedman's account of the historical divide between Analytic (as represented by Carnap) and Continental (as represented by Heidegger) philosophies, with their different approaches to the systems proposed by Kant as they central divergent points. Friedman's prose is sparse and a bit dry, which made the explications of Heidegger more difficult than it could have been, but this is still a compelling volume.
December 29, 2023
Edit: I originally gave 4 stars for this. Its not worth that. It is a interesting book but mainly due to its subject. Friedman is to my knowledge a good philosopher but this narrative is a bit too dense and unclear.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews