What are the two dogmas of empiricism?

Published in 1951 by Willard Van Orman Quine, "Two Dogmas of Empiricism" is a landmark essay in analytic philosophy that heavily criticizes logical positivism. The first dogma is the analytic-synthetic distinction, which separates truths grounded purely in meaning from those grounded in facts. The second dogma is reductionism, the theory that individual statements derive their meaning from direct logical constructions of immediate experience.

What we know

• The essay "Two Dogmas of Empiricism" was written by analytic philosopher Willard Van Orman Quine and published in 1951. [1, 2]
• The first target of Quine's critique is the analytic-synthetic distinction, separating truths grounded only in meanings from truths grounded in facts. [2]
• The second target is reductionism, defined as the theory that each meaningful statement gets its meaning from a logical construction of terms referring exclusively to immediate experience. [2]
• In the final sections of the essay, Quine presents his own holistic theory of meaning. [2]

Where to go next

• whoWho was Willard Van Orman Quine?
• the bigger pictureWhat was logical positivism?
• how it workedHow did Quine's holistic theory of meaning work?
• compared withWhat is analytic philosophy?
• an unexpected connectionWhat is constructive empiricism?

Sources

• [1]Two Dogmas of Empiricism (Wikidata Q232002) · CC0 1.0
• [2]Two Dogmas of Empiricism · CC BY-SA 4.0
• [3]Constructive empiricism · CC BY-SA 4.0
• [4]Logical positivism · CC BY-SA 4.0
• [5]Analytic philosophy · CC BY-SA 4.0