What was the Vienna Circle and logical positivism?

The Vienna Circle was a influential group of philosophers, scientists, and mathematicians who met in Vienna from 1924 to 1936 under the chairmanship of Moritz Schlick. They championed logical positivism, also known as logical empiricism, which sought to make philosophy scientific by applying modern logic and searching for an empiricist criterion of meaning. The movement ultimately declined and dissolved due to political pressures in Europe, the murder of Schlick, and internal philosophical difficulties in the following decades.

What we know

The Vienna Circle met regularly from 1924 to 1936 at the University of Vienna and was chaired by Moritz Schlick. [2]
The movement aimed to make philosophy scientific using modern logic, modernize empiricism, and establish an empiricist criterion of meaning. [2]
The verification principle asserted that a statement is cognitively meaningful only if it can be verified through empirical observation or is a tautology. [3]
The Vienna Circle effectively ended in Austria following the 1936 murder of Moritz Schlick by a former student and the subsequent forced emigration under Austrofascism and Nazi annexation. [2]

Still open

While some members like Schlick endorsed the verification principle, others such as Carnap and Neurath rejected it.

Where to go next

Sources

[1]Vienna Circle (Wikidata Q208238) · CC0 1.0
[2]Vienna Circle · CC BY-SA 4.0
[3]Logical positivism · CC BY-SA 4.0
[4]Berlin Circle · CC BY-SA 4.0
[5]Otto Neurath · CC BY-SA 4.0