"Society is becoming less and less transparent. People no longer know where decisions that substantially affect their lives are taken, nor by whom, nor how." -- Georg Henrik Von Wright
Georg Henrik von Wright (, 14 June 1916 – 16 June 2003) was a Finnish philosopher, who succeeded Ludwig Wittgenstein as professor at the University of Cambridge. He published in English, Finnish, German, and in Swedish. Belonging to the Swedish-speaking minority of Finland, von Wright also had Finnish and 17th-century Scottish ancestors.
Von Wright's writings come under two broad categories. The first is analytic philosophy and philosophical logic in the Anglo-American vein. His 1951 books, An Essay in Modal Logic and Deontic Logic, were landmarks in the postwar rise of formal modal logic and its deontic version. He was an authority on Wittgenstein, editing his later works. He was the leading figure in the Finnish philosophy of his time, specializing in philosophical logic, philosophical analysis, philosophy of action, philosophy of language, philosophy of mind, and the close study of Charles Sanders Peirce.
The other vein in von Wright's writings is moralist and pessimist. During the last twenty years of his life, under the influence of Oswald Spengler, Jürgen Habermas and the Frankfurt school's reflections about modern Rationality, he wrote prolifically. His best known article from this period is entitled The Myth of Progress, and it questions whether our apparent material and technological progress can really be considered "progress".
In the last year of his life, among his other honorary degrees, he held an honorary degree at the University of Bergen.
"If one is satisfied with things, one doesn't complain about the downsides that exist, either.""Transnational, gigantic industrial companies no longer operate within political systems, but rather above them."
The Logical Problem of Induction, PhD thesis, 31 May 1941
Den logiska empirismen (Logical Empirism), in Swedish, 1945
Über Wahrscheinlichkeit (On Chance), in German, 1945
An Essay in Modal Logic, 1951
A Treatise on Induction and Probability, 1951
Deontic Logic, 1951
Tanke och förkunnelse (Thought and Preaching), in Swedish, 1955
Logical Studies, 1957
Logik, filosofi och språk (Logic, philosophy and language), in Swedish, 1957
The Varieties of Goodness, 1963. (1958-60 Gifford Lectures in the University of St. Andrews, online) He considered this his best and most personal work.
Norm and Action, 1963 (1958-60 Gifford Lectures, St. Andrews, online)
The Logic of Preference, 1963
Essay om naturen, människan och den vetenskaplig-tekniska revolutionen (Essay on Nature, Man and the Scientific-Technological Revolution), in Swedish, 1963
An Essay in Deontic Logic, 1968
Time, Change and Contradiction, 1969
Tieteen filosofian kaksi perinnettä (The Two Traditions of the Philosophy of Science), in Finnish, 1970
Explanation and Understanding, 1971
Causality and Determinism, 1974
Handlung, Norm und Intention (Action, Norm and Intention), in German, 1977
Humanismen som livshållning (Humanism as an approach to Life), in Swedish, 1978
Freedom and Determination, 1980
Wittgenstein, 1982
Philosophical Papers I-III, 1983—1984
Filosofisia tutkielmia (Philosophical Dissertations), in Finnish, 1985
Vetenskapen och förnuftet (Science and Reason), in Swedish, 1986
Minervan Pöllö (The Owl of Minerva), in Finnish, 1991
Myten om framsteget (The Myth of Progress), in Swedish, 1993
The Tree of Knowledge, 1993
Att förstå sin samtid (To Understand one's own Time), in Swedish, 1994
Six Essays in Philosophical Logic, 1996
Viimeisistä ajoista. Ajatusleikki (On the End Times. A Thought Experiment.), in Finnish, 1997
Logiikka ja humanismi (Logic and Humanism), in Finnish, 1998
In the Shadow of Descartes, 1998
Mitt liv som jag minns det (My Life as I Remember it), in Swedish, 2001
Von Wright edited posthumous publications by Wittgenstein, which were published by Blackwell (unless otherwise stated):
1961. Notebooks 1914-1916.
1967. Zettel (Translated into English as Culture and Value).
1969. On Certainty.
1971. ProtoTractatus...An Early Version of Tractatus Logico- Philosophicus. Cornell University Press.
1973. Letters to C.K. Ogden with Comments on the English Translation of the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus.
1974. Letters to Russell, Keynes and Moore.
1978 (1956). Remarks on the Foundations of Mathematics.
1980. Remarks on the Philosophy of Psychology. Vols 1,2.
1980. Culture and Value (English translation of Zettel).
1982. Last Writings on the Philosophy of Psychology, Vol. 1. Vol. 2, 1992.