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In Fuzzy ontology everything exists to an extent between 0 and 1. However, the
Fuzzy ontolgy depends from the language in which the predicates are defined, or as
Sadegh-Zadeh formulated, “first, that a language induces an ontology, and second,
that being and nonbeing is relative to languages and logics.”. [69, p. 7]
3.2
The Systems View on Science
In February of 1930, a “study group for scientific cooperation” led by Rudolf Car-
nap was founded under the auspices of the Ernst Mach Society and organized in
the Vienna Chamber of Labor. The study group was intended “to bring about a
harmonization of the special branches of science and a clarification of their place
within the framework of science as a whole [...] by means of reports and discus-
sions, particularly about the newer methods, problems, concept formations in the
various specialist fields”. 4 The Vienna Circle had shaped the concept of unified
science, according to which there can only be pragmatic reasons for the separation
of scientific disciplines, for they believed that unified scientific language and logic
made it possible for everything to be described using this language.
Carnap elucidated this view in 1931 in a paper on The Physical Language as
a Universal Language of Science. Here he contrasted the “generally widespread
view” that the sciences “differ fundamentally in terms of their objects, their sources
of perception, their methods” with the belief held by the “Wittgenstein faction” in
the Vienna Circle: “By contrast, the view shall be expressed here that science forms
one unit: All sentences can be expressed in one language, all facts are of one type,
recognizable by one method.” 5
Carnap's book The Unity of Science , which was translated into English by Max
Black [18] featured both his physical thesis, namely that all meaningful sentences
can be translated into physical sentences, and the thesis that all events could be
explained by physical laws. Even the laws of biology could be traced back to the
laws of physics -- a thesis he admittedly could no longer substantiate later on, let
alone prove.
The Austrian theoretical biologist Ludwig von Bertalanffy (1901-1972), who em-
igrated to Canada after the war, likely also no longer expected this when he called
this view of a unity of the sciences in the mid-1950s “unrealistic”. In his article
“General Systems Theory” for the journal Main Currents in Modern Thought ,he
closed with some observations on the unity of science: “From our point of view,
unity of science gains a more realistic aspect. A unitary conception of the world
may be based, not upon the possibly futile and certainly far-fetched hope finally to
reduce all levels of reality to the level of physics, but rather on the isomorphy of
laws in different fields.” [10, p. 8]
4
[84, p. 382], quoted from Erkenntnis , 1, 1930-31, p. 79. See also [31, p. 74].
5
“Demgegenüber soll hier die Ansicht vertreten werden, dass die Wissenschaft eine Einheit
bildet: Alle Sätze sind in einer Sprache ausdrückbar, alle Sachverhalte sind von einer Art,
nach einer Methode erkennbar.” [17, p. 432].
 
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