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Early Childhood to High School
The Putnam family lived in France until 1934. With his family moving back to the United States to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania where he attended Central High School. It was here that Putnam would meet his friend and often times intellectual adversary Noam Chomsky. -
Birth
Born in Chicago, Illinois to Samuel and Riva Putnam. -
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Hilary Putnam
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University of Pennsylvania
Putnam studied mathematics and philosophy, where he recieved his Undergraduate Degree and would join the Philomathean Society. -
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Harvard University
Putnam would receive his Graduate Degree in Philosophy -
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University of California, Los Angeles
Here Putnam would study in the Philosophy Department and write his dissertation under Hans Reichenbach, "The Meaning of the Concept of Probability in Application to Finite Sequences." Receiving his Ph.D in 1951 -
The Meaning of the Concept of Probability in Application to Finite Sequences
Hilary Putnam's dissertation written in 1951 under Hans Reichenbach, initially republished in 1990. Here Putnam disagreed with the logical positivism, a position of which Reichenbach was a leading figure. Putnam, H. (1990). The Meaning of the Concept of Probability in Application to Finite Sequences (Routledge Revivals) (1st ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203357446 -
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Northwestern University
Professor of Philosophy and Mathematics -
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Princeton University
Professor of Philosophy and Mathematics -
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MIT
Professor of Philosophy and Mathematics. An active supporter of civil rights and opponent of the Vietnam War, would go on to organize the first student and faculty committee at MIT against the war. -
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Harvard
Professor of Philosophy and Mathematics. Due to his political activism there was attempts to censure Putnam, but this was stopped due to the support of two other faculty members. He permanently severed ties with the then political ideology due to disillusionment and described his involvement as a mistake. Putnam would stay teaching at Harvard until his retirement as the John Cogan University Professor Emeritus in 2000. -
Philosophy of Mind
One of Putnam's greatest contributions to philosophy was the Philosophy of Mind, in which he introduced the doctrine of functionalism. In which he would define the various mental states of the mind and their roles in which they relate to other states and behaviors. Putting forth the idea that the mind is defined by its functions and organization, not by what it is made of. Putnam, Hilary (1975). Philosophy and our mental life. In Mind, Language, and Reality. Cambridge University Press. -
Philosophy of Language
Putnam contributed greatly to the Philosophy of Linguistics. in The Meaning of "Meaning" he would establish his claim of semantic externalism using the "Twin Earth" thought experiment to show illustrate that a terms' meanings are determined by factors external of the mind itself. Putnam, Hillary (1975). The meaning of 'meaning'. Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science 7:131-193. -
Realism
A unifying theme throughout Putnam's philosophy was his defense of realism. A view that assertions (including theories, beliefs, and so on) are objectively true or false. He would shift from defending metaphysical realism to internal realism or pragmatic realism in 1976. A viewpoint in which; though the world may be causally independent of the mind, the world and its structure is in fact a function of the human mind -
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President of the American Philosophical Association
Putnam was elected as President of the Eastern Division. -
Walter Beverly Pearson Professor of Mathematical Logic
Putnam was selected for his contributions to philosophy of logic and mathematics. -
Mind and Computers
A short excerpt from an interview with Bryan Magee about the functionalist conception of the mind. https://youtu.be/mG-LWOq6jvY -
Reason, Truth and History
In his book Putnam would critique the Brain in a Vat thought experiment. He would argue that one cannot coherently state that one is a disembodied "brain in a vat" placed there by some "mad scientist". Putnam, Hilary. Reason, Truth and History. Cambridge University Press, 1981. -
Death
Died in his home in Arlington, Massachusetts on March 13, 2016