Decomposition

Abstract

When asked to explain what conceptual analysis is, philosophers sometimes resort to the idea of decomposition: analysis is “the process of breaking a concept down into more simple parts, so that its logical structure is displayed” (Blackburn 2008, 14; see also Hanna 2007, 145). Recourse to this idea is however problematic. The idea of decomposition is unlikely to provide an adequate description of philosophical practice and, as Beaney (2009) has argued, one should rather think of it as one among many different historical conceptions of analysis — and one that no longer constitutes a paradigm.¹ At the time Bolzano wrote, however, most philosophers held theories that were based on this idea. In Kant, for instance, ‘decomposition’ is used in a quite literal sense. Notions such as ‘Zergliederung’, ‘Auflösung’, ‘Inhalt’ and ‘enthalten sein’ were intended to provide a straightforward description of formal features of and relations among concepts. While Bolzano’s views on analysis were pioneering, he also often sought to preserve the terminology already available. This can at times be misleading. One likely mistake is to believe that Bolzano, because he assumes that ideas are complex (zusammengesetzt) and sometimes speaks of the “resolution” (Zerlegung) of an idea into its parts, also adopts a decompositional conception of analysis. Decompositional conceptions of analysis present certain variations.