This is a kind reminder that the next talk in the Reconstructing Carnap Webinar Series 2026 will be delivered by Thomas Hofweber on Wednesday, November 11, 2026.

Speaker: Thomas Hofweber (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill)
Title: Carnap on internal and external questions
Time: Wednesday, November 11, 2026 — 4:30–6:30 pm CET (10:30 am–12:30 pm EST)
Link: Meet - uaq-jqpf-mwr

The abstract is provided below. For further information about the Reconstructing Carnap Webinar Series 2026, please consult the following webpage: https://valep.vc.univie.ac.at/files/External/2026_Reconstructing_Carnap-original.pdf

Videos of past presentations are available on the YouTube channel of the series—feel free to explore and subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/@reconstructingcarnap.

The series is organized in collaboration with Carnap in Context IV (ÖAW, FWF Grant PAT7905424) and Rudolf Carnap Digital (MCMP, LMU Munich).

All the best,
Caterina

Carnap on internal and external questions
By Thomas Hofweber (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill)

Carnap’s celebrated distinction between internal and external questions can be seen as an attempt to solve a more general problem about the relationship between philosophy, especially metaphysics, and the sciences. The puzzle about this relationship is that sometimes we use the very same language when we apparently want to do very different things. How this tension can be resolved is a general problem that has potentially many very different solutions. In this talk I will outline what I take Carnap’s solution to be and what insights and flaws I see in it. Then I will outline a different solution that is partly inspired by Carnap, but also partly non-Carnapian. This solution also accepts a distinction between internal and external questions, but it has very different consequences for the status of metaphysics and how it relates to the sciences.

https://valep.vc.univie.ac.at/files/0External/2026_Reconstructing_Carnap-original.pdf