Abstract

My point of departure is a passage in which Coffa claims: “Wittgenstein’s and Carnap’s insights on the a priori belong in the same family as Kant’s... What we witness circa 1930 is a Copernican turn that, like Kant’s, bears the closest connection to the a priori; but its topic is meaning rather than experience” [Coffa, 1991, p. 263]. I draw out Kantian resonances in Wittgenstein’s and Carnap’s work on logic, grammar, and theoretical frameworks. In the end, Coffa’s remark comes out as significantly illuminating for a variety of questions, issues, and dynamic historical trends.