Defects of Logical Atomism
The atomists believed that the structure of reality can be pictured if there will be a perfect language grounded on the systematic calculus of Principia Mathematica. For the atomists, the calculus of Principia is the only possible skeleton of a perfect language picturing reality. Though the appearance of other calculi which could also serve as the skeletons of “perfect” languages had impeded the development of the ideal language of the atomists as Carnap and Polish logicians had discovered and developed other calculi. Thus, it resulted to the abandonment of the ideal of a unique perfect language which eventually led to the abandonment of metaphysics.
Likewise, the logical atomism seemed to lead inevitably to solipsism. The principle of acquaintance that the objects of acquaintance are sense-data are essentially private to the person who has them, and it follows that no two people can ever both be acquainted with the same object. That the atomic propositions that I utter is intelligible to me though I may refer to the experience of others, still my own atomic propositions are intelligible to one else. Any communication is therefore theoretically impossible. If the world is the totality of facts, then the world is given to me by the totality of my atomic propositions.
Another defect on logical atomism lies on the atomic propositions. Granted that we were able to reduce language into its simplest notion and axiom and transform it into atomic propositions, if we are able to identify them, the question is are they informative? Since, one cannot use logically proper names of anything which is not present as an object of acquaintance, then there is no descriptive element in logically proper names. That the danger might be one might too be cautious and say nothing at all. That in the attempt to say nothing erroneous, the atomists might cease to engage in dialogue and say nothing at all.
Moreover, the quest for atomist to picture the facts using the ideal language was generally taken to mean that the sentence “looked like” the fact pictured. That an atomic proposition must have the same structure of the atomic fact so as to picture the fact. This view was rejected by Ryle on the grounds that grammatical form was more a matter of convention than of natural correspondence. As supported by Ayer that picturing the fact like picturing the structure of reality does not play any part in actual language.