Felix Kaufmann (4 July 1895,
Vienna
en, Viennese
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– 23 December 1949,
New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* ...
) was an Austrian-American
philosopher of law.
Biography
Kaufmann studied
jurisprudence
Jurisprudence, or legal theory, is the theoretical study of the propriety of law. Scholars of jurisprudence seek to explain the nature of law in its most general form and they also seek to achieve a deeper understanding of legal reasoning a ...
and
philosophy
Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some s ...
in
Vienna
en, Viennese
, iso_code = AT-9
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. He became part of the legal-philosophical school of
Hans Kelsen
Hans Kelsen (; ; October 11, 1881 – April 19, 1973) was an Austrian jurist, legal philosopher and political philosopher. He was the author of the 1920 Austrian Constitution, which to a very large degree is still valid today. Due to the ri ...
. From 1922 to 1938 he was a
Privatdozent
''Privatdozent'' (for men) or ''Privatdozentin'' (for women), abbreviated PD, P.D. or Priv.-Doz., is an academic title conferred at some European universities, especially in German-speaking countries, to someone who holds certain formal qualific ...
at the University of Vienna. During this time Kaufmann was associated with the
Vienna Circle
The Vienna Circle (german: Wiener Kreis) of Logical Empiricism was a group of elite philosophers and scientists drawn from the natural and social sciences, logic and mathematics who met regularly from 1924 to 1936 at the University of Vienna, ch ...
. He also wrote on the
foundations of mathematics
Foundations of mathematics is the study of the philosophical and logical and/or algorithmic basis of mathematics, or, in a broader sense, the mathematical investigation of what underlies the philosophical theories concerning the nature of mathe ...
where, along with
Hermann Weyl
Hermann Klaus Hugo Weyl, (; 9 November 1885 – 8 December 1955) was a German mathematician, theoretical physicist and philosopher. Although much of his working life was spent in Zürich, Switzerland, and then Princeton, New Jersey, he is assoc ...
and
Oskar Becker
Oscar Becker (5 September 1889 – 13 November 1964) was a German philosopher, logician, mathematician, and historian of mathematics.
Early life
Becker was born in Leipzig, where he studied mathematics. His dissertation under Otto Hölder and ...
, he was attempting to apply the
phenomenology
Phenomenology may refer to:
Art
* Phenomenology (architecture), based on the experience of building materials and their sensory properties
Philosophy
* Phenomenology (philosophy), a branch of philosophy which studies subjective experiences and a ...
of
Edmund Husserl
, thesis1_title = Beiträge zur Variationsrechnung (Contributions to the Calculus of Variations)
, thesis1_url = https://fedora.phaidra.univie.ac.at/fedora/get/o:58535/bdef:Book/view
, thesis1_year = 1883
, thesis2_title ...
to
constructive mathematics
In the philosophy of mathematics, constructivism asserts that it is necessary to find (or "construct") a specific example of a mathematical object in order to prove that an example exists. Contrastingly, in classical mathematics, one can prove th ...
.
In 1938, the conditions for
Jewish
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
scholars became too hard and he left for the USA. There he taught until his death as a law professor, in the Graduate Faculty of the
New York School for Social Research. Kaufmann also aided fellow Austrian emigres in need of assistance during the pre-
war
War is an intense armed conflict between states, governments, societies, or paramilitary groups such as mercenaries, insurgents, and militias. It is generally characterized by extreme violence, destruction, and mortality, using regular o ...
years when the situation became dire for Jewish academics and scholars in
Germany and
Austria
Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous c ...
. Interceding on
Karl Popper
Sir Karl Raimund Popper (28 July 1902 – 17 September 1994) was an Austrian-British philosopher, academic and social commentator. One of the 20th century's most influential philosophers of science, Popper is known for his rejection of the c ...
's behalf, Popper was offered academic hospitality at
Cambridge University
, mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts.
Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge.
, established =
, other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...
and a stipend of £150 for one year - this offer was transferable, and
Friedrich Waismann
Friedrich Waismann (; 21 March 18964 November 1959) was an Austrian mathematician, physicist, and philosopher. He is best known for being a member of the Vienna Circle and one of the key theorists in logical positivism.
Biography
Born to a Jewis ...
took it up when Popper went to
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island country ...
instead (see John Watkins in Proceedings of the British Academy, 94, 645-684, 652).
In 1936 he produced a book on the methodology of the social sciences (Kaufmann 1936). After moving to the United States he was invited to write a similar book in English, but what he produced (Kaufmann 1944) was significantly different, under the influence of Dewey's ''Logic: The Theory of Inquiry''. The original book was translated over 70 years later (Cohen and Helling 2014).
Works
* ''Logik und Rechtwissenschaft'', 1922
* ''Die Kriterien des Rechts'', 1924
* ''Das Unendliche in der Mathematik und seine Ausschaltung'', 1930
* ''Methodenlehre der Sozialwissenschaften'', 1936
* ''Methododology of the Social Sciences'', New York: Oxford University Press 1941.
References
* Cohen, Robert S. and Helling, Ingeborg K. (eds) (2014) ''Felix Kaufmann's Theory and Method in the Social Sciences,'' Cham, Switzerland: Springer''.''
* Thomas Olechowski, ''Hans Kelsen. Biographie eines Rechtswissenschaftlers''. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck 2020.
1895 births
1949 deaths
Austrian jurists
Jewish emigrants from Austria to the United States after the Anschluss
Philosophers of law
The New School faculty
20th-century American lawyers
Jewish American writers
Academic staff of the University of Vienna
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