Hugo Albert Emil Hermann Dingler (July 7, 1881,

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the States of Germany, German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the List of cities in Germany by popu ...

– June 29, 1954, Munich) was a German

scientist A scientist is a person who conducts Scientific method, scientific research to advance knowledge in an Branches of science, area of the natural sciences. In classical antiquity, there was no real ancient analog of a modern scientist. Instead, ...

and

philosopher A philosopher is a person who practices or investigates philosophy. The term ''philosopher'' comes from the grc, φιλόσοφος, , translit=philosophos, meaning 'lover of wisdom'. The coining of the term has been attributed to the Greek th ...

Life

Hugo Dingler studied

mathematics Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. These topics are represented in modern mathematics ...

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 ...

, and

physics Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which r ...

with Felix Klein,

Hermann Minkowski Hermann Minkowski (; ; 22 June 1864 – 12 January 1909) was a German mathematician and professor at Königsberg, Zürich and Göttingen. He created and developed the geometry of numbers and used geometrical methods to solve problems in number t ...

David Hilbert David Hilbert (; ; 23 January 1862 – 14 February 1943) was a German mathematician, one of the most influential mathematicians of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Hilbert discovered and developed a broad range of fundamental ideas in many a ...

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 ...

, Woldemar Voigt, and Wilhem Roentgen at the universities of

Göttingen Göttingen (, , ; nds, Chöttingen) is a college town, university city in Lower Saxony, central Germany, the Capital (political), capital of Göttingen (district), the eponymous district. The River Leine runs through it. At the end of 2019, t ...

and

. He graduated from the University of Munich with a thesis under Aurel Voss. Dingler earned his Ph.D. in mathematics, physics and astronomy in 1906. His doctoral advisor was Ferdinand von Lindemann. In 1910 Dingler's first attempt to earn a

Habilitation Habilitation is the highest university degree, or the procedure by which it is achieved, in many European countries. The candidate fulfills a university's set criteria of excellence in research, teaching and further education, usually including a ...

failed. His second try in 1912 was successful. Dingler then taught as 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 ...

and hold lectures on mathematics, philosophy and the history of science. He became a professor at the University of Munich in 1920. Dingler got a position as Professor ordinarius in Darmstadt in 1932. In 1934, one year after the Nazis took power Dingler was dismissed from his teaching position for still unclear reasons. Dingler himself told several interviewers that this was because of his favorable writings concerning Jews. In fact both philo-semitic as well as anti-semitic statements by Dingler had been noted. From 1934 to 1936 he again held a teaching position. In 1940 Dingler joined the

Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...

Party and was again given a teaching position. Of Dingler's 1944 book ''Aufbau der exakten Fundamentalwissenschaft'' only thirty copies survived wartime bombing.

Thought

Dingler's position is usually characterized as "

conventionalist Conventionalism is the philosophical attitude that fundamental principles of a certain kind are grounded on (explicit or implicit) agreements in society, rather than on external reality. Unspoken rules play a key role in the philosophy's structur ...

" by

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 cl ...

and others. Sometimes he is called a "radical conventionalist" (also referred to as " critical voluntarism" in the secondary literature), as by the early

Rudolf Carnap Rudolf Carnap (; ; 18 May 1891 – 14 September 1970) was a German-language philosopher who was active in Europe before 1935 and in the United States thereafter. He was a major member of the Vienna Circle and an advocate of logical positivism. He ...

. Dingler himself initially characterized it as "critical conventionalism", to contrast it with the "naïve conventionalism" of other philosophers such as

Poincaré Poincaré is a French surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Henri Poincaré (1854–1912), French physicist, mathematician and philosopher of science * Henriette Poincaré (1858-1943), wife of Prime Minister Raymond Poincaré * Luci ...

, but he himself later ceased to call his position conventionalist. Dingler agrees with the conventionalists that the fundamental assumptions of

geometry Geometry (; ) is, with arithmetic, one of the oldest branches of mathematics. It is concerned with properties of space such as the distance, shape, size, and relative position of figures. A mathematician who works in the field of geometry is c ...

and physics are not extracted empirically and cannot be given a transcendental deduction. However, Dingler disagrees with conventionalists such as Henri Poincaré in that he does not believe there is freedom to choose alternative assumptions. Dingler believes that one can give a foundation to mathematics and physics by means of operations as building stones. Dingler claims that this operational analysis leads one to Euclidean geometry and

Newtonian mechanics Newton's laws of motion are three basic laws of classical mechanics that describe the relationship between the motion of an object and the forces acting on it. These laws can be paraphrased as follows: # A body remains at rest, or in motion ...

, which are the only possible results. Dingler opposed

Albert Einstein Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theory ...

relativity theory The theory of relativity usually encompasses two interrelated theories by Albert Einstein: special relativity and general relativity, proposed and published in 1905 and 1915, respectively. Special relativity applies to all physical phenomena in ...

and was therefore opposed and snubbed by most of the leaders of the

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

physics and mathematics community. This opposition, at least to the theory of

general relativity General relativity, also known as the general theory of relativity and Einstein's theory of gravity, is the geometric theory of gravitation published by Albert Einstein in 1915 and is the current description of gravitation in modern physics ...

, remains in the work of his follower Paul Lorenzen.

Influence

Paul Lorenzen, noted for his work on constructive foundations of mathematics was a follower of Dingler, at least with respect to the foundations of geometry and physics. The so-called Erlangen School of followers and allies of Lorenzen, including

Kuno Lorenz Kuno Lorenz (born September 17, 1932 in Vachdorf, Thüringen) is a German philosopher. He developed a philosophy of dialogue, in connection with the pragmatic theory of action of the Erlangen constructivist school. Lorenz is married to the lite ...

, Wilhelm Kamlah, and

Peter Janich Peter Janich (4 January 1942 – 4 September 2016) was a professor of philosophy at the University of Marburg. He was born in Munich. Janich studied physics, philosophy and psychology at the Universities of Erlangen and Hamburg. He attained a doct ...

, and more indirectly, Jürgen Mittelstraß, is thus in large part pursuing a modernized version of Dingler's program which claims to incorporate relativity,

quantum theory Quantum theory may refer to: Science *Quantum mechanics, a major field of physics *Old quantum theory, predating modern quantum mechanics * Quantum field theory, an area of quantum mechanics that includes: ** Quantum electrodynamics ** Quantum ch ...

and

quantum logic In the mathematical study of logic and the physical analysis of quantum foundations, quantum logic is a set of rules for manipulation of propositions inspired by the structure of quantum theory. The field takes as its starting point an observat ...

Works

*''Beiträge zur Kenntnis der infinitesimalen Deformation einer Fläche'' (thesis directed by Aurel Voss), Amorbach, 1907. *''Grundlinien einer Kritik und exakten Theorie der Wissenschaften'', 1907. *''Grenzen und Ziele der Wissenschaft'', 1910. *''Die Grundlagen der angewandten Geometrie'', Leipzig, 1911 / ''Die Grundlagen der Geometrie'', Stuttgart, 1933. *''Die Grundlagen der Naturphilosophie'', 1913 *''Kritische Bemerkungen zu den Grundlagen der Relativitätstheorie'', ''Physikalische Zeitschrift'', vol 21 (1920), 668-675. Reissued as pamphlet in Leipzig, 1921. *''Metaphysik als Wissenschaft und der Primat der Philosophie'', Munich, 1926. *''Philosophie der Logik und Arithmetik'', Munich, 1931. *''Geschichte der Naturphilosophie'', Berlin, 1932. *''Das System'', Munich, 1933. *''Das Handeln im Sinne des höchsten Zieles'', Munich, 1935. *''Die Methode der Physik'', Munich, 1938. *''Vom Tierseele zur Menschenseele'', Leipzig, 1941. *''Lehrbuch der Exakten Naturwissenschaften'', Berlin, 1944. Edited posthumously by Paul Lorenzen as ''Aufbau der Fundamentalwissenschaften'', Munich, 1964. *''Grundriss der methodischen Philosophie'', Fuessen, 1949 *''Ergreifung des Wirklichen'', Munich 1955. Reprinted (with intro. by Kuno Lorenz and Jürgen Mittelstrass), Frankfurt, 1969.

References

External links