News
Doctoral workshop 2024
thematically open, for first-generation academics, organised by Hamid Taieb and Barbara Vetter in cooperation with the GAP, 24-25 April 2024 at HU Berlin, application deadline: 31 December 2023. Further information can be found here.
On the 175th Birthday of Gottlob Frege (1848–1925)
8 November 2023 marks the 175th anniversary of Gottlob Frege's birth. To mark the occasion, Dolf Rami (Ruhr University Bochum) has written a text for the GAP that honours Frege's work, but also takes a critical look at insights into Frege as a person. The text is available here (in German).
november 8, 2023
Death of Hans Albert
On 24 October 2023, our honorary member Hans Albert died at the age of 102. Hans Albert held the chair of sociology and science at the University of Mannheim from 1963 to 1989.
He is one of the outstanding representatives of critical rationalism, which rejects in particular any form of infallibility, dogmatism and the claim to ultimate justification. He formulated the Münchhausen trilemma, which impressively illustrates this attitude: it shows that a conclusive justification of our knowledge is impossible, since we would either lose ourselves in endless justifications, resort to circular argumentation or cling dogmatically to unfounded assumptions.
On the occasion of Hans Albert's 100th birthday, Rainer Hegselmann had written a detailed appreciation of the life and work of this great philosopher and sociologist, to which we link again here (in German).
july 14, 2023
GAP.12: Save the date!
8.–11. September 2025 in Düsseldorf
Watch this Space!
GAP and GPS Essay Award 2023
The 2023 prize question is:
What, if anything, will AI never be capable of?
Submissions of essays of up to 3,000 words are possible until 30 November 2023. Please note the conditions of participation and submission instructions in this document. A poster on the current essay prize can be found here.
Death of Peter Bieri
Peter Bieri (1944–2023) passed away on 27 June 2023 at the age of 79. Bieri was influential in the development of analytical philosophy in the German-speaking world, among other things through his Analytical Philosophy of Mind (Hain 1981) and Analytical Philosophy of Cognition (Athenäum 1987). He has also been critical of certain developments in analytic philosophy. Due to the too strong orientation towards formal argumentation, philosophy sometimes reminds one of »hobby mathematics« and philosophical questions sound like mere »Logeleien« (see his essay »Was bleibt von der analytischen Philosophie?« in the DZPhil of 2007). In 1993 Bieri was appointed as a professorship in philosophy at the Freie Universität Berlin, which he gave up in 2007. Under the pseudonym »Pascal Mercier« he has published numerous novels, including Perlmanns Schweigen (Albrecht Knaus 1995) and Nachtzug nach Lissabon (Hanser 2004). On philpublica.de there are links to obituaries honouring Peter Bieri's achievements. For the FU Berlin and the GAP, Holm Tetens has written an obituary.
july 14, 2023
GAP statement on the draft law amending the Wissenschaftszeitvertragsgesetz (German Act on Temporary Academic Contracts)
On March 17, 2023, the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) presented the key points of a draft bill to amend the Wissenschaftszeitvertragsgesetz (WissZeitVG). In response to the vehement criticism of this, not least from #ichbinhanna and #profsfuerhanna, the BMBF has already announced that it wants to discuss the question of the maximum duration of post-doc qualification time limits once again with representatives of trade unions, employee initiatives, universities and research institutions.
The Executive Board of the GAP very much welcomes this invitation to dialogue, because the amendment does not offer any decisive improvement: a maximum fixed-term for the post-doc phase of three years (as in the BMBF’s proposal) is, for example, too short for qualification for a university professorship. Regulations on the duration of fixed-term contracts also cannot guarantee what is needed above all: that the federal states and the universities create more permanent mid-level positions and/or tenure-track professorships.
Instead of new compromise solutions in the WissZeitVG, a joint federal, state, and university initiative would be desirable to provide the financial and legal means for this. Paradigm shifts could also be considered here, such as those already presented by the GAP (in a joint paper with the German Society for Philosophy DGPhil). The paper can be found here (in German).
The GAP statement from July 3, 2023 on the BMBF's draft bill in connection with the WissZeitVG can be viewed here.
march 25, 2023 (updated on 8 july, 2023)
On the 100. Geburtstag von Wolfgang Stegmüller (1923–1991)
June 3, 2023, was the centenary of the birth of Wolfgang Stegmüller, full professor of philosophy, logic and philosophy of science at the LMU Munich and important 20th century philosopher of science. Stegmüller was one of the main figures responsible for analytical philosophy regaining a foothold in Germany after the war, after the generation of the Vienna Circle had been driven out by the Nazis. In his honour, the Society for Analytic Philosophy awards the Wolfgang Stegmüller Prize every three years for outstanding work in analytic philosophy. Information on the prize winners can be found here.
More information on Wolfgang Stegmüller and his significance for Analytic Philosophy can also be found in the Opening Speech by GAP President Elke Brendel at the symposium on the 100th birthday of Wolfgang Stegmüller »Quo Vadis? Analytische Philosophie in Deutschland dreißig Jahre nach Wolfgang Stegmüller« (LMU Munich, June 29, 2023).
june 10, 2023
Jury decision on the 2022 joint essay prize of the GAP and GPS
The Society for Analytic Philosophy (GAP) and Grazer Philosophische Studien (GPS) are pleased about the interest in the essay question: You can’t argue about taste, can you?
20 submissions were received (eight of which were from women). A jury consisting of nine experts thoroughly considered the contributions, which were rendered anonymous. After careful deliberation, the jury has awarded the prizes to:
- 1st Prize: –
- 2nd Prize: Aline Dammel (Georg-August Universität Göttingen): »Warum sich doch sinnvoll über Geschmack streiten lässt« (abstract)
- 2nd Prize: Matthias Luxenburger (Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main): »Streiten über Geschmack – eine Frage des Maßstabes« (abstract)
- 3rd Prize: –
Members of the jury were Larissa Berger, Jochen Briesen, Elke Brendel, Alexander Dinges, Martina Fürst, Markus Kneer, Lisa Schmalzried, Markus Schrenk and Julia Zakkou. The winning essays will be published in the Grazer Philosophische Studien in the second half of 2023. We congratulate the winners and thank all participants for their contributions!
april 11, 2023
Death of Ernst Tugendhat
Ernst Tugendhat (1930–2023) passed away on March 13, 2023, at the age of 93. Tugendhat made an important contribution to the new beginning of analytical philosophy in Germany after National Socialism. Stefan Gosepath has written a short obituary in appreciation of Ernst Tugendhat’s achievements.