Victor Kraft (4 July 1880 – 3 January 1975) was an

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 ...

n philosopher. He is best known for being a member of the Vienna Circle.

Early life and education

Kraft studied philosophy, geography and history at the University of Vienna. He participated in the events of the university's Philosophical Society, as well as with private circles (especially Oskar Ewald, Otto Weininger and

Othmar Spann Othmar Spann (1 October 1878 – 8 July 1950) was a conservative Austrian philosopher, sociologist and economist whose radical anti-liberal and anti-socialist views, based on early 19th century Romantic ideas expressed by Adam Müller et al. ...

). He received in 1903 his Ph.D. with a dissertation on "The Knowledge of the External World". Then he moved to Berlin to continue his studies under

Georg Simmel Georg Simmel (; ; 1 March 1858 – 26 September 1918) was a German sociologist, philosopher, and critic. Simmel was influential in the field of sociology. Simmel was one of the first generation of German sociologists: his neo-Kantian approach l ...

, Wilhelm Dilthey and

Carl Stumpf Carl Stumpf (; 21 April 1848 – 25 December 1936) was a German philosopher, psychologist and musicologist. He is noted for founding the Berlin School of Experimental Psychology. He studied with Franz Brentano at the University of Würzburg ...

at the

University of Berlin Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (german: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a German public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin. It was established by Frederick William III on the initiative o ...

. Kraft started working in 1912 at the university's library, where he was a scientific civil servant ("

Beamter The German civil servants called ' (men, singular ', more commonly ') or ' (women, singular ') have a privileged legal status compared to other German public employees (called '), who are generally subject to the same laws and regulations as emp ...

") until 1939. In 1914 he completed his habilitation under Adolf Stöhr with his book "Weltbegriff und Erkenntnisbegriff" (The Concept of World and the Concept of Knowledge). Kraft attend regularly the Vienna Circle until its dissolution, and at the same time was also a member of the Gomperz Circle and had contacts to the so-called periphery of the Vienna Circle (''e.g.'',

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 ...

). Victor Kraft received the title of associate professor for theoretical philosophy in 1924.

Academic career

After the ''

Anschluss The (, or , ), also known as the (, en, Annexation of Austria), was the annexation of the Federal State of Austria into the Nazi Germany, German Reich on 13 March 1938. The idea of an (a united Austria and Germany that would form a "Ger ...

'', Kraft was forced to leave his librarian position because of his wife's Jewish background. He lost his habilitation as university teacher as well. Kraft continued his philosophical research with great difficulties as "inner emigrant" during the Nazi regime. He regained his post at the university library in 1945, and became Generalstaatsbibliothekar (national librarian) in 1947. In this year he was also appointed associate professor for philosophy. Three years later he became full professor and co-director of the school of philosophy. He retired from his post in 1952. Kraft kept his research and publishing until his death. The Kraft Circle, which he chaired between 1949 and 1952/3, was named after him, and it was during this period that he supervised the dissertation of Paul Feyerabend and

Ingeborg Bachmann Ingeborg Bachmann (25 June 1926 – 17 October 1973) was an Austrian poet and author. Biography Bachmann was born in Klagenfurt, in the Austrian state of Carinthia, the daughter of Olga (née Haas) and Matthias Bachmann, a schoolteacher. Her f ...

. Karl Sigmund, ''Exact Thinking in Demented Times: The Vienna Circle and the Epic Quest for the Foundations of Science'', Hachette UK, 2017.

Philosophical work

Among the

logical positivists Logical positivism, later called logical empiricism, and both of which together are also known as neopositivism, is a movement in Western philosophy whose central thesis was the verification principle (also known as the verifiability criterion o ...

, Kraft represents a unique standing point: he wrote about a non-sensualist empiricism with a hypothetical-deductive structure. Before the First World War (and after it together with the Vienna Circle members) he dedicated most of his lectures and publications to promote scientific philosophy. He also made important contributions to the establishment of ethics as science and wrote about the theory of geography and the philosophy of history.

References

External links

Victor Kraft
Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2012)

at

Innsbruck University The University of Innsbruck (german: Leopold-Franzens-Universität Innsbruck; la, Universitas Leopoldino Franciscea) is a public research university in Innsbruck, the capital of the Austrian federal state of Tyrol, founded on October 15, 1669. I ...

Biography
mainly based on the obtuary: {{DEFAULTSORT:Kraft, Victor 1880 births 1975 deaths Vienna Circle Writers from Vienna 20th-century Austrian philosophers

Early life and education

Academic career

Philosophical work

References

Further reading

External links