Raphael "Rafi" Falk (; July 14, 1929 – September 15, 2019) was a

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

-born

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

i geneticist and historian of science. He was professor emeritus of

genetics Genetics is the study of genes, genetic variation, and heredity in organisms.Hartl D, Jones E (2005) It is an important branch in biology because heredity is vital to organisms' evolution. Gregor Mendel, a Moravian Augustinians, Augustinian ...

at the

Hebrew University of Jerusalem The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI; ) is an Israeli public university, public research university based in Jerusalem. Co-founded by Albert Einstein and Chaim Weizmann in July 1918, the public university officially opened on 1 April 1925. ...

. His early research was on the genetics of ''

Drosophila ''Drosophila'' (), from Ancient Greek δρόσος (''drósos''), meaning "dew", and φίλος (''phílos''), meaning "loving", is a genus of fly, belonging to the family Drosophilidae, whose members are often called "small fruit flies" or p ...

''; from 1983 he was active in researching the

history History is the systematic study of the past, focusing primarily on the Human history, human past. As an academic discipline, it analyses and interprets evidence to construct narratives about what happened and explain why it happened. Some t ...

and

philosophy of science Philosophy of science is the branch of philosophy concerned with the foundations, methods, and implications of science. Amongst its central questions are the difference between science and non-science, the reliability of scientific theories, ...

, with a particular focus on genetics.

Early life

Falk was born in

Frankfurt am Main Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the List of cities in Germany by population, fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the forela ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

. When he was aged 5, amid the rise of

Nazism Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During Hitler's rise to power, it was fre ...

in Germany, his family left for

Palestine Palestine, officially the State of Palestine, is a country in West Asia. Recognized by International recognition of Palestine, 147 of the UN's 193 member states, it encompasses the Israeli-occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and th ...

Education and career

He was educated at the

Stockholm University Stockholm University (SU) () is a public university, public research university in Stockholm, Sweden, founded as a college in 1878, with university status since 1960. With over 33,000 students at four different faculties: law, humanities, social ...

, where he worked with Gert Bonnier, and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He subsequently completed his

postdoc A postdoctoral fellow, postdoctoral researcher, or simply postdoc, is a person professionally conducting research after the completion of their doctoral studies (typically a PhD). Postdocs most commonly, but not always, have a temporary academ ...

with H. J. Muller and Curt Stern. His former teacher, Elisabeth Goldschmidt, eventually persuaded him to switch his research focus from ''Drosophila'' genetics to the history and philosophy of genetics as it pertains to the people of Israel. By the 1950s and 60s, his work appreciated the ways in which X-rays induced mutations in the flies in a way that Muller's original work in the 1920s had not. From the early 1980s, Falk increasingly turned his attention to the history and philosophy of biology, becoming "one of the leading practitioners of the field". He also began to look at the interactions between studies on the population genetics of Jews and Zionist agendas, and ultimately published his body of research on the subject first in Hebrew in 2006 and in English in 2017 as ''Zionism and the Biology of the Jews''.

Personal life

He was married to psychologist and probability theorist

Ruma Falk Ruma Falk (, née Oren-Aharonovich, 1932–2020) was an Israeli psychologist and philosopher of mathematics known for her work on probability theory and human understanding of probability and statistics. Falk was born in Jerusalem, and educate ...

Books

Falk's books include: *''The Concept of the Gene in Development and Evolution: Historical and Epistemological'' (edited with Peter J. Beurton and Hans-Jörg Rheinberger, Cambridge, University Press, 2000) * ''Genetic Analysis: A History of Genetic Thinking'' (Cambridge University Press, 2011) * ''Zionism and the Biology of Jews'' (Springer, 2017), English translation from the (Ressling, 2006)Review of ''Zionism and the Biology of Jews'': Snait Gissis (2009), ''Aleph'',

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Falk, Raphael 1929 births 2019 deaths Israeli geneticists Historians of biology 20th-century German historians Scientists from Frankfurt German emigrants to Mandatory Palestine Stockholm University alumni Hebrew University of Jerusalem alumni Academic staff of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem Israeli people of German descent