Hans-Jörg Rheinberger

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Hans-Jörg Rheinberger (born January 12, 1946 in Grabs , Canton St. Gallen , Switzerland ) is a science historian from Liechtenstein. From 1997 to 2014 he was director at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin . Within the history of science , his work focuses on the history and epistemology of the experiment as well as the history of molecular biology and protein biosynthesis. He also publishes essays and poems.

biography

Hans-Jörg Rheinberger, a great-great-nephew of the composer Josef Gabriel Rheinberger and grandson of the artist and architect Egon Rheinberger , studied philosophy, linguistics and biology at the University of Tübingen , the Free University of Berlin and the Technical University of Berlin . After completing his master's degree in philosophy (1973) and a diploma in biology (1979), he received his doctorate in 1982. rer.nat with a dissertation on protein biosynthesis and completed his habilitation in molecular biology at the Free University of Berlin in 1987. From 1982 to 1990 Hans-Jörg Rheinberger worked as a research associate and research group leader at the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics in Berlin-Dahlem. From 1987 he held visiting professorships at the Universities of Innsbruck and Salzburg. After a sabbatical at Stanford University (1989/90 within the "History of Science" program), he worked from 1990 to 1994 as a university lecturer at the Institute for Medical and Scientific History at the University of Lübeck . From 1994 to 1996 he was Associate Professor for Molecular Biology and History of Science at the Institute for Genetics and General Biology at the University of Salzburg .

Rheinberger has been a scientific member of the Max Planck Society since 1996 and was director at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin from 1997 to 2014. Since then he has been a retired scientific member of the institute. From 1993 to 1994 he was a fellow at the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin . In 2000, Rheinberger taught as a visiting scholar at the Collegium Helveticum of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich , in 2006 at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore and in 2016 at Northwestern University in Evanston. He is an honorary professor at the TU Berlin and a member of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences , the German Academy of Natural Scientists Leopoldina and the PEN Club Liechtenstein .

plant

Rheinberger's primary field of activity in the history of science is epistemological research into experiments and scientific research practice with a focus on the biology of the 19th and 20th centuries. In his studies, he describes “experimental systems” as driving factors in the development of modern natural sciences. He develops his theoretical terminology based on the philosophy of Jacques Derrida and draws numerous inspirations from the work of Gaston Bachelard .

His main focus is on the "structures of the experiment", which he seeks to decipher through precise reconstructive analyzes of the life sciences laboratory work. In contrast to the usual self-image of the research sciences, Rheinberger shows that less planning and control, but more improvisation and chance characterize everyday research. For Rheinberger, promising “experimental systems” are characterized by the fact that they give “epistemic things” enough leeway to develop. According to Rheinberger, this is essential for “productive handling of ignorance”.

Among other things, Rheinberger examined the laboratory notes of Carl Correns , one of the three rediscoverers of Mendel's laws around 1900.

The "epistemic thing"

The “epistemic thing” is the object of investigation in the research process, which in the course of the investigation can develop into a “technical object”, that is to say something that can be used as an instrument in the investigation of further “epistemic things”. However, this limit is not static and the identification as either “epistemic thing” or “technical object” is not necessarily permanent. So knowledge is neither inevitable nor complete. Rheinberger's experience as a molecular biologist has brought the “materiality of the natural sciences” into the focus of the history of science.

Awards

Publications (selection)

Monographs
  • Experiment, difference, writing. On the history of epistemic things. Basilisken-Presse, Marburg / Lahn 1992, ISBN 3-925347-20-8 .
  • Experimental systems and epistemic things. A history of protein synthesis in the test tube. Frankfurt am Main 2006
  • Iterations (= International Merve Discourse. Vol. 271). Merve-Verlag, Berlin 2005, ISBN 3-88396-205-8 .
  • Epistemology of the concrete. Studies on the history of modern biology (= Suhrkamp-Taschenbuch Wissenschaft. Vol. 1771). Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 2006, ISBN 3-518-29371-0 .
  • Historical epistemology for introduction (= introduction. Vol. 336). Junius, Hamburg 2007, ISBN 978-3-88506-636-1 .
  • On Historicizing Epistemology: An Essay. Stanford University Press, Stanford 2010, ISBN 978-0-8047-6289-2 .
  • An Epistemology of the Concrete: Twentieth-Century Histories of Life. Duke University Press, Durham 2010, ISBN 978-0-8223-4575-6 .
  • Introduction à la philosophy des sciences. Editions La Découverte, Paris 2014, ISBN 978-2-7071-7824-4 .
  • Recurrences. Texts on Althusser. Merve, Berlin 2014, ISBN 978-3-88396-355-6 .
  • Nature and culture in the mirror of knowledge: Marsilius lecture on February 6, 2014. Universitätsverlag Winter, Heidelberg 2015, ISBN 978-3-8253-6439-7 .
  • The colors of the key. Edition Faust, Frankfurt am Main 2015, ISBN 978-3-945400-23-4 .
  • The engraver and the philosopher. Diaphanes, Zurich and Berlin 2016, ISBN 978-3-03734-621-1 .
  • with Staffan Müller-Wille :
    • Inheritance. History and culture of a biological concept. Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 2009, ISBN 978-3-596-17063-0 .
    • The gene in the age of post-genomics. A history of science inventory. Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 2009, ISBN 978-3-518-26025-8
    • A Cultural History of Heredity. University of Chicago Press, Chicago 2012, ISBN 978-0-226-21348-4 .
  • Experimentality: in conversation about laboratory, studio and archive (conversations with Rheinberger), Kulturverlag Kadmos Berlin 2018
editor
  • with Michael Hagner : The Experimentalization of Life. Experimental systems in the biological sciences 1850/1950. Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 1993, ISBN 3-05-002307-4 .
  • with Michael Hagner, Bettina Wahrig-Schmidt: Objects, Differences and Conjunctures. Experimental systems in a historical context . Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 1994, ISBN 3-05-002585-9 .
  • with Michael Hagner, Bettina Schmidt-Wahrig: Spaces of Knowledge. Representation, coding, trace. Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 1997, ISBN 3-05-002781-9 .
  • with André L. Blum, John M. Krois: Embodiments . Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-05-005699-9 .
  • with André Blum, Nina Zschocke, Vincent Barras: Diversity. History and timeliness of a concept . Königshausen & Neumann, Würzburg 2016, ISBN 978-3-8260-5904-9 .
Essays
  • Anything that can even lead to an enrollment. In: Norbert Haas, Rainer Nägele , Hans-Jörg Rheinberger (eds.): In the train of writing. Fink, Munich 1994, ISBN 3-7705-2946-4 , pp. 295-309.
  • Experimental Systems - Graphematic Spaces. In: Timothy Lenoir (Ed.): Inscribing Science. Scientific Texts and the Materiality of Communication. Stanford University Press, Stanford CA 1998, ISBN 0-8047-2777-5 , pp. 285-303.
  • Ludwik Fleck and the Historicity of Scientific Knowledge. In: Rainer Egloff (ed.): Fact - thinking style - controversy: arguments with Ludwik Fleck. Zurich 2005, pp. 29–32.
  • Vignette for WH In: Aris Fioretos (Ed.): Babel. For Werner Hamacher . Urs Paul Engeler , Basel 2009, ISBN 3-938767-55-3 , p. 314 f.
  • Carl Correns' Experiments with Pisum, 1896-1899. In: FL Holmes, J. Renn, H.-J. Rheinberger (Ed.): Reworking the bench. Research notebooks in the history of science. Kluwer 2003, pp. 221-252.

Translations

  • Jacques Derrida : Grammatology (= Suhrkamp-Taschenbuch Wissenschaft. Bd. 417). Translated by Hans-Jörg Rheinberger and Hanns Zischler . Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 1983, ISBN 3-518-28017-1 (Original edition: De la Grammatologie. Éditions de Minuit, Paris 1967).

Festschrift

  • A natural history for the 21st century: Hommage à Hans-Jörg Rheinberger. Published by Department III of the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin. Alpheus-Verlag, Berlin 2014, ISBN 978-3-9813184-5-6 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ See Edition Isele , Verlagsprogramm 1984–2014ff (PDF) and Klaus Isele Editor, Annual Programs from 2013 (PDF), accessed on April 30, 2020.
  2. ↑ MPI website
  3. ↑ Member entry by Prof. Dr. Hans-Jörg Rheinberger (with picture) at the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina , accessed on July 19, 2016.
  4. ↑ Knowledge Workshop - "Experimental Systems"
  5. ^ Norbert Staub: ETH Day 2006: Ambition and the joy of change , ETH Life, ETH Zurich website, November 20, 2006, accessed on April 16, 2014.
  6. ↑ Hansjakob Ziemer: Max Planck Institute for the History of Science honors Director Prof. Dr. Hans-Jörg Rheinberger , press release, Science Information Service , January 22, 2011, accessed on April 16, 2014.
  7. ↑ Hansjakob Ziemer: Science historians Lorraine Daston receives Sarton Medal for life's work , press release, Science Information Service , November 28, 2012, accessed on April 16, 2014.
  8. ^ Marsilius College: Marsilius Lectures , accessed on January 11, 2016.
personal data
SURNAME Rheinberger, Hans-Jörg
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Liechtenstein science historian
DATE OF BIRTH January 12, 1946
PLACE OF BIRTH Grabs , Canton of St. Gallen , Switzerland