Rupert Riedl

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Rupert Riedl

Rupert Riedl (born February 22, 1925 in Vienna ; † September 18, 2005 there ) was an Austrian zoologist . Riedl was best known for his work in the field of marine research (biology of sea caves, fauna and flora of the Mediterranean) as well as the system theory of evolution and evolutionary epistemology . In his later life he also dealt with social and environmental issues. He was the founding president of the Club of Vienna .

Life

From September to December 1943 Riedl worked as assistant to marine researcher Hans Hass at the University of Vienna. In 1945 Rupert Riedl, son of the sculptor Josef Franz Riedl , began studying fine arts, medicine, anthropology and zoology at the University of Vienna and received his doctorate in zoology after 12 semesters in 1951 . In 1956 he became a lecturer in comparative anatomy and systematics and four years later he received his habilitation and professorship at the Zoological Institute of the University of Vienna. His work took him to the USA, where he became Full Professor and Research Professor of Marine Sciences at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1968 .

Rupert Riedl returned from 1971 to the head of the Zoological Institute Vienna and i. V. Chairman of the Institute for Human Biology, both at the University of Vienna and visiting professor at the University of North Carolina.

From 1983 to 1990 Rupert Riedl was the director of the Institute for Zoology and Anthropology at the University of Vienna. During this time he produced five documentary films with the Austrian television ORF with the title "The Gardens of Poseidon: How does the Mediterranean live and die" . He was also a co-founder of the Konrad Lorenz Institute for Evolution and Cognition Research at the former residence of Konrad Lorenz in Altenberg in 1989. He then also became chairman of the board of the Altenberg Institute and editor of the magazine Evolution and Cognition . From 1999 onwards he only performed this function as honorary president.

At the same time, Rupert Riedl founded the Club of Vienna , analogous to the Club of Rome , which deals with interdisciplinary scientific and socio-political issues. Even after his retirement in 1995, Rupert Riedl held lectures at the university until shortly before his death. Evolution was an important topic in his lectures. He criticized Darwin's factors as inadequate; He called the mutation a “blind constructor” and the selection a “short-sighted opportunist”. Riedl suspected a kind of preselection already in the area of ​​the genes (since the selection in the area of ​​the phane would be much too time-consuming and therefore could never have brought about the "order of the living"). Overall, he viewed natural events and in particular the evolutionary development of organisms as a system of networked relationships:

“The strategy of Genesis, I claim, knows cause links in the form of chains only in the smaller and only networks of causes as a whole. And no thing in the real world can be explained solely from one direction, each from a system of effects, of which it is one. "

On the occasion of his 80th birthday, in addition to a summary of his scientific work, his view of the world, My View of the World and his autobiography Curiosity and Amazement, appeared .

Hoimar von Ditfurth (1921–1989) attests to Riedl having initiated the third Copernican turning point through evolutionary epistemology, as he advocates it: "Man is not smart enough for this life."

Riedl was buried at the Neustift cemetery in Vienna.

Quote

"You know, you are not lazy enough to be a behavioral scientist." (Konrad Lorenz (1903–1989) at Riedl's suggestion to join the then new comparative behavioral theory.)

Research trips

Rupert Riedl went on several research trips. Including by:

  • 1948–1949 Head of the first Austrian post-war expedition with Heinz Löffler in Sicily and the North African island world ("Unterwasser-Expedition Austria")
  • 1950–1952 study visits to various marine stations in the Mediterranean and the North Sea
  • 1952 leader of the Austrian "Tyrrhenia Expedition". The film Lights Under Water was made during the expedition .

His research work in North Carolina dealt mainly with the sand gap system of the coasts, the mesopsammon , the ecological importance of which Riedl placed in the foreground. Many new species, especially from the tribe of the jaw mouth ( Gnathostomulida ), were discovered.

Works

  • Fauna and flora of the Adriatic. Parey. 1963.
  • Sea cave biology. Blackwell Science 1966.
  • Fauna and flora of the Mediterranean. Parey. 1983.
  • The order of the living: system conditions of evolution. Parey, Hamburg / Berlin 1975.
  • The strategy of Genesis. Natural history of the real world. Piper, Munich 1976.
  • Order in Living Systems: A Systems Analysis of Evolution. Wiley, New York 1978 (translation from: The order of the living ).
  • About the biology of causal thought; an evolutionist, systems-theoretical attempt. In: Mannheimer Forum 78/79. Mannheim. 1978/79.
  • Biology of knowledge: the phylogenetic foundations of reason. Parey, Berlin / Hamburg 1980.
  • The Consequences of Cause Thinking. In: Paul Watzlawick (Ed.): The invented reality. How do we know what we think we know? Piper, Munich / Zurich 1981, pp. 67-91.
  • Evolution and knowledge. Piper, Munich 1982.
  • with Franz Kreuzer (ed.): Evolution and image of man. Hoffmann and Campe, Hamburg 1983.
  • The split in the worldview. Biological foundations of explaining and understanding. Parey, Berlin / Hamburg 1985.
  • with Franz Wuketits (Ed.): The Evolutionary Epistemology: Conditions, Solutions, Controversies. Parey, Berlin / Hamburg 1987.
  • Culture: late start of evolution? Answers to questions about evolution and epistemology. Piper, Munich 1987.
  • Concept and world: biological foundations of knowledge and understanding. Parey, Berlin / Hamburg 1987.
  • Rebuilding the human. We need contracts between nature and society. Piper, Zurich 1988.
  • Deficiencies in adaptation of human reason. In: L. Bauer, H. Matis (Ed.): Evolution - Organization - Management. For the development and self-control of more complex systems. Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1989, pp. 39-54.
  • The gardens of Poseidon. How does the Mediterranean live and die? Ueberreuter, Vienna 1989.
  • Limits of adaptation. In: A. Fenk (ed.): Evolution and self-reference of cognition. Böhlau, Vienna / Cologne 1990.
  • Truth and probability. Biological foundations of perceiving. Parey, Hamburg, Berlin 1992.
  • Darwin, Zeus and Russell's chicken. Conversations in heaven and on earth. Kremayr & Scheriau, Vienna 1994.
  • With your head against the wall: the biological limits of thinking. Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 1996.
  • with M. Delpos: The causes of growth. Kremayr & Scheriau, Vienna 1996.
  • with M. Delpos (ed.): The evolutionary epistemology in the mirror of the sciences. WUV, Vienna 1996.
  • Structures of Complexity: A Morphology of Knowing and Explaining. Springer, Berlin / Heidelberg 2000.
  • Chance, chaos, meaning. Thinking about God and the world. Cross, Stuttgart 2002.
  • The unholy alliance. Loss of education between research and industry. Faculties, Vienna 2002.
  • Riedl's cultural history of the theory of evolution. Springer, Berlin / Heidelberg 2003.
  • Clarissa and the blue camel. Time travel on the edge of Europe. Seifert, Vienna 2003.
  • My view of the world. Seifert, Vienna 2004.
  • No end to Genesis. We and our states. Czernin, Vienna 2004.
  • Curiosity and amazement. Autobiography. Seifert, Vienna 2004.
  • World Wonder Man or How We Are Made. Seifert, Vienna 2005.
  • The loss of morphology. Seifert, Vienna 2006.

Web links

Single receipts

  1. ↑ Michael Jung: Steps into No Man's Land. New insights into the life and work of the natural scientist Hans Hass. Hamburg, 2019, p. 101
  2. ^ Franz Stuhlhofer : Charles Darwin. World trip to agnosticism . Berneck 1988, p. 14.
  3. ^ Rupert Riedl: The strategy of Genesis. Munich / Zurich 1976, p. 21.
  4. ↑ Hoimar von Ditfurth, On the Border between Spirit and Biology , Spiegel 1979, No. 40
  5. ↑ The first Copernican turn put man on the edge of the world and the second Copernican turn by Charles Darwin (1809–1882) put man in the animal kingdom. (Rupert Riedl, Evolution and Knowledge , Munich 1982, p. 242)
  6. ^ Rupert Riedl: Evolution and Knowledge , Munich 1982, p. 76
personal data
SURNAME Riedl, Rupert
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian zoologist
DATE OF BIRTH February 22, 1925
PLACE OF BIRTH Vienna
DATE OF DEATH September 18, 2005
Place of death Vienna