-
1915
Reichenbach’s doctoral thesis, The Concept of Probability in the Mathematical Representation of Reality, contains many of the themes that concerned him throughout his life, and anticipated in some detail 21st century philosophical discussions of probability relations between microscopic and macroscopic systems. -
1925
Reichenbach’s essay “The Causal Structure of the World” is also an early attempt to account for the direction of time in terms of causal and probabilistic asymmetries. Reichenbach there introduces the notion of a “probability implication” with 10 axiom schemes on propositional variables involving both material implication and a new 2-place probability implication connective. -
1926
In 1926, he assumed a teaching position in “natural philosophy” at the University of Berlin, where he remained until Hitler came to power in 1933. During this time Reichenbach organized discussion groups on scientific philosophy, similar to those of the Vienna Circle. The group around Reichenbach that developed out of the Society for Empirical Philosophy and became known as the Berlin Group included Kurt Grelling, Kurt Lewin, Richard von Mises and later Carl Hempel, Reichenbach’s student. -
1930
Together with members of the Vienna Circle, Reichenbach initiated the publication of the journal Erkenntnis in 1930 as a forum for scientific philosophy. Reichenbach and Carnap were the only editors after Schlick resigned in reaction to Reichenbach’s opening article. He was also a frequent contributor of popular essays and a regular radio lecturer on scientific topics. -
1933
With Hitler’s elevation, the views and methods of the Berlin Group and Vienna Circle were branded Jewish philosophy, and Reichenbach was dismissed from his university position and from radio work. He moved to Istanbul in 1933, where Mustafa Kemal had established a new university to attract intellectuals fleeing Europe. Reichenbach was joined there by 32 other German professors, notably Richard von Mises, the mathematician whose views on probability must have influenced Reichenbach. -
1938
Reichenbach moved to the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) with his family. With the US entry into World War II in 1941, Reichenbach was kept under effective house arrest, allowed to leave only to work and for medical purposes until he obtained American citizenship in 1943. During the war, Reichenbach was engaged in helping to move members of his family out of Germany and to secure positions for colleagues at UCLA, in particular members of the Frankfurt School -
1953
Reichenbach’s untimely death from another heart attack on April 9, 1953, prevented him from presenting the William James Lectures at Harvard in the fall of the same year, and also prevented his inclusion in a planned volume of Living Philosophers in the series edited by Arthur Schilpp. -
Citation
Hans Reichenbach. Aug 24, 2008; substantive revision Mar 23, 2021. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/reichenbach/