Ulrich Charpa
Research Professor at LBI London, Professor of Philosophy and Member of the Research School at Ruhr University, Bochum. Previously he taught Philosophy, History of Science and Jewish Thought at various universities. Today he is also affiliated to the Jacques Loeb Center for History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences at Ben Gurion University, Israel. He has published several books and over 100 articles in academic journals and collections, mostly on history and philosophy of science as well as the humanities. He advocates a philosophical conception of research that emphasizes the role of expert knowledge and other competencies of the scientists/scholars involved. Apart from the LBI project on Jews in German-speaking Academia, he is working on 19th century methodology and on some systematic aspects of the relationship between science and Jewish religion. Recent projects include the role of Jews in the history of philology, the historian Victor Ehrenberg and German-Jewish history of music.
Among his books are:
- (with U. Deichmann) eds., Jews and Sciences in German Contexts. Case Studies from the 19th and 20th Centuries (Schriftenreihe des Leo-Baeck-Institutes, vol 72), Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr (Siebeck) 2007.
- (with U. Deichmann) eds., Simon Dubnow Institute Yearbook, vol. 3, Teil 2 (Schwerpunkt Wissenschaftsgeschichte) 2004, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, 2004, pp. 149-312.
- Wissen und Handeln – Grundzüge einer Forschungstheorie, Stuttgart/Weimar: J. B. Metzler 2001.
- Grundprobleme der Wissenschaftsphilosophie, Paderborn/München/Wien/Zürich: Schöningh (UTB 1952) 1996.
- Philosophische Wissenschaftshistorie – Grundsatzfragen / Verlaufsmodelle (Wissenschaftstheorie, Wissenschaft und Philosophie, vol. 42), Braunschweig/ Wiesbaden: Vieweg 1995.
- (with Armin Grunwald) Albert Einstein (Campus Einführungen), Frankfurt/New York: Campus 1993.
- Aristoteles (Campus Einführungen), Frankfurt/New York: Campus 1991.
- (ed.) Matthias Jakob Schleiden – Wissenschaftsphilosophische Schriften mit kommentierenden Texten von Jakob Friedrich Fries, Christian G. Nees von Esenbeck u. Gerd Buchdahl (History of the Philosophy of Science), Köln: Dinter 1989,
(separate edition with an essay ‚Zum 100jährigen Bestehen der Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung’, Optisches Museums der Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung 1989).
- (with Paul Janssen) eds., Zeit in Natur und Geschichte (Philosophia Naturalis, 25/1988, 1-2, [in one volume] 1988.
- (ed.) Literatur und Erkenntnis – Texte zum Streit zwischen Dichtung und Wissenschaft (Universalbibliothek 15005), Stuttgart: Reclam 1988.
- Methodologie der Wissenschaft – Theorie literaturwissenschaftlicher Praxis? (Philosophische Texte und Studien vol. 6) Hildesheim/Zürich/New York: Olms 1983.
Recent papers:
- “Anti-Semitism as Mental Mechanism. A Model Suggested by Some Similarities between 19th Century Anti-Semitisms in Music and Science”, in: S. Baumgarten, F. Rash and D. Wildmann (eds). English and German Nationalist and Anti-Semitic Discourse, Oxford: Lang 2011 (forthcoming).
- “Ich setze nur logisches Denken und die deutsche Sprache als bekannt voraus. Zur Geschichte deutschsprachiger jüdischer Mathematiker”, NTM Zeitschrift für Geschichte der Wissenschaften, Technik und Medizin N. S. 18/2010, 231-243.
- Review: “A. I. Baumgarten, Elias Bickerman as a Historian of the Jews”, Modern Judaism (forthcoming).
- “On How Watson and Crick Discovered what Watson and Crick had Suggested. The Concept of Discovery Rediscovered”, in: History and Philosophy of The Life Sciences 30/2008, pp. 7-30.
- “Darwin, Schleiden, and the ‘London Doctors’. Evolutionism and Microscopical Research in the 19th Century”, in: Darwinism, Philosophy, and Experimental Biology, ed. U. Deichmann and A. S. Travis, Dordrecht: Springer 2010, pp. 7-30 (see also: J General Philosophy of Science 41/2010, pp. 61-84).
- “Des Esels langer Schatten – Überlegungen zur Deutung von Kontroversen”, in: Das Wagnis des Neuen. Kontexte und Restriktionen der Wissenschaft. Fs. K. Fischer zum 60. Geburtstag, ed. H. R. Yousefi u.a., Nordhausen: Traugott Bautz 2009 (forthcoming).
- “Jews and Science”, in: The Cambridge History of Judaism, vol. 8 (The Modern Period), ed. M. Hart u. T. Michels, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (forthcoming).
- (with U. Deichmann)”Jewish Scientists as Geniuses and Epigones – Scientific Practices and Attitudes towards them: Albert Einstein, Ferdinand Cohn, Richard Goldschmidt”, in: Studia Rosenthaliana 40/2007, pp. 75-108.
- “Introduction by the Editors: Problems, Phenomena, Explanatory Approaches”, in: Jews and Sciences in German Contexts (see above), pp. 3-36.
- “Aaron Bernstein’s ‘nächster großer Reformator’ – Einstein, Reform Judaism, and the Fries School”, in: Jews and Sciences in German Contexts (see above), pp. 155-180.
- “Mister Bixby, Monsieur Bernard, and Some other 19th Century Scientist-Philosophers on Knowledge-Based Actions”, in: Journal for General Philosophy of Science 37/2006, pp. 257-268.
- “Kompetenz und technischer Fortschritt – Eine alternative Betrachtungsweise mit einigen Hinweisen zur jüdischen Tradition”, in: Gespaltene Welt? Technikzugänge in der Wissensgesellschaft, eds. M. Kerner and Th. Müller, Köln/Weimar/Wien: Böhlau 2005, pp. 31-47.
- “Eruw techumim – Fortschrittshandeln und Grenzziehung. Analogisierungen im Blick auf Talmud und Wissenschaft”, in: Horizonte des Horizontbegriffs, ed. R. Elm, Sankt Augustin: Academia 2004, pp. 15-31.
- (with U. Deichmann), “Vertrauensvorschuß und wissenschaftliches Fehlhandeln – Eine reliabilistische Modellierung der Fälle Abderhalden, Goldschmidt, Moewus und Waldschmidt-Leitz”, Berichte zur Wissenschaftsgeschichte 27/2004, pp. 187-204.
- (with U. Deichmann) “Jews in the Sciences – Sciences and the Jews: the 19th and 20th Centuries. Introductory Remarks”, Simon Dubnow Institute Yearbook, vol. 3, 2004, pp. 149-159.
- “Matthias Jakob Schleiden (1804-1881). The History of Jewish Interest in Science and the Methodology of Microscopic Botany”, in: Aleph – Historical Studies in Science and Judaism vol. 3, ed. G. Freudenthal, Jerusalem: The Hebrew University / Indiana University Press: 2003, pp. 213-245.
- “Judentum und wissenschaftliche Forschung. Einstellungscluster im späten 19. Jahrhundert und ihr Fortwirken”, in: Simon Dubnow Institute Yearbook, vol. 3, 2004, pp. 175-198.
- “Matthias Jakob Schleiden”, in: Naturphilosophie im 19. Jahrhundert, eds. O. Breidbach und Th. Bach, Bad Cannstatt: Frommann-Holzboog 2004, pp. 627-653.
