Rudolf Haller - Biography#

Obituary#

By Friedrich Stadler, Professor für Wissenschaftsgeschichte und Wissenschaftstheorie, Vorstand des Instituts Wiener Kreis, Vienna University (Friedrich.Stadler@univie.ac.at

Rudolf Haller (1929-2014) On February 14 the renowned Austrian philosopher Rudolf Haller (professor emeritus) passed away in his hometown of Graz. He was 85 and had been suffering from a serious illness for some time. Haller, who was born in St. Gallen in 1929, studied philosophy, history and history of art at the University of Graz and afterwards pursued post-doctoral studies in Oxford. After obtaining his habilitation in philosophy at the University of Graz in 1961, he also taught at the University of Munich and the University of Hannover. In 1967 he was appointed Professor of Philosophy (Philosophische Grundlagenforschung). Until becoming Professor Emeritus in 1997, Haller’s teaching and research concerned analytical philosophy and the history of Austrian philosophy, in particular Bolzano, Brentano, Mach, Meinong, Vienna Circle, Wittgenstein and Popper.

Haller’s career was distinguished by numerous achievements. In 1983 he established, with the support of the Ministry of Science, the “Center for the Documentation and Research of Austrian Philosophy” which he directed until his retirement. This center became one of the most important for the study of philosophy in Austria. Together with Adolf Hübner, Elisabeth and Werner Leinfellner, Paul Weingartner, Haller was one of the originators of the “Austrian Ludwig Wittgenstein Society” founded in 1976 (it continues to organize and hold the annual International Wittgenstein Congress in Kirchberg/Wechsel.) Through these activities and the many well-known foreign philosophers that he invited to Graz he was instrumental in opening up Austrian philosophy to international developments and breaking the provincial isolation that it had suffered from after World War 2. Haller also, by serving for many years as the head of its Scientific Board, contributed significantly to the founding and consolidation of the Vienna Circle Institute which has become internationally renowned and is now part of Philosophy Faculty of the University of Vienna. Important impulses came from the journal that Haller launched in 1975, the “Grazer Philosophische Studien. Internationale Zeitschrift für analytische Philosophe” as well as the book series he edited for many years “Studien zur österreichischen Philosophie”. It is in this series that his own Studien zur österreichischen Philosophie (Studies on Austrian Philosophy) appeared as volume 1 and his Fragen zu Wittgenstein und Aufsätze zur österreichischen Philosophie (Questions on Wittgenstein and Essays on Austrian Philosophy) as volume 10 in 1986. In 1993 he published Neopositivismus and throughout most of 1990s he was one of the directors of the Graz Modernity project for which he edited Nach Kakanien. Annäherung an die Moderne (Towards Kakania. Approaching Modernity) in 1996.

Haller made important contributions to philosophy through his editorial work on the complete writings of Alexius Meinong, the collected writings of Otto Neurath and the publications of the Austrian Ludwig Wittgenstein Society, but he will be remembered mainly for his own writings on Wittgenstein, on the Vienna Circle and on the development of a typically Austrian philosophy since the 19th century (whose main features are critique of language, symbolic logic and an empirical orientation, contrasting with the dialectical or transcendental character of German philosophy: the “Neurath-Haller thesis”). Two Festschrifts and numerous visiting professorships and honors marked the international career of this outstanding philosopher. In person he stood out not only with his exceptional expertise, but also with his openness, creativity and humanity. He was an irreplaceable representative of the intellectual and scientific community both in Austria and abroad and he will be much missed here and internationally.