Christian von Ehrenfels
Encyclopedia
Christian von Ehrenfels (June 2, 1859 in Rodaun near Vienna - September 8, 1932 in
Lichtenau
) was an Austria
n philosopher
, and is known as one of the founders and precursors of Gestalt psychology
.
in Lower Austria
. He joined secondary school in Krems and first studied at the Hochschule für Bodenkultur in Vienna and then changed to the Universität Wien
.
There he studied philosophy, was a pupil of Franz Brentano
and Alexius Meinong
, promoted under supervision of Meinong, following him after his move to the Karl-Franzens-Universität (Graz), in 1885 on the topic of Größenrelationen und Zahlen. Eine psychologische Studie ("Relations of magnitude and numbers. A psychological study"). He obtained his habilitiation in 1888 in Vienna with the work Über Fühlen und Wollen ("On feeling and willing"). From 1896 to 1929 he was professor of philosophy at the German university of Prague. Interested in his lectures were among others Max Brod
, Franz Kafka
and Felix Weltsch
.
His daughter was the author Imma von Bodmershof
and his son Rolf
, a professor of anthropology who converted to Islam in 1927 and assumed the name Omar. Omar Rolf's wife, Elfriede von Bodmershof, was a literary person. As well, she registered the pseudonym "Kurban Said
" as belonging to her for the novels "Ali and Nino" as well as "Girl from the Golden Horn." However, Lucy Tal whose company E.P. Tal had published "Ali and Nino" wrote her lawyer saying, "I had never heard of the Baroness... Also my late husband's right hand and secretary knew nothing of the Baroness. Only much later, when for some reason, we looked at Buchhaendler Boersenblatt, we discovered the Baroness as Kurban Said. Of course, under the Nazis pseudonyms were born, people unrightful had themselves as authors ..."
and Ernst Mach
. Max Wertheimer
is to be credited as the founder of the movement of Gestalt psychology. The concept of Gestalt
itself was first introduced in contemporary philosophy and psychology by Ehrenfels in his famous work Über Gestaltqualitäten (On the Qualities of Form, 1890). Both he and Edmund Husserl
seem to have been inspired by Mach's work Beiträge zur Analyse der Empfindungen (Contributions to the Analysis of the Sensations, 1886) to formulate their very similar concepts of Gestalt and Figural Moment respectively.
Famous became his transition of a melody to another key. Ehrenfels explained that a melody consists of individual sounds, but that it is considerably more than the sum of these notes. The individual notes would be able to join themselves for completely different melodies, while the melody would remain the same, if transposed into another key and containing single tones.
This new opinion, that came up to a “perception of the whole” compared to its “parts” Ehrenfels called Gestaltqualitäten (Figure qualities).
(Compare with: Aristotle
(trans. 1952) “In the case of all things that have several parts and in which the whole is not like a heap, but is a particular something besides the parts, there must be some such uniting factor”.)
Ehrenfels argued in numerous culture-scientifical and sexual-political writings against the cultural harmfulness of monogamy
and for the utopia of a polygynian
social order. He defended the opinion that monogamy would hinder a darwinistic
reproduction-logic and procreation-selection, what would have a devastating affect on society in a cultural-biological way and therefore monogamy should be combated. With those theories, Ehrenfels exposed himself to a massive criticism, because he offered with his theories unimaginable thoughts to contemporian conventions.
The Czech Zionist, philosopher and friend of Kafka Felix Weltsch
wrote many essays and memos about Ehrenfels, who himself was of partly Jewish descent. He was one of his most important pupils.
Lichtenau
Lichtenau
Lichtenau may refer to:In Germany:* Towns and municipalities:**Hessisch Lichtenau**Lichtenau, Baden-Württemberg**Lichtenau, Bavaria**Lichtenau, Saxony**Lichtenau, Westphalia* Localities:**Lichtenau, Feuchtwangen**Lichtenau, Lübbenau...
) was an Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
n philosopher
Philosophy
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
, and is known as one of the founders and precursors of Gestalt psychology
Gestalt psychology
Gestalt psychology or gestaltism is a theory of mind and brain of the Berlin School; the operational principle of gestalt psychology is that the brain is holistic, parallel, and analog, with self-organizing tendencies...
.
Life
On June 20, 1859 Christian von Ehrenfels was born in Rodaun near Vienna and grew up at his father's castle Brunn am WaldeLichtenau im Waldviertel
Lichtenau im Waldviertel is a town in the district of Krems-Land in the Austrian state of Lower Austria....
in Lower Austria
Lower Austria
Lower Austria is the northeasternmost state of the nine states in Austria. The capital of Lower Austria since 1986 is Sankt Pölten, the most recently designated capital town in Austria. The capital of Lower Austria had formerly been Vienna, even though Vienna is not officially part of Lower Austria...
. He joined secondary school in Krems and first studied at the Hochschule für Bodenkultur in Vienna and then changed to the Universität Wien
University of Vienna
The University of Vienna is a public university located in Vienna, Austria. It was founded by Duke Rudolph IV in 1365 and is the oldest university in the German-speaking world...
.
There he studied philosophy, was a pupil of Franz Brentano
Franz Brentano
Franz Clemens Honoratus Hermann Brentano was an influential German philosopher and psychologist whose influence was felt by other such luminaries as Sigmund Freud, Edmund Husserl, Kazimierz Twardowski and Alexius Meinong, who followed and adapted his views.-Life:Brentano was born at Marienberg am...
and Alexius Meinong
Alexius Meinong
Alexius Meinong was an Austrian philosopher, a realist known for his unique ontology...
, promoted under supervision of Meinong, following him after his move to the Karl-Franzens-Universität (Graz), in 1885 on the topic of Größenrelationen und Zahlen. Eine psychologische Studie ("Relations of magnitude and numbers. A psychological study"). He obtained his habilitiation in 1888 in Vienna with the work Über Fühlen und Wollen ("On feeling and willing"). From 1896 to 1929 he was professor of philosophy at the German university of Prague. Interested in his lectures were among others Max Brod
Max Brod
Max Brod was a German-speaking Czech Jewish, later Israeli, author, composer, and journalist. Although he was a prolific writer in his own right, he is most famous as the friend and biographer of Franz Kafka...
, Franz Kafka
Franz Kafka
Franz Kafka was a culturally influential German-language author of short stories and novels. Contemporary critics and academics, including Vladimir Nabokov, regard Kafka as one of the best writers of the 20th century...
and Felix Weltsch
Felix Weltsch
Felix Weltsch , Dr. jur et phil., was a German-speaking Jewish librarian, philosopher, author, editor, publisher and journalist...
.
His daughter was the author Imma von Bodmershof
Imma von Bodmershof
Imma von Bodmershof was an Austrian poetess born in Graz. She received the Grand Austrian State Prize in 1958 for her work Sieben Handvoll Salz , a novel set in Sicily. She was notorious in her contribution to Islamic literature...
and his son Rolf
Baron omar Rolf von Ehrenfels
- Life outline :Omar, or as he later chose, Umar Rolf Ehrenfels was born 28 April 1901 in Prague, Austria. His father was Baron Christian von Ehrenfels professor of philosophy at the German part of Prague University. He is known as the founder of the Gestalt theory. His mother was Emma von...
, a professor of anthropology who converted to Islam in 1927 and assumed the name Omar. Omar Rolf's wife, Elfriede von Bodmershof, was a literary person. As well, she registered the pseudonym "Kurban Said
Kurban Said
Kurban Said .Kurban Said is the pseudonym for the author of Ali and Nino, a novel originally published in 1937 in the German language by the Austrian publisher, E.P. Tal...
" as belonging to her for the novels "Ali and Nino" as well as "Girl from the Golden Horn." However, Lucy Tal whose company E.P. Tal had published "Ali and Nino" wrote her lawyer saying, "I had never heard of the Baroness... Also my late husband's right hand and secretary knew nothing of the Baroness. Only much later, when for some reason, we looked at Buchhaendler Boersenblatt, we discovered the Baroness as Kurban Said. Of course, under the Nazis pseudonyms were born, people unrightful had themselves as authors ..."
Intellectual contributions
The idea of Gestalt has its roots in theories by Johann Wolfgang von GoetheJohann Wolfgang von Goethe
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe was a German writer, pictorial artist, biologist, theoretical physicist, and polymath. He is considered the supreme genius of modern German literature. His works span the fields of poetry, drama, prose, philosophy, and science. His Faust has been called the greatest long...
and Ernst Mach
Ernst Mach
Ernst Mach was an Austrian physicist and philosopher, noted for his contributions to physics such as the Mach number and the study of shock waves...
. Max Wertheimer
Max Wertheimer
- External links :* * * * *...
is to be credited as the founder of the movement of Gestalt psychology. The concept of Gestalt
Gestalt psychology
Gestalt psychology or gestaltism is a theory of mind and brain of the Berlin School; the operational principle of gestalt psychology is that the brain is holistic, parallel, and analog, with self-organizing tendencies...
itself was first introduced in contemporary philosophy and psychology by Ehrenfels in his famous work Über Gestaltqualitäten (On the Qualities of Form, 1890). Both he and Edmund Husserl
Edmund Husserl
Edmund Gustav Albrecht Husserl was a philosopher and mathematician and the founder of the 20th century philosophical school of phenomenology. He broke with the positivist orientation of the science and philosophy of his day, yet he elaborated critiques of historicism and of psychologism in logic...
seem to have been inspired by Mach's work Beiträge zur Analyse der Empfindungen (Contributions to the Analysis of the Sensations, 1886) to formulate their very similar concepts of Gestalt and Figural Moment respectively.
Famous became his transition of a melody to another key. Ehrenfels explained that a melody consists of individual sounds, but that it is considerably more than the sum of these notes. The individual notes would be able to join themselves for completely different melodies, while the melody would remain the same, if transposed into another key and containing single tones.
This new opinion, that came up to a “perception of the whole” compared to its “parts” Ehrenfels called Gestaltqualitäten (Figure qualities).
(Compare with: Aristotle
Aristotle
Aristotle was a Greek philosopher and polymath, a student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great. His writings cover many subjects, including physics, metaphysics, poetry, theater, music, logic, rhetoric, linguistics, politics, government, ethics, biology, and zoology...
(trans. 1952) “In the case of all things that have several parts and in which the whole is not like a heap, but is a particular something besides the parts, there must be some such uniting factor”.)
Ehrenfels argued in numerous culture-scientifical and sexual-political writings against the cultural harmfulness of monogamy
Monogamy
Monogamy /Gr. μονός+γάμος - one+marriage/ a form of marriage in which an individual has only one spouse at any one time. In current usage monogamy often refers to having one sexual partner irrespective of marriage or reproduction...
and for the utopia of a polygynian
Polygyny
Polygyny is a form of marriage in which a man has two or more wives at the same time. In countries where the practice is illegal, the man is referred to as a bigamist or a polygamist...
social order. He defended the opinion that monogamy would hinder a darwinistic
Darwinism
Darwinism is a set of movements and concepts related to ideas of transmutation of species or of evolution, including some ideas with no connection to the work of Charles Darwin....
reproduction-logic and procreation-selection, what would have a devastating affect on society in a cultural-biological way and therefore monogamy should be combated. With those theories, Ehrenfels exposed himself to a massive criticism, because he offered with his theories unimaginable thoughts to contemporian conventions.
The Czech Zionist, philosopher and friend of Kafka Felix Weltsch
Felix Weltsch
Felix Weltsch , Dr. jur et phil., was a German-speaking Jewish librarian, philosopher, author, editor, publisher and journalist...
wrote many essays and memos about Ehrenfels, who himself was of partly Jewish descent. He was one of his most important pupils.
Poetry and Fiction
- 1876 - Hadmar von Kuering (Bourgeois tragedy)
- 1876 - Brutus (Bourgeois tragedy)
- 1876 - Richard Löwenherz (Bourgeois tragedy)
- 1885 - Die Brüder von Hartenstein (Drama) -, Graz 1885
- 1890 - Der Kampf des Prometheus (Libretto)
Non-fiction books
- 1886 - Metaphysische Ausführungen im Anschlusse an Emil du Bois-ReymondEmil du Bois-ReymondEmil du Bois-Reymond was a German physician and physiologist, the discoverer of nerve action potential, and the father of experimental electrophysiology.-Life:...
- 1888 - Über Fühlen und Wollen: Eine psychologische Studie -, Carl Gerold & Sohn, Wien 1888
- 1890 - Über Gestaltqualitäten -, In: Vierteljahrsschrift für wissenschaftliche Philosophie 14 (1890), (Page 249-292) (English: "On the Qualities of Form", 1890)
- 1893 - Werttheorie und Ethik -, In: Vierteljahrsschrift für wissenschaftliche Philosophie 17 (1893), (Page 26-110, 200-266, 321-363, 413-425)
- 1894 - Werttheorie und Ethik -, In: Vierteljahrsschrift für wissenschaftliche Philosophie, 18 (1894), (Page 22-97)
- 1897 - System der Werttheorie -, O. Reisland, Leipzig 1898, (2 volumes)
- 1904 - Sexuales, Ober- und Unterbewusstsein -, In: Politisch-Anthropologische Revue 2 (1903-4), (Page 456-476)
- 1904 - Die sexuale Reform -, In: Politisch-Anthropologische Revue 2 (1903–1904) (Page 970-994)
- 1907 - Sexualethik -, J. F. Bergmann, Wiesbaden 1907
- 1911 - Leitziele zur Rassenbewertung -, In: Archiv für Rassen- und Gesellschaftsbiologie 8 (1911), (Page 59-71)
- 1913 - Richard Wagner und seine Apostaten. Ein Beitrag zur Jahrhundertfeier. -, H. Heller Wien & Leipzig 1913
- 1916 - Kosmogonie, Diederichs, Jena 1916
- 1922 - Das Primzahlengesetz, entwickelt und dargestellt auf Grund der Gestalttheorie -, Reisland, Leipzig 1922
- 1930 - Sexualmoral der Zukunft -, In: Archiv für Rassen- und Gesellschaftsbiologie, 22 (1930), (Page 292-304)
Secondary literature
- Reinhard Fabian (Hg.) - Philosophische Schriften -, Philosophia-Verlag, München & Wien 1990 (4 volumes: 1. Werttheorie. (1982), 2. Ästhetik. (1986), 3. Psychologie, Ethik, Erkenntnistheorie. (1988), 4. Metaphysik. (1990))
- Reinhard Fabian - Christian von Ehrenfels: Leben und Werk -, Editions Rodopi, Amsterdam 1986, ISBN 978-90-6203-856-5
- Petra Gehring: Viriler Faktor. Die Sexualwissenschaft des Christian von Ehrenfels. In: Zeitschrift für Ideengeschichte (III, 2, page 40-51), 2009
- Richard Meister - Ehrenfels, Christian Freiherr von. In: Neue Deutsche Biographie, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1959, (Volume 4, page 352f.)
- Volkmar SiguschVolkmar SiguschVolkmar Sigusch is a German sexologist, physician and sociologist. He was from 1973 to 2006 director of the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft [Institute for Sexual Science] at the clinic of the Goethe-University in Frankfurt am Main....
: Geschichte der Sexualwissenschaft -, Campus, Frankfurt / New York 2008, ISBN 978-3-593-38575-4, (Page 327-343) - Volkmar SiguschVolkmar SiguschVolkmar Sigusch is a German sexologist, physician and sociologist. He was from 1973 to 2006 director of the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft [Institute for Sexual Science] at the clinic of the Goethe-University in Frankfurt am Main....
& Günter Grau (Hg.) - Personenlexikon der Sexualforschung -, Campus Frankfurt / New York: 2009, ISBN 978-3-593-39049-9, (Page 119-125)
- Ehrenfels Christian Frh. von - In: Österreichisches Biographisches Lexikon 1815–1950 , Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Wien 1957, (Volume 1, page 226f.)
See also
- School of BrentanoSchool of BrentanoThe School of Brentano refers to the philosophers and psychologists who studied with Franz Brentano and were essentially influenced by him. While it was never a school in the traditional sense, Brentano tried to maintain some cohesion in the school...
- Berlin School of experimental psychology
- Graz SchoolGraz SchoolThe Graz School of experimental psychology and object theory was headed by Alexius Meinong, who was professor and Chair of Philosophy at the University of Graz where he founded the Graz psychological institute ....
- Gestalt collapse phenomenon (Gestalt collapse disorder)