Biography

Kambartel studied mathematics

Mathematics

Mathematics is the study of quantity, space, structure, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns and formulate new conjectures. Mathematicians resolve the truth or falsity of conjectures by mathematical proofs, which are arguments sufficient to convince other mathematicians of their validity...

, physics

Physics

Physics is a natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion through spacetime, along with related concepts such as energy and force. More broadly, it is the general analysis of nature, conducted in order to understand how the universe behaves.Physics is one of the oldest academic...

, chemistry

Chemistry

Chemistry is the science of matter, especially its chemical reactions, but also its composition, structure and properties. Chemistry is concerned with atoms and their interactions with other atoms, and particularly with the properties of chemical bonds....

 and philosophy

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...

 at the University of Münster, where he received his PhD (in mathematics) and his “habilitation”, the postdoctoral lecture qualification (in philosophy). In 1966 he was appointed Professor of Philosophy at the University of Constance, where he took active part in the reformation of the university (“Little Harvard on Lake Constance”). Kambartel has close ties to the Erlangen School of constructivist philosophy of science. He taught at Frankfurt am Main from 1993 until his retirement in 2000.

Kambartel’s main research areas are the philosophy of language

Philosophy of language

Philosophy of language is the reasoned inquiry into the nature, origins, and usage of language. As a topic, the philosophy of language for analytic philosophers is concerned with four central problems: the nature of meaning, language use, language cognition, and the relationship between language...

, the philosophy of the natural sciences, and the philosophy of mind

Philosophy of mind

Philosophy of mind is a branch of philosophy that studies the nature of the mind, mental events, mental functions, mental properties, consciousness and their relationship to the physical body, particularly the brain. The mind-body problem, i.e...

. However, he also did work in logic

Logic

In philosophy, Logic is the formal systematic study of the principles of valid inference and correct reasoning. Logic is used in most intellectual activities, but is studied primarily in the disciplines of philosophy, mathematics, semantics, and computer science...

, action theory

Action theory

Action theory is an area in philosophy concerned with theories about the processes causing willful human bodily movements of more or less complex kind. This area of thought has attracted the strong interest of philosophers ever since Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics...

, ethics

Ethics

Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality—that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.Major branches of ethics include:...

 and the philosophy of economics.

His most important works are the habilitation thesis “Erfahrung und Struktur” (“Experience and Structure”), published by Suhrkamp in 1968, as well as the two anthologies “Theorie und Begründung” (1978, “Theory and Justification”) and “Philosophie der humanen Welt” (1989, “Philosophy of the Human World”), also published by Suhrkamp.

Two major topics are present throughout Kambartel’s work — on the one hand the primacy of practical reason, and on the other the conception of reason as culture.

The first topic shapes his work in the philosophies of science, mind, and action. If practical reason were granted primacy over theoretical reason, if the latter were only possible on the basis of the former, then results obtained by neuroscience

Neuroscience

Neuroscience is the scientific study of the nervous system. Traditionally, neuroscience has been seen as a branch of biology. However, it is currently an interdisciplinary science that collaborates with other fields such as chemistry, computer science, engineering, linguistics, mathematics,...

, for example, could never show that man is determined after all and cannot really act freely.

The second topic does not emerge clearly until his later work, and then it also marks a distance to the constructive attempts of the Erlangen School. Reason was not to be understood exactly, e.g. to be defined as a principle or criterion. Reason was rather a culture you grow into, a social practice within which you cultivate your judgment. Conceptual judgments like Kant

KANT

KANT is a computer algebra system for mathematicians interested in algebraic number theory, performing sophisticated computations in algebraic number fields, in global function fields, and in local fields. KASH is the associated command line interface...

’s formula of man as an end in itself served as comments to parts of the “grammar” of this culture. Contrary to what Kant believed, morality was not supreme; it was only one standard of rationality among others; reason integrated this standard and weighed it up against other standards of rationality.

Books

• Bernard Bolzano
  Bernard Bolzano
  Bernhard Placidus Johann Nepomuk Bolzano , Bernard Bolzano in English, was a Bohemian mathematician, logician, philosopher, theologian, Catholic priest and antimilitarist of German mother tongue.-Family:Bolzano was the son of two pious Catholics...
  
  's Grundlegung der Logik. Ausgewählte Paragraphen aus der Wissenschaftslehre, Vol. 1 and 2, with supplementary text summaries, an introduction and indices, edited by F. Kambartel, Hamburg, 1963, 1978².
• Erfahrung und Struktur. Bausteine zu einer Kritik des Empirismus und Formalismus, Frankfurt a.M., 1968, 19762; Span.: Buenos Aires, 1972.
• Gottlob Frege
  Gottlob Frege
  Friedrich Ludwig Gottlob Frege was a German mathematician, logician and philosopher. He is considered to be one of the founders of modern logic, and made major contributions to the foundations of mathematics. He is generally considered to be the father of analytic philosophy, for his writings on...
  
  : Nachgelassene Schriften, with contributions from G. Gabriel and W. Rödding, edited, introduced, and commented by H. Hermes, F. Kambartel, F. Kaulbach, Hamburg, 1969; Engl.: Oxford, 1979.
• Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie, co-edited by F. Kambartel, Stuttgart / Basel, 1971ff.
• Zum normativen Fundament der Wissenschaft, edited by F. Kambartel, J. Mittelstraß, Frankfurt a.M., 1973.
• Wissenschaftstheorie als Wissenschaftskritik (together with P. Janich, J. Mittelstraß), Frankfurt a.M., 1974.
• Praktische Philosophie und konstruktive Wissenschaftstheorie, edited by F. Kambartel, Frankfurt a.M., 1974.
• Theorie und Begründung. Studien zum Philosophie- und Wissenschaftsverständnis, Frankfurt a.M., 1976.
• Philosophie der humanen Welt. Abhandlungen, Franfurt a.M., 1989.
• Vernunftkritik nach Hegel. Analytisch-kritische Interpretation zur Dialektik, edited by Chr. Demmerling, F. Kambartel, Frankfurt a.M., 1992.
• Philosophie und Politische Ökonomie, Göttingen, 1998.
• Sprachphilosophie. Probleme und Methoden (together with P. Stekeler-Weithofer), Stuttgart, 2005.

Papers in journals and anthologies

(This list does not include the papers from the anthologies: "Philosophie der humanen Welt", "Philosophie und politische Ökonomie" and "Theorie und Begründung".)

• Symbolic Acts. Remarks on the Foundation of a Pragmatic Theory of Language, in: (edited by G. Ryle) Contemporary Aspects of Philosophy, Stockfield, 1976, 70 – 85; German: Symbolische Handlungen. Überlegungen zu den Grundlagen einer pragmatischen Theorie der Sprache, in: (edited by J. Mittelstraß, M. Riedel) Vernünftiges Denken. Studien zur praktischen Philosophie und Wissenschaftstheorie, Berlin, 1978, 3 – 22.
• Versuch über das Verstehen, in: (edited by B. McGuiness, J. Habermas, K.-O. Apel, R. Rorty, Ch. Taylor, F. Kambartel, A. Wellmer) Der Löwe spricht … und wir können ihn nicht verstehen, Frankfurt a.M., 1991, 121-137; also in: (edited by P. Stekeler-Weithofer) Geschichte der Philosophie in Text und Darstellung, Vol. 9: Gegenwart, Stuttgart, 2004, 288 – 309.
• Über die praktische Form unseres Lebens, in: (edited by H. Schnädelbach, G. Keil) Philosophie der Gegenwart – Gegenwart der Philosophie, Hamburg, 1993, 281 – 289.
• Normative Bemerkungen zum Problem einer naturwissenschaftlichen Definition des Lebens, in: (edited by A. Barkhaus and co.) Identität, Leiblichkeit, Normativität, Frankfurt a.M., 1996, 109 – 114; also in: (edited by A. Krebs) Naturethik, Frankfurt a.M., 1997, 331 - 336.
• Wahrheit und Vernunft. Zur Entwicklung ihrer praktischen Grundlagen, in: (edited by Ch. Hubig) Cognitio Humana. Dynamik des Wissens und der Werte, Berlin, 1997, 175 – 187; abbreviated version in: Information Philosophie, 1997, Booklet 4, 5 – 17.
• Die Aktualität des philosophischen Konstruktivismus, in: (edited by Chr. Thiel) Akademische Gedenkfeier für Paul Lorenzen, Akademische Reden und Kolloquien der Friedrich Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg, Vol. 13, Erlangen / Nürnberg, 1998, 25 – 36.
• Wahrheit und Begründung, in: Dialektik. Enzyklopädische Zeitschrift für Philosophie und Wissenschaften, 1999, 37 – 52.
• Strenge und Exaktheit, in: (edited by G.-L. Lueken) Formen der Argumentation = Leipziger Schriften zur Philosophie, 11, Leipzig, 2000, 75 – 85.
• Semantischer Inhalt und Begründung, in: (edited by A. Fuhrmann, E.J. Olsson) Pragmatisch denken, Frankfurt / Lancaster, 2004, 135 – 145.
• Geist und Natur. Bemerkungen zu ihren normativen Grundlagen, in: (edited by G. Wolters, M. Carrier) Homo Sapiens und Homo Faber. Epistemische und technische Rationalität in Antike und Gegenwart, Berlin / New York, 2005, 253 – 265.
• Meaning, Justification, and Truth, in: Pragmatics & Cognition, 13, 2005, 109 – 119.

Entries in encyclopedias

• In: (edited by J. Ritter) Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie, Basel / Stuttgart, 1971–1989, the entries: Abfolge; Anschauungssatz / Begriffssatz; Bedingung; Erfahrung; Größe; Methode (together with R. Welter); Naturgeschichte; Analytische Philosophie und Wissenschaftstheorie (together with G. Gabriel, Th. Rentsch).
• In: (edited by J. Mittelstraß) Enzyklopädie Philosophie und Wissenschaftstheorie, Vol. 1 and 2, Mannheim / Zürich / Wien, 1980–1984, Vol. 3 and 4, Stuttgart / Weimar, 1995–1996, the entries: Abfolge; allgemein (ethisch); Analogien der Erfahrung; Analytik; Anschauung; analytisch; Antizipationen der Wahrnehmung; Apprädikator; a priori; Arbeit; Ästhetik, transzendentale; Bacon, F.; Bedingung; Begründung; Besonnenheit; Bolzano, B.; Brückenprinzip; Empirismus; Erlanger Schule; finit/Finitismus; Folge (logisch); Frankfurter Schule; Frieden; Gebrauchswert; Gelassenheit; Grenznutzen; Größe; Größenlehre; Grund; Grundlagenforschung; Grundsatz; ceteris-paribus-Klausel (together with R. Wimmer); Idee (systematisch); Keynes, J.M.; Konsens; Leben, gutes; Leben, vernünftiges; Lebensqualität; Malthus, T.R.; Mehrwert; Metaethik; Mittel; Moral; Moralismus; Moralität; Norm (handlungstheoretisch, moralphilosophisch); normativ; Normierung; Nutzen; Ökonomie, politische; Pascal
  Blaise Pascal
  Blaise Pascal , was a French mathematician, physicist, inventor, writer and Catholic philosopher. He was a child prodigy who was educated by his father, a tax collector in Rouen...
  
  , B.; Person (together with A. Krebs, Th. Jantschek); Philosophie, praktisch; Pluralismus; Positivismus (systematisch); Pragmatik; pragmatisch; Prinzip; Rechtfertigung; Regel (together with Th. Jantschek); Ritter, J.; Satz an sich; Schema; Schematismus; Scholz, H.; Selbstzweck; Sinnkriterium, empiristisches (together with M. Carrier); Sokrates; Struktur; Stufe; Symbol (together with B. Gräfrath); Tauschwert; theoretisch; Theorie, kritische; Theorie und Praxis; transsubjektiv / Transsubjektivität; Universalisierung; Universalität (ethisch); Utopismus; Verifikationsprinzip (together with M. Carrier); Verstandesbegriffe, reine; Voraussetzung; voraussetzungslos / Voraussetzungslosigkeit; Vorstellung an sich; Wertgesetz; Whitehead, A. N.; Wissenschaft; Wissenschaftskritik.

Unpublished papers

• Unterscheidungen zur Praktischen Philosophie. Mit Blick auf die Diskursethik. Frankfurt a.M., 1992/1993.
• Wahrheit und Begründung. Zur Grammatik von Geltungsansprüchen. I. Allgemeine Überlegungen, II. Praktische Urteile, Frankfurt a.M., 1997.

External links

• Complete bibliography