About me
“Eigentlich bin ich ganz anders, nur komme ich so selten dazu.”
(“Actually, I’m quite different. But I so rarely have time to show it.”)
Ödön von Horváth
Areas of Interest: Integrating History and Philosophy of Science, Early Modern Philosophy, Kant, Neo-Kantianism, and Pre-History of the Scientific World View of the Vienna Circle
Rudolf Meer defended his PhD with distinction on November 17, 2017. After a post-doc position at the University of Graz, he was a Marie Curie STAR fellow at the University of Siegen. Since March 2024, Rudolf Meer is the PI of the DFG-funded project Alois Riehl’s Critical Realism: Spatial and Temporal Foundations of Science (project number: 521640504).
Much of his recent work and work in progress centers on the history of philosophical ideas and philosophical analysis of science: especially on the sources of scientific philosophy. This work focuses here on finding links between the 18th and 19th century. In recent papers, he has examined the historical impact of Maupertuis’ principle of least action (↗), the development of psycho-physical monism (↗) , a qualified realism based on Kant (↗), and the relationship between Mach and Riehl (↗).
In addition to his 2018 book Der transzendentale Grundsatz der Vernunft, Meer has written many articles, details of which can be found here and in his ORCID-account. One of his most notable contributions to the profession is his editing work, in particular the special issues The Uses of Reason in Kantian Philosophy of Science in the journal Studies in History and Philosophy of Science and Kant’s Transcendental Dialectic: A Re-Evaluation in the journal Open Philosophy. He is the editor of Alois Riehl’s Philosophical Criticism (Meiner 2023), and co-edited the collection Kant in Österreich (de Gruyter 2021) and Konzepte der Einbildungskraft (de Gruyter 2019).
Meer has a very active speaking career, nationally and internationally. He has been a featured speaker at the Conference of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (2021, 2024), an invited speaker at the Kant-Conference in Oslo, Vienna, Bonn (2019, 2015, 2024), and an invited speaker at multiple venues, notably the LMU, Trier Kant-Colloquium, and the KU Leuven. He has given about 40 talks overall.
Recent Papers
In Kant-Studien (2021): “Die Raum- und Zeitlehre Alois Riehls im Kontext realistischer Interpretationen von Kants transzendentalem Idealismus”, 1–28 [online first].
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/kant-2021-0031
In European Yearbook of the History of Psychology (2022): “Alois Riehl and the History of Psychology: The 1913 Declaration of the Philosophers” (co-author: Josef Hlade), 11–39. DOI: http://doi.org/10.1484/J.EYHP.5.127017
In Open Philosophy (2021): “Between Old and New Teleology. Kant on Maupertuis’ Principle of Least Action ”, 265–280.
Upcoming Events / News
The publishing house Meiner has announced the first volume of the new edition of Alois Riehl’s Philosophical Criticism for spring 2023.