Hans Reichenbach, German philosopher from the Vienna Circle (b. 1891)

Hans Reichenbach (September 26, 1891 – April 9, 1953) was a leading philosopher of science, educator, and proponent of logical empiricism. He was influential in the areas of science, education, and of logical empiricism. He founded the Gesellschaft für empirische Philosophie (Society for Empirical Philosophy) in Berlin in 1928, also known as the “Berlin Circle”. Carl Gustav Hempel, Richard von Mises, David Hilbert and Kurt Grelling all became members of the Berlin Circle.

In 1930, Reichenbach and Rudolf Carnap became editors of the journal Erkenntnis. He also made lasting contributions to the study of empiricism based on a theory of probability; the logic and the philosophy of mathematics; space, time, and relativity theory; analysis of probabilistic reasoning; and quantum mechanics. In 1951, he authored The Rise of Scientific Philosophy, his most popular book.