Point Zero: Death. Günther Anders (Sern) Biography

The project "Point zero Death: Guenther Anders (1902-1992). A Biography" will fill a gap in the biographical research of the history of Austrian philosophers. The central aim of the project is to write an extensive biography of Günther Anders, born Stern (1902-1992), one of the famoust austrian philosophers and cultural critics of the 20th Century. No complete biography has been yet published anywhere in the world. One research by Elke Schubert and four monographical works, which deal with the oeuvre of Guenther Anders, are available. On one hand a biography of Guenther Anders will show the less known Austrian tradition in the discourse of technology and media, on the other it will create a starting point for a further and more intensive confrontation with Guenther Anders` life and work. Apart from this fact it is possible to write along his philosophy of technology a basic biography of a scientist, who stands for several important knowledges in the science community about the 20th century and the European cultural history. Apart from that his life and work has influenced many scientists, artists and politicians in the German and French speaking countries. To understand some of the traditions of European scientists, it is necessary to make a fundamental biographical research of Günther Anders. The biography should not only document Günther Anders` life, but also show the complexity of his work and the onnections to the work of the famous European philosophers and cultural critics of the 20th century, like: Theodor W. Adorno, Hanna Arendt, Samuel Beckett, Walter Benjamin, Bertolt Brecht, Ernst Bloch, Jonas Cohn, Claude Eatherly, Klaus Eichmann, Elisabeth Freundlich, Hermann Hakl, Martin Heidegger, Max Horkheimer, Edmund Husserl, Hans Jonas, Robert Jungk, Herbert Marcuse, Bertrand Russell, Georg Simmel, William Stern. Without a Günther Anders biography, the intellectual history of the 20th Century will not be complete. As we see, that a biography is necessary on the named reasons. Günther Anders was living on the transition from the mechanical to the technological civilization. He is not only gone personal through this transition, he has also observed and documented it. His philosophy is very interesting, and so is indeed his life. It shows a men, who is determinated from his family (his parents were William and Clara Stern) to luckyness, but born in a world, which is able to destroy mankind. And this possibility is upright know, which we can see in the development of weapons, computers and biotechnology. The first necessary step should be a complete bibliography. The second one would be to research in the William Stern Archive (Harvard College) and in his legacy (the owner is Mr. Gerhard Oberschlick). Then it would be necessary to complete the resulting material by qualitative interviews with contemporary witnesses, acquaintances and living family members. To this extend it will be important to meet the Anders-Stern- Family in Israel, the Stern-Marchwitza-Family in Germany and the Zelka-Family in the United States. The writing of Guenther Anders Biography and the presentation of his philosophy will follow his "geographical life" - from Breslau (1902), where he is born, to Berlin (Germany), where he became a philosopher, to France and USA as an emigrant, to Vienna (Austria), where he stayed till his death in 1992. Essential questions are: the relationship to his father, to his wives and his lovers, his experiences with and his reflexions on the diversity of processes of destruction in the modern period. Guenther Anders` life and his works make it possible to show and discuss all the main problems of the modern society in the 20th century: Industrialization and War, Fascism, Emigration and Holocaust, Atomic Weapons and Nuclear Energy, Mass Media and Politics.