Jean Cavaillès | |
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Born |
Saint-Maixent |
May 15, 1903
Died | February 17, 1944 Arras |
(aged 40)
Alma mater |
École Normale Supérieure University of Paris |
Era | 20th-century philosophy |
Region | Western Philosophy |
School |
Continental philosophy French historical epistemology |
Main interests
|
Philosophy of mathematics |
Notable ideas
|
Philosophy of the concept, dialectics of the concept (dialectique du concept) |
Influences
|
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Influenced
|
Jean Cavaillès (French: [ʒɑ̃ kavajɛs]; May 15, 1903 – February 17, 1944) was a French philosopher and mathematician, specialized in philosophy of science. He took part in the French Resistance within the Libération movement and was shot by the Gestapo on February 17, 1944.
Cavaillès was born in Saint-Maixent, Deux-Sèvres. After a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics, he entered the École Normale Supérieure in 1923, lecturing philosophy. In 1927 he successfully passed the agrégation competitive exam. He began graduate studies in Philosophy in 1928. Cavaillès won a Rockefeller Foundation scholarship in 1929-1930. He was teaching assistant at the École Normale Supérieure between 1929 and 1935, then teacher at the Lycée d'Amiens (now Lycée Louis-Thuillier ) in 1936. In 1937, he successfully defended his doctoral theses at the University of Paris and became a Doctor of Letters in Philosophy. He then became a lecturer in General and Logical Philosophy in the Faculty of Arts at the University of Strasbourg.
After the outbreaks of World War II, he was mobilized in 1939 as an infantry lieutenant with the 43rd Regiment, and was later attached to the Staff of the 4th Colonial Division. He was honoured for bravery twice, and was captured on June 11, 1940. At the end of July 1940 he escaped from Belgium and fled to Clermont-Ferrand, where the university of Strasbourg was re-organized.