Józef Maria Bocheński

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Józef Maria Bocheński (born August 30, 1902 in Czuszów, Poland - died February 8, 1995 in Fribourg, Switzerland) was a Polish Dominican, logician and philosopher.

After taking part in the 1920 campaign against Bolshevik Russia, he took up legal studies in Lwów, then he studied economy in Poznań. Having received his doctorate in philosophy (studied in Freiburg, 1928-1931) and theology (Rome, 1931-1934), he lectured in logic at the Collegium Angelicum in Rome (until 1940).

During World War II he served as a chaplain for Polish forces fighting in the Invasion of Poland (1939) taken prisoner of war, he escaped the Germans and reached Rome. He joined the Polish army and served as chaplain first in France, and then in England. Fought as a soldier in 1944, in the Italian campaign of the II Corps at Monte Cassino. In 1945 he received the chair of history of twentieth-century philosophy at the University of Fribourg (of which he was Rector in 1964-1966); he founded and ran the Institute of Eastern Europe there, and published the journal Studies in Soviet Thought and a book series concerned with the foundations of the Marxists philosophy (Sovietica).

Bocheński served as consultant to several governments: West Germany (under Adenauer), South Africa, USA, Argentina, and Switzerland. Before 1989 none of his works had been published officially in Poland.

His works include:

Europäische Philosophie der Gegenwart (1947)
Der sowjetrussische Dialektische Materialismus (1950)
Die zeitgenössischen Denkmethoden (1954)
Die kommunistische Ideologie und die Würde, Freiheit und Gleichheit der Menschen im Sinne des Grundgesetzes für die Bundesrepublik Deutschland vom 23.5.1949 (1956)
Formale Logik (1956)
Der sowjetrussische dialektische Materialismus (Diamat) (1962)
The Logic of Religion (1965)
Was ist Autorität? (1974)
Marxismus-Leninismus. Wissenschaft oder Glaube (1973)
Sto zabobonów. Krótki filozoficzny słownik zabobonów ("One Hundred Superstitions. A Short Philosophical Dictionary of Superstitions", 1987).