Ernst von Glasersfeld was a philosopher, and Emeritus Professor of
PsychologyPsychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...
at the
University of GeorgiaThe University of Georgia is a public research university located in Athens, Georgia, United States. Founded in 1785, it is the oldest and largest of the state's institutions of higher learning and is one of multiple schools to claim the title of the oldest public university in the United States...
, Research Associate at the Scientific Reasoning Research Institute, and Adjunct Professor in the Department of Psychology at the
University of MassachusettsThis article relates to the statewide university system. For the flagship campus often referred to as "UMass", see University of Massachusetts Amherst...
,
AmherstAmherst is a town in Hampshire County, Massachusetts, United States in the Connecticut River valley. As of the 2010 census, the population was 37,819, making it the largest community in Hampshire County . The town is home to Amherst College, Hampshire College, and the University of Massachusetts...
. He was a member of the Board of Trustees, American Society of Cybernetics, from which he received the McCulloch Memorial Award in 1991. He was a member of the Scientific Board,
Instituto PiagetInstituto Piaget is a Portuguese private institution of higher education with branches in Almada, Mirandela, Silves, Vila Nova de Gaia and Viseu. The Instituto Piaget provides both university and polytechnic higher education in a number of fields...
,
LisbonLisbon is the capital city and largest city of Portugal with a population of 545,245 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Lisbon extends beyond the administrative city limits with a population of 3 million on an area of , making it the 9th most populous urban...
.
Von Glasersfeld was a proponent of radical constructivism and spent large parts of his life in
IrelandIreland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
(1940s), in
ItalyItaly , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
(1950s) where he worked with
Silvio CeccatoSilvio Ceccato was an Italian philosopher and linguist.Born in Montecchio Maggiore, he studied law and music. In 1949 he founded the international magazine Methodos, which was published until 1964....
, and in the
USThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
.
Elaborating upon
Giambattista VicoGiovanni Battista ' Vico or Vigo was an Italian political philosopher, rhetorician, historian, and jurist....
,
Jean PiagetJean Piaget was a French-speaking Swiss developmental psychologist and philosopher known for his epistemological studies with children. His theory of cognitive development and epistemological view are together called "genetic epistemology"....
's genetic
epistemology, Bishop Berkeley's theory of perception,
James JoyceJames Augustine Aloysius Joyce was an Irish novelist and poet, considered to be one of the most influential writers in the modernist avant-garde of the early 20th century...
's
Finnegans WakeFinnegans Wake is a novel by Irish author James Joyce, significant for its experimental style and resulting reputation as one of the most difficult works of fiction in the English language. Written in Paris over a period of seventeen years, and published in 1939, two years before the author's...
, and other important texts, von Glasersfeld developed his model of Radical Constructivism, which is an
ethosEthos is a Greek word meaning "character" that is used to describe the guiding beliefs or ideals that characterize a community, nation, or ideology. The Greeks also used this word to refer to the power of music to influence its hearer's emotions, behaviors, and even morals. Early Greek stories of...
shared by all of these writers to one degree or another.
He was also the creator of the first 120 symbols of the lexigram, a device used in the field of
animal languageAnimal language is the modeling of human language in non human animal systems. While the term is widely used, researchers agree that animal languages are not as complex or expressive as human language....
.
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