‘The border problems of science and philosophy’: Ilse Rosenthal-Schneider and post-World War 2 science in Australian academia and society

Abstract

Ilse Rosenthal-Schneider (1891–1990), a refugee immigrant to Australia in 1938, was a student of Nobel Prize-winning physicists, Einstein, Planck, and von Laue. She combined a background in physics, especially relativity theory, with a philosophical focus on the nature and possibilities of knowledge. As well as working at the University of Sydney to teach science students how to recognise philosophical issues in their subjects, she drove a major outreach programme to regional towns in New South Wales, where she was fêted by her audiences as a highly accomplished science communicator. Her best-known book, published in 1980, examined her interactions with Einstein, Planck, and von Laue by expanding on how all of them understood the relationship between science and philosophy. Rosenthal-Schneider never achieved a great deal of recognition, due in part to the limited opportunities for women of her era, but also due to her insistence on bridging disciplines and engaging in a scientific and philosophical dialogue beyond academia. We will show how Rosenthal-Schneider explored the borderlands of science and philosophy throughout her life, as she argued for the relevance of philosophical questions to practising scientists and non-academic publics in Australia.