Michael Polanyi (born Polányi Mihály) (March 11, 1891 – February 22, 1976) was a Hungarian–British polymath whose thought and work extended across physical chemistry, economics, and philosophy. He was a Fellow of the Royal Society and a Fellow of Merton College, Oxford. Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... Image File history File links No higher resolution available. ... is the 70th day of the year (71st in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1891 (MDCCCXCI) was a common year starting on Thursday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Saturday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar). ... is the 53rd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1976 Pick up sticks(MCMLXXVI) was a leap year starting on Thursday (link will display full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... Leonardo da Vinci, a polymath, is seen as the epitome of the related term, Renaissance Man A polymath (Greek polymathÄ“s, πολυμαθής, having learned much)[1][2] is a person with encyclopedic, broad, or varied knowledge or learning. ... Physical chemistry is the application of physics to macroscopic, microscopic, atomic, subatomic, and particulate phenomena in chemical systems[1]within the field of chemistry traditionally using the principles, practices and concepts of thermodynamics, quantum chemistry, statistical mechanics and kinetics. ... Face-to-face trading interactions on the New York Stock Exchange trading floor. ... For other uses, see Philosophy (disambiguation). ... The Fellowship of the Royal Society was founded in 1660. ... and of the Merton College College name The House of Scholars of Merton Named after Walter de Merton Established 1264 Sister college Peterhouse, Cambridge Warden Prof. ...

Early life

Michael was born into a Jewish family in Budapest. His older brother Karl became a famous economist. Their father was an engineer and entrepreneur whose volatile fortunes building railways perhaps encouraged Polanyi to seek a career in medicine. He graduated in 1913, and shortly afterwards served as a physician in the Austro-Hungarian army during World War I, but was hospitalised, and during his convalescence wrote what became a doctorate in physical chemistry from the University of Budapest (supervised by Gusztáv Buchböck) in 1917. For other uses, see Jew (disambiguation). ... For other uses, see Budapest (disambiguation). ... Karl Paul Polanyi (October 21, 1886 - Pickering, Ontario April 23, 1964) was a Hungarian intellectual known for his opposition to traditional economic thought and his influential book The Great Transformation. ... Alan Greenspan, former chairman, United States Federal Reserve. ... Look up engineer in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... An entrepreneur (a loanword from French introduced and first defined by the Irish economist Richard Cantillon) is a person who operates a new enterprise or venture and assumes some accountability for the inherent risks. ... For the chemical substances known as medicines, see medication. ... Year 1913 (MCMXIII) was a common year starting on Wednesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Tuesday of the 13-day-slower Julian calendar). ... Austria-Hungary, also known as the Dual monarchy (or: the k. ... “The Great War ” redirects here. ... This article is about Eötvös Loránd University, which is often referred to as University of Budapest. ... 1917 (MCMXVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar (see link for calendar) or a common year starting on Tuesday of the 13-day slower Julian calendar (see: 1917 Julian calendar). ...

In 1920, he emigrated to Germany, eventually ending up as a research chemist at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Fiber Chemistry in Berlin. There, he married Magda Elizabeth in a Roman Catholic ceremony. In 1929, Magda gave birth to a son John, who went on to win a Nobel Prize in chemistry. With the coming to power in 1933 of the Nazi party Polanyi eventually accepted the offer of a chair in in Physical Chemistry at the University of Manchester. As a consequence of his shift of interest from chemistry to economics to philosophy Manchester created a new chair in Social Science (1948-58) for him. Year 1920 (MCMXX) was a leap year starting on Thursday (link will display 1920) of the Gregorian calendar. ... Kaiser Wilhelm Institute (in German Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gesellschaft) was the name of a number of scientific institutes in Germany before World War II. After 1945 they were re-organised and renamed as Max Planck Institutes. ... This article is about the capital of Germany. ... The Roman Catholic Church, most often spoken of simply as the Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with over one billion members. ... Year 1929 (MCMXXIX) was a common year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... John Charles Polanyi (born January 23, 1929) is a Canadian chemist. ... The Nobel Prize (Swedish: ), as designated in Alfred Nobels will in 1895, is awarded in Physics, Chemistry, Physiology or Medicine, Literature, and Peace. ... Nazism in history Nazi ideology Nazism and race Outside Germany Related subjects Lists Politics Portal         Nazism or National Socialism (German: Nationalsozialismus), refers primarily to the ideology and practices of the Nazi Party (National Socialist German Workers Party, German: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP) under Adolf Hitler. ... Affiliations Russell Group, EUA, N8 Group, NWUA, Worldwide Universities Network (WUN) Website http://www. ... The social sciences are groups of academic disciplines that study the human aspects of the world. ...

Physical chemistry

Polanyi's scientific interests were diverse, embracing chemical kinetics, x-ray diffraction and the absorption of gases at solid surfaces. In physical chemistry, chemical kinetics or reaction kinetics is the study of reaction rates in a chemical reaction. ... X-ray crystallography is a technique in crystallography in which the pattern produced by the diffraction of x-rays through the closely spaced lattice of atoms in a crystal is recorded and then analyzed to reveal the nature of that lattice. ... Gas can also refer to gasoline and natural gas and also hydrogen. ... For other uses, see Solid (disambiguation). ... An open surface with X-, Y-, and Z-contours shown. ...

In 1934, Polanyi, roughly contemporarily with G. I. Taylor and Egon Orowan realised that the plastic deformation of ductile materials could be explained in terms of the theory of dislocations developed by Vito Volterra in 1905. The insight was critical in developing the modern science of solid mechanics. Year 1934 (MCMXXXIV) was a common year starting on Monday (link will display full 1934 calendar) of the Gregorian calendar. ... Sir Geoffrey Ingram Taylor (7 March 1886 - 27 June 1975) was a physicist, mathematician and expert on fluid dynamics and wave theory. ... Egon Orowan (in Hungarian Orován Egon) (August 2, 1901 — August 3, 1989) was an Hungarian/US physicist and metallurgist. ... For other uses, see Plasticity. ... Ductility is the physical property of being capable of sustaining large plastic deformations without fracture (in metals, such as being drawn into a wire). ... In materials science, a dislocation is a crystallographic defect, or irregularity, within a crystal structure. ... Vito Volterra (May 3, 1860 - October 11, 1940) was an Italian mathematician and physicist, best known for his contributions to mathematical biology. ... For other uses, see 1905 (disambiguation). ... Solid mechanics is the branch of physics and mathematics that concern the behavior of solid matter under external actions (e. ...

Philosophy of science

From the mid-1930s, Polanyi began to articulate his opposition to the prevailing positivist account of science, arguing that it failed to recognise the part which personal commitment and tacit knowing play in science. The 1930s (years from 1930–1939) were described as an abrupt shift to more radical and conservative lifestyles, as countries were struggling to find a solution to the Great Depression, also known as the World Depression. ... Positivism is a philosophy developed by Auguste Comte in the beginning of the 19th century, which stated that the only authentic knowledge is scientific knowledge. ... Look up commitment in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... The concept of tacit knowing comes from scientist and philosopher Michael Polanyi. ...

Polanyi argues that positivism encourages the belief that science ought to be directed by the State. He drew attention for example to what happened to genetics in the Soviet Union, once the doctrines of Trofim Lysenko were deemed to be politically correct. Polanyi, like his friend Friedrich Hayek, supplied reasons why it is desirable to live within a free society. Positivism is a philosophy developed by Auguste Comte in the beginning of the 19th century, which stated that the only authentic knowledge is scientific knowledge. ... Trofim Denisovich Lysenko (Russian: Трофи́м Дени́сович Лысе́нко) (September 29, 1898–November 20, 1976) was a Soviet politician who made pretense of being a biologist. ... Friedrich August von Hayek, CH (May 8, 1899 in Vienna – March 23, 1992 in Freiburg) was an Austrian-born British economist and political philosopher known for his defense of liberal democracy and free-market capitalism against socialist and collectivist thought in the mid-20th century. ...

Polanyi embraced the existence of objective truth (Personal Knowledge, p. 16). However, he criticised the notion that there is something called the scientific method which enables science to mechanistically supply us with truths. Scientific method is a body of techniques for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, or correcting and integrating previous knowledge. ...

Instead, he argued that all knowing personal, and as such relies upon fallible commitments. Our skills, biases, and passions are not flaws but play an important and necessary role in discovery and validation. No observer can remove themselves from their observations and judgements, nor should they, it is enough that we act in accordance with the consequences imposed upon us by our beliefs. What saves this claim from relativism is his belief that our tacit awareness connects us with realities, although as our tacit awareness relies upon assumptions acquired within a local context, we cannot simply assume that they have universal validity, we must rather be open to the possibility of error while seeking to identify objective truths. Any process of articulation however inevitably relies upon that which we have not articulated, indeed reliance upon what we have not articulated is how words become meaningful i.e. meaning is not reducible to a set of rules, it is grounded in our experience of the world - where experience is not something that can simply be reduced to collections of sense data.

Polanyi acknowledged the role played by inherited practices (tradition). The fact that we know more than we can clearly articulate contributes to the conclusion that much knowledge is passed on by non-explicit means, such as apprenticeship (observing a master, and then practicing under the master's guidance). For other uses, see Tradition (disambiguation). ... Apprenticeship is a system of training a new generation of skilled crafts practitioners, which is still popular in some countries. ...

Polanyi's philosophical ideas are most fully expressed in the Gifford lectures he gave in 1951–52 at the University of Aberdeen which resulted in the book Personal Knowledge. These ideas would influence the thought and work of Thomas Kuhn and Paul Feyerabend in the 1960s. The Gifford Lectures were established by the will of Adam Lord Gifford (d. ... The University of Aberdeen was founded in 1495, in Aberdeen, Scotland. ... Thomas Samuel Kuhn (July 18, 1922 – June 17, 1996) was an American intellectual who wrote extensively on the history of science and developed several important notions in the philosophy of science. ... Paul Karl Feyerabend (January 13, 1924 – February 11, 1994) was an Austrian-born philosopher of science best known for his work as a professor of philosophy at the University of California, Berkeley, where he worked for three decades (1958-1989). ... The 1960s decade refers to the years from 1960 to 1969. ...

Economics

Polanyi applied his philosophy of science to the field of economics in his 1951 book, The Logic of Liberty, a collection of essays most of which had been published in the 1940s. He elaborated on the connections in a 1962 article, "The Republic of Science: Its Political and Economic Theory" in Minerva.^[1][2] Polanyi extrapolated his conclusions about the structure of liberty from within the context of science.

Polanyi noted that scientists cooperate with each other, or "self coordinate," in a way similar to that in which individuals coordinate in the free market. Even though each scientist pursues his own goals, the scientist reacts to the limited available knowledge produced by nearby, relevant actors. The dedicated communities of scientists are formed however by a commitment to truth that transcends the market. Other examples of dedicated communities is the pursuit of justice within the legal community as an end which transcends the rewards of the market. Because ends such as truth and justice transcend our ability to wholly articulate them, a society which gives these communities the freedom to pursue these ends is desirable. Scientists, like entrepreneurs, require the freedom to pursue discoveries and react to the claims made by their peers. In The Republic of Science, Polanyi thus urged societies to allow the freedom to pursue science for its own sake: A free market is an idealized market, where all economic decisions and actions by individuals regarding transfer of money, goods, and services are voluntary, and are therefore devoid of coercion and theft (some definitions of coercion are inclusive of theft). Colloquially and loosely, a free market economy is an economy... Entrepreneurs created by Thomas Clarke in 2001. ...

"...[S]cientists, freely making their own choice of problems and pursuing them in the light of their own personal judgment, are in fact cooperating as members of a closely knit organization. ...

"Such self-co-ordination of independent initiatives leads to a joint result which is unpremeditated by any of those who bring it about. Their co-ordination is guided as by an "invisible hand" towards the joint discovery of a hidden system of things. Since its end-result is unknown, this kind of co-operation can only advance stepwise, and the total performance will be the best possible if each consecutive step is decided upon by the person most competent to do so. ... For other uses, see Invisible hand (disambiguation). ...

"Any attempt to organize the group ... under a single authority would eliminate their independent initiatives and thus reduce their joint effectiveness to that of the single person directing them from the centre. It would, in effect, paralyse their cooperation."

Family

Michael Polanyi's son, John Charles Polanyi, is a Professor of Chemistry at the University of Toronto, Canada. In 1986 John Polanyi was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry.^[3] John Charles Polanyi (born January 23, 1929) is a Canadian chemist. ... The University of Toronto (U of T) is a public research university in the city of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. ... This is a list of Nobel Prize laureates in Chemistry from 1901 to 2006. ...

See also

• Tacit knowledge
• Knowledge management

The concept of tacit knowing comes from scientist and philosopher Michael Polanyi. ... Knowledge Management (KM) comprises a range of practices used by organisations to identify, create, represent, and distribute knowledge for reuse, awareness and learning. ...

References

Bibliography

• Polanyi, M (1932) Atomic Reactions Williams and Norgate, London.
• Polanyi, M (1946) Science, Faith, and Society ISBN 0-226-67290-5
• Polanyi, M (1951) The Logic of Liberty ISBN 0-226-67296-4
• Polanyi, M (1964) Personal Knowledge: Towards a Post-Critical Philosophy ISBN 0-226-67288-3
• Polanyi, M (1967) The Tacit Dimension ISBN 0-8446-5999-1 (1983 Doubleday reprint)
• Polanyi, M & Prosch, H (1975) Meaning ISBN 0-226-67294-8

Further reading

• Richard Gelwick, The Way of Discovery, An Introduction to the Thought of Michael Polanyi. Eugene, Oregon: Wipf and Stock, 2004, 181, pp. ISBN 1-59244-687-6 (English).
• Mark Mitchell, Michael Polanyi: The Art of Knowing (Library Modern Thinkers Series). Wilmington, Delaware: Intercollegiate Studies Institute, 2006, 220 pp. ISBN 1932236902, ISBN-13 978-1932236903.
• Drusilla Scott, Everyman Revived: The Common Sense of Michael Polanyi. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1995, 216 pp. ISBN 0-8028-4079-5.
• William Taussig Scott and Martin X. Moleski, Michael Polanyi, Scientist and Philosopher. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2005, 364 pp. ISBN-13-978-0-19-517433-5, ISBN 0-19-517433-X.

External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:

Michael Polanyi

• Broad biography by Mary Joe Nye
• Largely philosophical biography by Phil Mullins, Editor of the Polanyi journal Tradition and Discovery
• Polanyi Society home page
• Polanyi resources at erraticimpact.com
• Polanyiana, Volume 8, Number 1-2 published in Budapest.
• 'Michael Polanyi and tacit knowledge' by M. K. Smith (2003), the encyclopedia of informal education