Nicholas Rescher, Pitt philosopher and professor, dies at 95

Nicholas Rescher, former chair of Pitt’s Center for Philosophy of Science, died on Jan. 5 at 95 years old. 

Rescher is a well-known name in the philosophy world, and he “helped establish and maintain Pitt’s Department of Philosophy as one of the world’s top philosophy units,” according to PittWire.

Rescher was born in Germany in 1928 and came to the U.S. as a refugee during the Nazi regime. After graduating with a doctorate from Princeton at 22 years old, he was a Marine and worked at Lehigh University before coming to Pitt in 1961. 

In addition to working in the philosophy department, Rescher was also president of the Metaphysical Society of America and the American Philosophical Association. 

According to Robert Brandom, a Pitt professor of philosophy, Rescher was renowned for the broad amount of topics he knew about and taught.

“There is no area of philosophy — from medieval Arabic to mathematical logic, through philosophy of science, to philosophy of mind, ethics and welfare economics — that he did not think hard about and make contributions to,” Brandom said.