Enlightenment in the 21st century
Prof. Dr. Gerhard Streminger, philosopher
Gerhard Streminger was born in 1952 in Graz, Austria. Beginning in 1970, he studied philosophy and mathematics in Graz, Göttingen, Edinburgh, and Oxford. From 1975 to 1997 he was employed at the Institute of Philosophy at the University of Graz, where he received his PhD in 1978. Three years later he became visiting professor at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis.
Jacques Tilly, sculptor/communication designer
Tilly was born in Düsseldorf in 1963. From 1973 to 1982 he attended the Comenius-Gymnasium in Düsseldorf. From 1985 to 1994 he studied communication design at GH Essen University. He designs and builds political floats for the Düsseldorf Shrove Monday Procession ("Rosenmontagszug") since 1983. His provocative floats regularly spark heated discussions. Tilly also works as an illustrator and designs large sculptures.
Rüdiger Vaas, science journalist, biologist, philosopher
Rüdiger Vaas was born in Stuttgart in 1966. He studied biology, German philology/linguistics, and philosophy at the universities of Hohenheim, Stuttgart, and Tübingen. He is an astronomy and physics editor for the monthly science magazine "bild der wissenschaft". As a philosopher he deals with questions of cosmology, natural philosophy, science, and epistemology.
Esther Vilar, author, physician
Esther Vilar was born in 1935 in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to German-Jewish emigrants. She studied medicine in Argentina and subsequently psychology and sociology in Germany. She worked as a hospital physician until 1963, after which she worked as a translator and radio author, and then as a freelance writer. In 1971 she had her breakthrough as an author with the international bestseller "The Manipulated Man". Due to hostilities and death threats after publication of the book she left Germany in 1975.
Prof. Dr. Eckart Voland, sociobiologist, biophilosopher
Eckart Voland was born in 1949 in Münden (Lower Saxony). He studied biology and social sciences at the University of Göttingen. In 1978 he received his PhD with a thesis on the social behaviour of primates. In 1992 he habilitated at the University of Göttingen in anthropology with works on "Historical Demography and Sociobiology".
Prof. Dr. Dr. Gerhard Vollmer, physicist/philosopher
Gerhard Vollmer was born in Speyer in 1943. From 1963 to 1968 he studied physics, mathematics, and chemistry in Munich, Berlin, and Hamburg, and from 1967 to 1974 philosophy and linguistics in Freiburg and Montreal. He received his PhD in physics in 1971 and his PhD in philosophy in 1974, both in Freiburg. From 1971 to 1974 he worked as a scientific assistant for theoretical physics with Siegfried Flügge. In 1975 he became academic councillor/senior councillor for philosophy in Hanover.
Dr. Bernd Vowinkel, physicist
Bernd Vowinkel, born in 1947 in Alsfeld, Germany, studied communications engineering in Giessen. After two years as an engineer at an ESA satellite ground station in southern Belgium he studied physics and astronomy at the universities of Giessen and Bonn. From 1981 to 2010 he was employed as a scientist at the University of Cologne Institute of Physics. During this time he was mainly involved in the development of microwave reception systems for radio astronomy, molecular spectroscopy, plasma research, and earth exploration. He was involved in the defining phase of the satellite project "Herschel" (submillimeter wave space telescope).
Lilly Walden, actress/writer
Lilly Walden was born on August 6, 1953, as the child of a bandmaster & music clown and a businesswoman & bridge player. After graduating from high school at the Königin Olga Stift in Stuttgart she first studied theology, philosophy, and art history in Tübingen. After losing her faith she changed to acting studies at the Hochschule der Künste (HdK – College of Arts) in Berlin. She paid for her studies by teaching tap dance.
Prof. Dr. Barbro Walker, educationalist
Barbro Walker, born in 1968, is professor of childhood education at the University of Applied Education in Berlin. She studied educational science, primary school education and psychology in Frankfurt am Main and Darmstadt. In 2003 she received her PhD. She worked as a research assistant at the Goethe University in Frankfurt, as a teacher and mentor for trainee teachers, and as a consultant for neuroscience and learning at the State Education Authority in Darmstadt and the Hessian Ministry of Education and Cultural Affairs.
Prof. Prof. h.c. Dr. rer. nat. Dr. h.c. Ulrich Walter, physicist, science astronaut
Ulrich Walter was born in 1954 in Iserlohn (North Rhine-Westphalia). After studying physics at the University of Cologne he spent one year at the US research laboratory Argonne National Laboratories, Chicago, then one year as a postdoc at the University of California, Berkeley. From there he was appointed to the German astronaut team in 1987 and trained until his shuttle mission D-2 (26 April to 6 May 1993) at the German Aerospace Center (DLR) in Cologne-Porz and at NASA's Space Centre in Houston.