Raphael Falk (geneticist)

Raphael "Rafi" Falk (July 14, 1929 – September 15, 2019)[1][2][3] was a German-born Israeli geneticist and historian of science. He was professor emeritus of genetics at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Israel. His early research was on the genetics of Drosophila; from 1983 he was active in researching the history and philosophy of science, with a particular focus on genetics.[4][5]

Early life

Falk was born in Frankfurt am Main, Germany.[6] When he was aged 5, amid the rise of Nazism in Germany, his family left for Palestine.[7]

Education and career

He was educated at the University of Stockholm, where he worked with Gert Bonnier, and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He subsequently completed his postdoc with H. J. Muller and Curt Stern.[4][8][7] His former teacher, Elisabeth Goldschmidt, eventually persuaded him to switch his research focus from Drosophila genetics to the history and philosophy of genetics as it pertains to the people of Israel.[5] By the 1950s and 60s, his work appreciated the ways in which X-rays induced mutations in the flies in a way that Muller's original work in the 1920s had not.[7]

From the early 1980s, Falk increasingly turned his attention to the history and philosophy of biology, becoming "one of the leading practitioners of the field".[7] He also began to look at the interactions between studies on the population genetics of Jews and Zionist agendas, and ultimately published his body of research on the subject first in Hebrew in 2006 and in English in 2017 as Zionism and the Biology of the Jews.[7]

Personal life

He was married to psychologist and probability theorist Ruma Falk.[9]

Books

Falk's books include:

  • The Concept of the Gene in Development and Evolution: Historical and Epistemological (edited with Peter J. Beurton and Hans-Jörg Rheinberger, Cambridge, University Press, 2000)[10]
  • Genetic Analysis: A History of Genetic Thinking (Cambridge University Press, 2011)[11]
  • Zionism and the Biology of Jews (Springer, 2017), English translation from the Hebrew: הציונות והביולוגיה של היהודים (Ressling, 2006)[12]

References
  1. "Prof. (Emeritus) Raphael Falk". The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Retrieved 24 January 2021.
  2. "Falk, Raphael". Library of Congress Name Authority File. Retrieved 2019-05-01.
  3. Sarkar, Sahotra (March 2021). "In Memoriam: Raphael Falk, 1929–2019". Biological Theory. 16 (1): 1–4. doi:10.1007/s13752-020-00368-1. ISSN 1555-5542. S2CID 231655302.
  4. "Raphael Falk". Jewish Women's Archive. Retrieved 2019-05-01.
  5. Karpel, Dalia (2006-10-19). "Culture Club". Haaretz. Retrieved 2019-05-01.
  6. "Raphael Falk". Oral History Project. Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. Retrieved 2019-05-01.
  7. Harman, Oren. "Rafi Falk (1929–2019)". The Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
  8. Müller-Wille, Staffan (July 2012). "Raphael Falk: Genetic Analysis: A History of Genetic Thinking. Studies in Philosophy of Biology, edited by Michael Ruse: Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. 344 pages, price: $110.00 (hardback)". Science & Education. 21 (7): 1051–1053. doi:10.1007/s11191-012-9473-5. ISBN 978-0-521-88418-1. ISSN 0926-7220. S2CID 140370335.
  9. Aderet, Ofer (September 10, 2020). "2020-1932 החוקרת שבדקה מה הסיכוי" [The researcher who examined the chances of a coincidence: Prof. Roma Falk, who died last month, has used statistics and psychology to examine why only fools seek hidden meeting in a casual meeting on the street]. Haaretz (in Hebrew).
  10. Reviews of The Concept of the Gene in Development and Evolution: David Magnus (2001), Journal of the History of Biology, JSTOR 4331671; Robert Olby (2002), British Journal for the History of Science, JSTOR 4028207; Sheldon Penman (2001), "What Are Genes, Anyway?", American Scientist, JSTOR 27857403; J. Chris Pires (2001), Plant Systematics and Evolution, JSTOR 23645013
  11. Reviews of Genetic Analysis: Robert Meunier (2012), Prolegomena, ; Staffan Müller-Wille (2012), Science & Education, doi:10.1007/s11191-012-9473-5; Robert Olby (2010), Isis, JSTOR 10.1086/659664, doi:10.1086/659664
  12. Review of Zionism and the Biology of Jews: Snait Gissis (2009), Aleph, JSTOR 40385942
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