100 Notable alumni of
University of Vienna
Updated:
The University of Vienna is 22nd in the world, 6th in Europe, and 1st in Austria by aggregated alumni prominence. Below is the list of 100 notable alumni from the University of Vienna sorted by their wiki pages popularity. The directory includes famous graduates and former students along with research and academic staff. 3 individuals affiliated with the University of Vienna won Nobel Prizes in Physics and Physiology or Medicine.
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Sigmund Freud
- Occupations
- neurologistessayistpsychoanalyst
- Biography
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Sigmund Freud was an Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, a clinical method for evaluating and treating pathologies seen as originating from conflicts in the psyche, through dialogue between patient and psychoanalyst, and the distinctive theory of mind and human agency derived from it.
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Gregor Mendel
- Occupations
- botanistbeekeepergeneticistbiologistCatholic priest
- Biography
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Gregor Johann Mendel OSA was an Austrian biologist, meteorologist, mathematician, Augustinian friar and abbot of St. Thomas' Abbey in Brno (Brünn), Margraviate of Moravia. Mendel was born in a German-speaking family in the Silesian part of the Austrian Empire (today's Czech Republic) and gained posthumous recognition as the founder of the modern science of genetics. Though farmers had known for millennia that crossbreeding of animals and plants could favor certain desirable traits, Mendel's pea plant experiments conducted between 1856 and 1863 established many of the rules of heredity, now referred to as the laws of Mendelian inheritance.
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Sebastian Kurz
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Studied in 2005-2011
- Occupations
- politician
- Biography
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Sebastian Kurz is an Austrian former politician who served twice as Chancellor of Austria, first from 2017 to 2019 and then again from 2020 to 2021. On 23 February 2024, Kurz received an eight-month suspended sentence after being convicted of perjury by a court in Vienna over his involvement in a parliamentary inquiry.
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Stefan Zweig
- Occupations
- translatorbiographerhistorianprose writerpoet
- Biography
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Stefan Zweig was an Austrian writer. At the height of his literary career, in the 1920s and 1930s, he was one of the most widely translated and popular writers in the world.
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Erwin Schrödinger
- Occupations
- physicisttheoretical physicistprofessornon-fiction writermathematician
- Biography
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Erwin Rudolf Josef Alexander Schrödinger, sometimes written as Schroedinger or Schrodinger, was an Austrian-Irish theoretical physicist who developed fundamental results in quantum theory. In particular, he is recognized for postulating the Schrödinger equation, an equation that provides a way to calculate the wave function of a system and how it changes dynamically in time. Schrödinger coined the term "quantum entanglement", and was the earliest to discuss it, doing so in 1932. He also anticipated the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics.
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Karl Popper
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Studied in 1918
- In 1928 graduated with Doctor of Philosophy
- Occupations
- philosopherwriterteacherphilosopher of scienceuniversity teacher
- Biography
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Sir Karl Raimund Popper CH FRS FBA was an Austrian–British philosopher, academic and social commentator. One of the 20th century's most influential philosophers of science, Popper is known for his rejection of the classical inductivist views on the scientific method in favour of empirical falsification. According to Popper, a theory in the empirical sciences can never be proven, but it can be falsified, meaning that it can (and should) be scrutinised with decisive experiments. Popper was opposed to the classical justificationist account of knowledge, which he replaced with critical rationalism, namely "the first non-justificational philosophy of criticism in the history of philosophy".
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Viktor Frankl
- Occupations
- psychologistpsychotherapistexistential therapistuniversity teachersurgeon
- Biography
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Viktor Emil Frankl was an Austrian neurologist, psychologist, philosopher, and Holocaust survivor, who founded logotherapy, a school of psychotherapy that describes a search for a life's meaning as the central human motivational force. Logotherapy is part of existential and humanistic psychology theories.
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Paracelsus
- Occupations
- physicianpharmacistnaturalistastronomerphysician writer
- Biography
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Paracelsus, born Theophrastus von Hohenheim (full name Philippus Aureolus Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim), was a Swiss physician, alchemist, lay theologian, and philosopher of the German Renaissance.
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Theodor Herzl
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Studied law
- Occupations
- politicianjournalistplaywrightliterary criticlawyer
- Biography
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Theodor Herzl was an Austro-Hungarian Jewish journalist, lawyer, writer, playwright and political activist who was the father of modern political Zionism. Herzl formed the Zionist Organization and promoted Jewish immigration to Palestine in an effort to form a Jewish state. Due to his Zionist work, he is known in Hebrew as Chozeh HaMedinah (חוֹזֵה הַמְדִינָה), lit. 'Visionary of the State'. He is specifically mentioned in the Israeli Declaration of Independence and is officially referred to as "the spiritual father of the Jewish State".
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Friedrich Hayek
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- 1918-1923 studied economics, philosophy, and psychology
- Graduated with Doctor of Philosophy in political science
- Occupations
- political scientisteconomistuniversity teacherhistorianphilosopher
- Biography
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Friedrich August von Hayek CH FBA, often referred to by his initials F. A. Hayek, was an Austrian-born British academic who contributed to political economy, political philosophy and intellectual history. Hayek shared the 1974 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences with Gunnar Myrdal for work on money and economic fluctuations, and the interdependence of economic, social and institutional phenomena. His account of how prices communicate information is widely regarded as an important contribution to economics that led to him receiving the prize. He was a major contributor to the Austrian school of economics.
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Billy Wilder
- Occupations
- directorscreenwriterwriterproducerfilm producer
- Biography
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Billy Wilder was an American filmmaker and screenwriter. He was born in Sucha Beskidzka, Poland, a town in Austria-Hungary at the time of his birth. His career in Hollywood spanned five decades, and he is regarded as one of the most brilliant and versatile filmmakers of Classic Hollywood cinema. He received seven Academy Awards (among 21 nominations), a BAFTA Award, the Cannes Film Festival's Palme d'Or and two Golden Globe Awards.
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Mihai Eminescu
- Occupations
- politicianlibrarianjournalistactorwriter
- Biography
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Mihai Eminescu was a Romanian Romantic poet, novelist, and journalist from Moldavia, generally regarded as the most famous and influential Romanian poet. Eminescu was an active member of the Junimea literary society and worked as an editor for the newspaper Timpul ("The Time"), the official newspaper of the Conservative Party (1880–1918). His poetry was first published when he was 16 and he went to Vienna, Austria to study when he was 19. The poet's manuscripts, containing 46 volumes and approximately 14,000 pages, were offered by Titu Maiorescu as a gift to the Romanian Academy during the meeting that was held on 25 January 1902. Notable works include Luceafărul, Odă în metru antic (Ode in Ancient Meter), and the five Letters (Epistles/Satires). In his poems, he frequently used metaphysical, mythological and historical subjects.
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Ignaz Semmelweis
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- In 1844 studied medicine
- Occupations
- physicianbotanistobstetricianuniversity teacherhygienist
- Biography
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Ignaz Philipp Semmelweis was a Hungarian physician and scientist of German descent who was an early pioneer of antiseptic procedures and was described as the "saviour of mothers". Postpartum infection, also known as puerperal fever or childbed fever, consists of any bacterial infection of the reproductive tract following birth and in the 19th century was common and often fatal. Semmelweis discovered that the incidence of infection could be drastically reduced by requiring healthcare workers in obstetrical clinics to disinfect their hands. In 1847, he proposed hand washing with chlorinated lime solutions at Vienna General Hospital's First Obstetrical Clinic, where doctors' wards had three times the mortality of midwives' wards. The maternal mortality rate dropped from 18% to less than 2%, and he published a book of his findings, Etiology, Concept and Prophylaxis of Childbed Fever, in 1861.
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Alfred Adler
- Occupations
- psychotherapistophthalmologistpsychiatrist
- Biography
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Alfred Adler was an Austrian medical doctor, psychotherapist, and founder of the school of individual psychology. His emphasis on the importance of feelings of belonging, relationships within the family, and birth order set him apart from Freud and others in their common circle. He proposed that contributing to others (social interest or Gemeinschaftsgefühl) was how the individual feels a sense of worth and belonging in the family and society. His earlier work focused on inferiority, coining the term inferiority complex, an isolating element which he argued plays a key role in personality development. Alfred Adler considered a human being as an individual whole, and therefore he called his school of psychology "individual psychology".
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Kurt Gödel
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Studied in 1923-1929
- Occupations
- university teacherphysicistcomputer scientistphilosophermathematician
- Biography
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Kurt Friedrich Gödel was a logician, mathematician, and philosopher. Considered along with Aristotle and Gottlob Frege to be one of the most significant logicians in history, Gödel profoundly influenced scientific and philosophical thinking in the 20th century (at a time when Bertrand Russell, Alfred North Whitehead, and David Hilbert were using logic and set theory to investigate the foundations of mathematics), building on earlier work by Frege, Richard Dedekind, and Georg Cantor.
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Karl Landsteiner
- Occupations
- immunologistphysicianhematologistresearcherpathologist
- Biography
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Karl Landsteiner ForMemRS was an Austrian-American biologist, physician, and immunologist. He emigrated with his family to New York in 1923 at the age of 55 for professional opportunities, working for the Rockefeller Institute.
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Edmund Husserl
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- 1881-1883 graduated with Doctor in mathematics
- Occupations
- phenomenologistmathematicianphilosopheruniversity teacher
- Biography
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Edmund Gustav Albrecht Husserl was an Austrian-German philosopher and mathematician who established the school of phenomenology.
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Joseph Schumpeter
- Occupations
- political scientistuniversity teacherpoliticianbook collectoreconomist
- Biography
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Joseph Alois Schumpeter was an Austrian political economist. He served briefly as Finance Minister of Austria in 1919. In 1932, he emigrated to the United States to become a professor at Harvard University, where he remained until the end of his career, and in 1939 obtained American citizenship.
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Michael Haneke
- Occupations
- film actortheatrical directorscreenwriterfilm directordirector
- Biography
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Michael Haneke is an Austrian film director and screenwriter. His work often examines social issues and depicts the feelings of estrangement experienced by individuals in modern society. Haneke has made films in French, German, and English and has worked in television and theatre. He also teaches film direction at the Film Academy Vienna.
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Ludwig von Mises
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- 1900-1906 graduated with Doctor of Philosophy in law
- Occupations
- university teacherwritereconomistphilosopher
- Biography
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Ludwig Heinrich Edler von Mises was an Austrian-American economist, logician, sociologist and philosopher of economics of the Austrian school. Mises wrote and lectured extensively on the societal contributions of classical liberalism and the power of consumers. He is best known for his work in praxeology, particularly for studies comparing communism and capitalism, as well as for being a defender of classical liberalism in the face of rising illiberalism and authoritarianism throughout much of Europe during the 20th century.
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Ivan Franko
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Graduated with Doctor of Philosophy in philosophy
- Occupations
- politicianwriterplaywrighttranslatoreconomist
- Biography
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Ivan Yakovych Franko was a Ukrainian poet, writer, social and literary critic, journalist, translator, economist, political activist, doctor of philosophy, ethnographer, and the author of the first detective novels and modern poetry in the Ukrainian language.
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Lise Meitner
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- 1901-1906 graduated with doctorate in physics
- Occupations
- university teachernuclear physicistphysicistchemist
- Biography
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Elise Meitner, commonly known as Lise Meitner, was an Austrian-Swedish nuclear physicist who was instrumental in the discovery of nuclear fission.
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Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Studied in 1872-1876
- Occupations
- editing staffjournalistteachersociologistuniversity teacher
- Biography
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Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk was a Czechoslovak statesman, progressive political activist and philosopher who served as the first president of Czechoslovakia from 1918 to 1935. He is regarded as the founding father of Czechoslovakia.
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Huldrych Zwingli
- Occupations
- Protestant reformerwritertranslatortheologianpreacher
- Biography
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Huldrych or Ulrich Zwingli He was a Swiss Christian theologian, musician, and leader of the Reformation in Switzerland. Born during a time of emerging Swiss patriotism and increasing criticism of the Swiss mercenary system, he attended the University of Vienna and the University of Basel, a scholarly center of Renaissance humanism. He continued his studies while he served as a pastor in Glarus and later in Einsiedeln, where he was influenced by the writings of Erasmus.
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Ivo Andrić
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- In 1913 studied philosophy
- Occupations
- short story writerdiplomatpoetwriternovelist
- Biography
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Ivo Andrić was a Yugoslav novelist, poet and short story writer who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1961. His writings dealt mainly with life in his native Bosnia under Ottoman rule.
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Konrad Lorenz
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- 1923-1928 graduated with Doctor of Medicine
- In 1933 graduated with Doctor of Philosophy in zoology
- Occupations
- philosopherphysicianethologistzoologistpsychologist
- Biography
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Konrad Zacharias Lorenz was an Austrian zoologist, ethologist, and ornithologist. He shared the 1973 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Nikolaas Tinbergen and Karl von Frisch. He is often regarded as one of the founders of modern ethology, the study of animal behavior. He developed an approach that began with an earlier generation, including his teacher Oskar Heinroth.
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Ludwig Boltzmann
- Occupations
- philosopherphysicistchemisttheoretical physicistuniversity teacher
- Biography
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Ludwig Eduard Boltzmann was an Austrian theoretical physicist and philosopher. His greatest achievements were the development of statistical mechanics and the statistical explanation of the second law of thermodynamics. In 1877 he provided the current definition of entropy, S = k B ln Ω {\displaystyle S=k_{\rm {B}}\ln \Omega }, where Ω is the number of microstates whose energy equals the system's energy, interpreted as a measure of the statistical disorder of a system. Max Planck named the constant kB the Boltzmann constant.
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Jörg Haider
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- 1969-1973 graduated with Doctor of Laws in legal science and political science and government
- Occupations
- businesspersonpoliticianlawyer
- Biography
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Jörg Haider was an Austrian politician. He was Governor of Carinthia on two occasions, the long-time leader of the Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ) and later Chairman of the Alliance for the Future of Austria (Bündnis Zukunft Österreich, BZÖ), a breakaway party from the FPÖ.
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Alcide De Gasperi
- Occupations
- politicianjournalistdiplomatlinguist
- Biography
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Alcide Amedeo Francesco De Gasperi was an Italian politician and statesman who founded the Christian Democracy party and served as prime minister of Italy in eight successive coalition governments from 1945 to 1953.
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Richard Nikolaus von Coudenhove-Kalergi
- Years
- 1894-1972 (aged 78)
- Occupations
- writerpoliticianphilosopher
- Biography
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Richard Nikolaus Eijiro, Count of Coudenhove-Kalergi, was a politician, philosopher, and count of Coudenhove-Kalergi. A pioneer of European integration, he served as the founding president of the Paneuropean Union for 49 years. His parents were Heinrich von Coudenhove-Kalergi, an Austro-Hungarian diplomat, and Mitsuko Aoyama, the daughter of an oil merchant, antiques-dealer and major landowner in Tokyo. His childhood name in Japan was Eijiro Aoyama. Being a native Austrian-Hungarian citizen, he became a Czechoslovak citizen in 1919 and then took French citizenship from 1939 until his death.
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Martin Buber
- Occupations
- philosopheruniversity teachertheologianliterary editoreducator
- Biography
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Martin Buber was an Austrian-Israeli philosopher best known for his philosophy of dialogue, a form of existentialism centered on the distinction between the I–Thou relationship and the I–It relationship. Born in Vienna, Buber came from a family of observant Jews, but broke with Jewish custom to pursue secular studies in philosophy. He produced writings about Zionism and worked with various bodies within the Zionist movement extensively over a nearly 50-year period spanning his time in Europe and the Near East. In 1923, Buber wrote his famous essay on existence, Ich und Du (later translated into English as I and Thou), and in 1925 he began translating the Hebrew Bible into the German language.
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Otto Preminger
- Occupations
- directorcharacter actorfilm producerfilm actorfilm director
- Biography
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Otto Ludwig Preminger was an Austrian-American film and theatre director, film producer, and actor. He directed more than 35 feature films in a five-decade career after leaving the theatre, and was one of the most influential directors in Hollywood during the 1940s and 1950s. He was nominated for three Academy Awards, twice for Best Director and once for Best Picture, among many other accolades.
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Hans Kelsen
- Occupations
- university teacherlawyerjudgephilosopherjurist
- Biography
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Hans Kelsen was an Austrian jurist, legal philosopher and political philosopher. He was the principal architect of the 1920 Austrian Constitution, which with amendments is still in operation. Due to the rise of totalitarianism in Austria (and a 1929 constitutional change), Kelsen left for Germany in 1930 but was forced out of his university post after the Nazi seizure of power in 1933 because of his Jewish ancestry. That year he left for Geneva and in 1940 he moved to the United States. In 1934, Roscoe Pound lauded Kelsen as "undoubtedly the leading jurist of the time". While in Vienna, Kelsen met Sigmund Freud and his circle, and wrote on social psychology and sociology.
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Roger Willemsen
- Occupations
- man of lettersliterary scholarnews presenterjournalisttelevision presenter
- Biography
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Roger Willemsen was a German author, essayist and TV presenter.
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Arthur Schnitzler
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Studied medicine
- Occupations
- screenwriterplaywrighttelevision writerphysician writerwriter
- Biography
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Arthur Schnitzler was an Austrian author and dramatist. He is considered one of the most significant representatives of Viennese Modernism. Schnitzler’s works, which include psychological dramas and narratives, dissected turn-of-the-century Viennese bourgeois life, making him a sharp and stylistically conscious chronicler of Viennese society around 1900. Schnitzler's Jewish upbringing and the sexual content of his works made them controversial or banned in his time and beyond.
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İlber Ortaylı
- Occupations
- university teacherhistorianmilitary historianart historian
- Biography
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İlber Ortaylı is a Turkish historian and professor of history of Crimean Tatar origin at the MEF University, Galatasaray University in Istanbul and at Bilkent University in Ankara. In 2005, he was appointed as the director of the Topkapı Museum in Istanbul, until he retired in 2012.
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Elfriede Jelinek
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Studied in 1967
- Occupations
- screenwriterplaywrightliterary criticlibrettistwriter
- Biography
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Elfriede Jelinek is an Austrian playwright and novelist. She is one of the most decorated authors to write in German and was awarded the 2004 Nobel Prize in Literature for her "musical flow of voices and counter-voices in novels and plays that, with extraordinary linguistic zeal, reveal the absurdity of society's clichés and their subjugating power". She is considered to be among the most important living playwrights of the German language.
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Elias Canetti
- Occupations
- chemistessayistwriterplaywrightaphorist
- Biography
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Elias Canetti was a German-language writer, known as a modernist novelist, playwright, memoirist, and nonfiction writer. Born in Ruse, Bulgaria, to a Sephardic Jewish family, he later lived in England, Austria, Germany, and Switzerland. He won the 1981 Nobel Prize in Literature, "for writings marked by a broad outlook, a wealth of ideas and artistic power". He is noted for his nonfiction book Crowds and Power, among other works.
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Melanie Klein
- Occupations
- psychoanalyst
- Biography
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Melanie Klein was an Austrian-British author and psychoanalyst known for her work in child analysis. She was the primary figure in the development of object relations theory. Klein’s work primarily focused on the role of ambivalence and moral ambiguity in human development. Klein suggested that pre-verbal existential anxiety in infancy catalyzed the formation of the unconscious, which resulted in the unconscious splitting of the world into good and bad idealizations. In her theory, how the child resolves that split depends on the constitution of the child and the character of nurturing the child experiences. The quality of resolution can inform the presence, absence, and/or type of distresses a person experiences later in life.
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Herbert Kickl
- Occupations
- politician
- Biography
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Herbert Kickl is an Austrian politician who has been leader of the far-right Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ) since June 2021. He previously served as minister of the interior from 2017 to 2019 and general-secretary of the FPÖ from 2005 to 2018. Kickl calls himself Volkskanzler (The People‘s Chancellor) and advocates a Fortress Austria and remigration.
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Ernst Mach
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Studied in 1855-1860
- Occupations
- photographerphysicistpedagogueprofessorphilosopher
- Biography
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Ernst Waldfried Josef Wenzel Mach was an Austrian physicist and philosopher, who contributed to the physics of shock waves. The ratio of the speed of a flow or object to that of sound is named the Mach number in his honour. As a philosopher of science, he was a major influence on logical positivism and American pragmatism. Through his criticism of Isaac Newton's theories of space and time, he foreshadowed Albert Einstein's theory of relativity.
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Joseph Roth
- Occupations
- writerjournalistplaywright
- Biography
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Moses Joseph Roth was an Austrian-Jewish journalist and novelist, best known for his family saga Radetzky March (1932), about the decline and fall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, his novel of Jewish life Job (1930) and his seminal essay "Juden auf Wanderschaft" (1927; translated into English as The Wandering Jews), a fragmented account of the Jewish migrations from eastern to western Europe in the aftermath of World War I and the Russian Revolution. In the 21st century, publications in English of Radetzky March and of collections of his journalism from Berlin and Paris created a revival of interest in Roth.
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Franz Anton Mesmer
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- 1759-1766 studied medicine
- Occupations
- astronomerphysicianmagnetizer
- Biography
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Franz Anton Mesmer was a German physician with an interest in astronomy. He theorized the existence of a process of natural energy transference occurring between all animate and inanimate objects; this he called "animal magnetism", later referred to as mesmerism. Mesmer's theory attracted a wide following between about 1780 and 1850, and continued to have some influence until the end of the 19th century. In 1843, the Scottish doctor James Braid proposed the term "hypnotism" for a technique derived from animal magnetism; today the word "mesmerism" generally functions as a synonym of "hypnosis". Mesmer also supported the arts, specifically music; he was on friendly terms with Haydn and Mozart.
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Karel Schwarzenberg
- Occupations
- foreign ministerpoliticianentrepreneurdiplomat
- Biography
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Karel Schwarzenberg was a Czech politician, diplomat and statesman who served as the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic from 2007 to 2009 and then again between 2010 and 2013. Schwarzenberg was leader and co-founder of the TOP 09 party and its candidate for president of the Czech Republic in the 2013 election. He served as a member of the Chamber of Deputies (MP) from 2010 to 2021 and in the Senate from 2004 until 2010.
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Money Boy
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- In 2008 graduated with magister degree in science of journalism and communication studies
- Occupations
- rapper
- Biography
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Sebastian Meisinger, better known by his stage name Money Boy, is an Austrian rapper and singer. He became famous with his hit "Dreh den Swag auf".
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Paul Feyerabend
- Occupations
- philosopheruniversity teacherscholar
- Biography
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Paul Karl Feyerabend was an Austrian philosopher best known for his work in the philosophy of science. He started his academic career as lecturer in the philosophy of science at the University of Bristol (1955–1958); afterwards, he moved to the University of California, Berkeley, where he taught for three decades (1958–1989). At various points in his life, he held joint appointments at the University College London (1967–1970), the London School of Economics (1967), the FU Berlin (1968), Yale University (1969), the University of Auckland (1972, 1975), the University of Sussex (1974), and, finally, the ETH Zurich (1980–1990). He gave lectures and lecture series at the University of Minnesota (1958–1962), Stanford University (1967), the University of Kassel (1977) and the University of Trento (1992).
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Hugo von Hofmannsthal
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Studied law and classical philology
- Occupations
- screenwriterwriterplaywrightlibrettistcomposer
- Biography
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Hugo Laurenz August Hofmann von Hofmannsthal was an Austrian novelist, librettist, poet, dramatist, narrator, and essayist.
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Martin Sellner
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Graduated with Licentiate in Philosophy
- Occupations
- conspiracy theoristpoliticianblogger
- Biography
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Martin Michael Sellner is an Austrian far-right political activist, and leader of the Identitarian Movement of Austria, which he cofounded in 2012. He is considered to be a key figure in the Neue Rechte in the German-speaking countries. He is also deemed to be part of the alt-right movement.
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Christian Kern
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- In 1997 graduated with magister degree in communication science and science of journalism
- Studied political science, communication science, science of journalism, and sociology
- Occupations
- politician
- Biography
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Christian Kern is an Austrian businessman and former politician who served as Chancellor of Austria from 17 May 2016 to 18 December 2017 and chairman of the Social Democratic Party from 25 June 2016 to 25 September 2018.
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Joseph von Eichendorff
- Occupations
- poet lawyerplaywrightwritertranslatornovelist
- Biography
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Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff was a German poet, novelist, playwright, literary critic, translator, and anthologist. Eichendorff was one of the major writers and critics of Romanticism. Ever since their publication and up to the present day, some of his works have been very popular in German-speaking Europe.
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Karl Kautsky
- Occupations
- philosopherpoliticianeconomistjournalist
- Biography
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Karl Johann Kautsky was a Czech-Austrian philosopher, journalist, and Marxist theorist. A leading theorist of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) and the Second International, Kautsky advocated orthodox Marxism, which emphasized the scientific, materialist, and determinist character of Karl Marx's work. This interpretation dominated European Marxism for two decades, from the death of Friedrich Engels in 1895 to the outbreak of World War I in 1914.
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Karl Kraus
- Occupations
- playwrightliterary criticjournalistopinion journalistwriter
- Biography
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Karl Kraus was an Austrian writer and journalist, known as a satirist, essayist, aphorist, playwright and poet. He directed his satire at the press, German culture, and German and Austrian politics. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature three times.
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Anton Webern
- Occupations
- musiciancomposerclassical composerconductor
- Biography
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Anton Webern was an Austrian composer, conductor, and musicologist. His music was among the most radical of its milieu in its concision and use of then novel atonal and twelve-tone techniques. His approach was typically rigorous, inspired by his studies of the Franco-Flemish School under Guido Adler and by Arnold Schoenberg's emphasis on structure in teaching composition from the music of Johann Sebastian Bach, the First Viennese School, and Johannes Brahms. Webern, Schoenberg, and their colleague Alban Berg were at the core of what became known as the Second Viennese School.
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Fred Zinnemann
- Occupations
- film producerphotographerdirectorfilm directorproducer
- Biography
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Alfred Zinnemann was an Austrian-American film director and producer. He won four Academy Awards for directing and producing films in various genres, including thrillers, westerns, film noir and play adaptations. He began his career in Europe before emigrating to the US, where he specialized in shorts before making 25 feature films during his 50-year career.
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Bruno Kreisky
- Occupations
- war correspondentpoliticianlawyerdiplomat
- Biography
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Bruno Kreisky was an Austrian social democratic politician who served as foreign minister from 1959 to 1966 and as chancellor from 1970 to 1983. Aged 72, he was the oldest chancellor after World War II.
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Brigitte Bierlein
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- In 1971 graduated with Doctor of Laws
- Occupations
- judgepoliticianjurist
- Biography
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Brigitte Bierlein was an Austrian jurist who served as President of the Constitutional Court from 2018 to 2019 and as Chancellor of Austria from 2019 to 2020. An independent, she was the first woman to hold either office.
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Franziska Weisz
- Occupations
- stage actorfilm actoractor
- Biography
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Franziska Weisz is an Austrian actress. She starred in the film Hotel, which was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival.
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Verena Altenberger
- Occupations
- stage actorfilm actor
- Biography
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Verena Altenberger is an Austrian actress. She is known for having played the lead role in the 2017 film The Best of All Worlds (Die beste aller Welten).
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Alexander Schallenberg
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- 1989-1994 studied jurisprudence
- Occupations
- juristpolitician
- Biography
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Alexander Georg Nicolas Schallenberg is an Austrian diplomat, jurist, and politician who has been the acting chancellor of Austria since 10 January 2025. He previously served in that position 28th chancellor from two months in 2021.
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Karin Kneissl
- Occupations
- opinion journalistpoliticianjournalistdiplomat
- Biography
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Karin Kneissl is an Austrian diplomat, journalist, and politician. She served as Minister of Foreign Affairs between 2017 and 2019. Prior to assuming her government position, she was a lecturer.
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Georg Trakl
- Occupations
- writerpharmacistpoet
- Biography
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Georg Trakl was an Austrian poet and the brother of the pianist Grete Trakl. He is considered one of the most important Austrian Expressionists. He is perhaps best known for his poem "Grodek", which he wrote shortly before he died of a cocaine overdose.
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Pamela Rendi-Wagner
- Occupations
- physicianwomen's rights activistchairman of the Social Democratic Partycivil servantpolitician
- Biography
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Pamela Rendi-Wagner is an Austrian physician and politician who is the current director of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, and who previously served as chairwoman of the Social Democratic Party (SPÖ) from 2018 to 2023. She was the first woman to lead the SPÖ.
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Lucian Blaga
- Occupations
- translatorpoetlibrarianphilosopherjournalist
- Biography
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Lucian Blaga was a Romanian philosopher, poet, playwright, poetry translator and novelist. He is considered one of the greatest philosophers and poets of Romania, and a prominent philosopher of the twentieth century who due to the unfortunate circumstances surrounding his career is barely known to the outside world.
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Daniel Kehlmann
- Occupations
- translatornovelistwriter
- Biography
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Daniel Kehlmann is a German-language novelist and playwright of both Austrian and German nationality.
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France Prešeren
- Occupations
- poet lawyerpoetlawyer
- Biography
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France Preseren was a 19th-century Romantic Slovene poet whose poems have been translated into many languages.
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Ludwig von Bertalanffy
- Occupations
- university teacherbiologistphysiologistphilosopher
- Biography
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Karl Ludwig von Bertalanffy was an Austrian biologist known as one of the founders of general systems theory (GST). This is an interdisciplinary practice that describes systems with interacting components, applicable to biology, cybernetics and other fields. Bertalanffy proposed that the classical laws of thermodynamics might be applied to closed systems, but not necessarily to "open systems" such as living things. His mathematical model of an organism's growth over time, published in 1934, is still in use today.
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Christian Doppler
- Occupations
- physicistpedagogueprofessorastronomermathematician
- Biography
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Christian Andreas Doppler was an Austrian mathematician and physicist. He formulated the principle – now known as the Doppler effect – that the observed frequency of a wave depends on the relative speed of the source and the observer.
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Heinz Fischer
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- 1956-1961 graduated with Doctor of Laws in legal science and political science and government
- Occupations
- politicianuniversity teacherjurist
- Biography
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Heinz Fischer GColIH, OMRI, RSerafO, GCollSE is an Austrian politician who served as the president of Austria from 2004 to 2016. Fischer previously served as minister of science from 1983 to 1987 and as president of the National Council of Austria from 1990 to 2002. A member of the Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ) until 2004, he suspended his party membership as he became president.
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Josef Breuer
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- In 1867 studied medicine
- Occupations
- physiologistphysicianuniversity teacherpsychoanalystphilosopher
- Biography
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Josef Breuer was an Austrian physician who made discoveries in neurophysiology, and whose work during the 1880s with his patient Bertha Pappenheim, known as Anna O., led to the development of the "cathartic method" (also referred to as the "talking cure") for psychiatric disorders. The method was a major initiatory factor for psychoanalysis, as developed by Breuer's friend and collaborator Sigmund Freud.
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Carl Menger
- Occupations
- professoreconomist
- Biography
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Carl Menger von Wolfensgrün was an Austrian economist who contributed to the marginal theory of value. Menger is considered the founder of the Austrian school of economics.
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Robert Bunsen
- Occupations
- chemistteacherphysicistexperimentalistuniversity teacher
- Biography
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Robert Wilhelm Eberhard Bunsen was a German chemist. He investigated emission spectra of heated elements, and discovered caesium (in 1860) and rubidium (in 1861) with the physicist Gustav Kirchhoff. The Bunsen–Kirchhoff Award for spectroscopy is named after Bunsen and Kirchhoff.
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Lothar Rendulic
- Occupations
- politicianauthorjuristmilitary personnel
- Biography
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Lothar Rendulic was an Austrian army group commander in the Wehrmacht during World War II. Rendulic was one of three Austrians who rose to the rank of Generaloberst (colonel general) in the German armed forces. The other two were Romanian-born Alexander Löhr and Erhard Raus from Moravia.
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Werner Faymann
- Occupations
- politicianconsultanttaxi driver
- Biography
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Werner Faymann is an Austrian former politician who was Chancellor of Austria and chairman of the Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ) from 2008 to 2016. On 9 May 2016, he resigned from both positions amid widening criticism within his party.
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Helmuth James Graf von Moltke
- Occupations
- resistance fighterjuristlawyer
- Biography
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Helmuth James Graf von Moltke was a German jurist who, as a draftee in the German Abwehr, acted to subvert German human-rights abuses of people in territories occupied by Germany during World War II. He was a founding member of the Kreisau Circle opposition group, whose members opposed the government of Adolf Hitler in Nazi Germany, and discussed prospects for a Germany based on moral and democratic principles after Hitler. The Nazis executed him for treason for his participation in these discussions.
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Ernst Gombrich
- Occupations
- professoraestheticianwriterhistorianart historian
- Biography
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Sir Ernst Hans Josef Gombrich OM CBE FBA was an Austrian-born art historian who, after settling in England in 1936, became a naturalised British citizen in 1947 and spent most of his working life in the United Kingdom.
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Christoph Schönborn
- Occupations
- university teacherCatholic priesttheologianwriterLatin Catholic bishop
- Biography
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Christoph Maria Michael Hugo Damian Peter Adalbert Schönborn, OP is a Bohemian-born Austrian Catholic prelate who served as Archbishop of Vienna from 1995 until 2025. He was chairman of the Austrian Bishops' Conference from 1998 to 2020 and was made a cardinal in 1998. He is a member of the Dominican Order.
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Adalbert Stifter
- Occupations
- poetteacherpainterwriterpreservationist
- Biography
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Adalbert Stifter was a Bohemian-Austrian writer, poet, painter, and pedagogue. He was notable for the vivid natural landscapes depicted in his writing and has long been popular in the German-speaking world.
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Anton Zeilinger
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- In 1971 graduated with doctor rerum naturalium
- Occupations
- university teacherquantum physicistphysicistnon-fiction writer
- Biography
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Anton Zeilinger is an Austrian quantum physicist and Nobel laureate in physics of 2022. Zeilinger is professor of physics emeritus at the University of Vienna and senior scientist at the Institute for Quantum Optics and Quantum Information of the Austrian Academy of Sciences. Most of his research concerns the fundamental aspects and applications of quantum entanglement.
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Paul Ehrenfest
- Occupations
- university teachermathematiciantheoretical physicistphysicist
- Biography
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Paul Ehrenfest was an Austrian theoretical physicist who made major contributions to statistical mechanics and its relation to quantum mechanics, including the theory of phase transition and the Ehrenfest theorem. He befriended Albert Einstein on a visit to Prague in 1912 and became a professor in Leiden, where he frequently hosted Einstein. He died by murder-suicide in 1933, killing his disabled son, Wassik, and then himself.
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Otto Rank
- Occupations
- psychologistexistential therapistpsychoanalyst
- Biography
-
Otto Rank was an Austrian psychoanalyst, writer, and philosopher. Born in Vienna, he was one of Sigmund Freud's closest colleagues for 20 years, a prolific writer on psychoanalytic themes, editor of the two leading analytic journals of the era, including Internationale Zeitschrift für Psychoanalyse (“International Journal of Psychoanalysis”), managing director of Freud's publishing house, and a creative theorist and therapist. In 1926, Rank left Vienna for Paris and, for the remainder of his life, led a successful career as a lecturer, writer, and therapist in France and the United States.
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George Pólya
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Studied in 1910-1911
- Occupations
- mathematicianuniversity teacher
- Biography
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George Pólya was a Hungarian-American mathematician. He was a professor of mathematics from 1914 to 1940 at ETH Zürich and from 1940 to 1953 at Stanford University. He made fundamental contributions to combinatorics, number theory, numerical analysis and probability theory. He is also noted for his work in heuristics and mathematics education. He has been described as one of The Martians, an informal category which included one of his most famous students at ETH Zurich, John von Neumann.
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Alfred Schütz
- Occupations
- sociologistuniversity teacherwriterphilosophermusicologist
- Biography
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Alfred Schutz was an Austrian philosopher and social phenomenologist whose work bridged sociological and phenomenological traditions. Schutz is gradually being recognized as one of the 20th century's leading philosophers of social science. He related Edmund Husserl's work to the social sciences, using it to develop the philosophical foundations of Max Weber's sociology, in his major work Phenomenology of the Social World. However, much of his influence arose from the publication of his Collected Papers in the 1960s.
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Percy Lavon Julian
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Graduated with Doctor of Philosophy
- Occupations
- chemist
- Biography
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Percy Lavon Julian was an American research chemist and a pioneer in the chemical synthesis of medicinal drugs from plants. Julian was the first person to synthesize the natural product physostigmine, and a pioneer in industrial large-scale chemical synthesis of the human hormones progesterone and testosterone from plant sterols such as stigmasterol and sitosterol. His work laid the foundation for the steroid drug industry's production of cortisone, other corticosteroids, and artificial hormones that led to birth control pills.
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Fritjof Capra
- Occupations
- documentary participantwriterenvironmentalistphysicist
- Biography
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Fritjof Capra is an Austrian-born American author, physicist, systems theorist and deep ecologist. In 1995, he became a founding director of the Center for Ecoliteracy in Berkeley, California. He was on the faculty of Schumacher College which was disestablished in 2024.
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Richard von Krafft-Ebing
- Occupations
- psychologistneurologistphysicianphilosopheruniversity teacher
- Biography
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Richard Freiherr von Krafft-Ebing was a German psychiatrist and author of the foundational work Psychopathia Sexualis (1886).
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Helmut Qualtinger
- Occupations
- stage actorjournalisttelevision actorwriterfilm actor
- Biography
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Helmut Gustav Friedrich Qualtinger was an Austrian actor, cabaret performer, writer and reciter.
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Walter Kohl
- Occupations
- entrepreneureconomistwriter
- Biography
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Walter Kohl is a German financial analyst, businessman and author. He is the elder of the two sons of the former German Chancellor Helmut Kohl and Hannelore Kohl, and the brother of Peter Kohl.
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Abraham Wald
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Studied in 1927-1931
- Occupations
- statisticianeconomistuniversity teacherresearch scientistmathematician
- Biography
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Abraham Wald was a Jewish Hungarian mathematician who contributed to decision theory, geometry and econometrics, and founded the field of sequential analysis. One of his well-known statistical works was written during World War II on how to minimize the damage to bomber aircraft and took into account the survivorship bias in his calculations. He spent his research career at Columbia University. He was the grandson of Rabbi Moshe Shmuel Glasner.
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Franz Grillparzer
- Occupations
- politicianwriterplaywrightpoet
- Biography
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Franz Seraphicus Grillparzer was an Austrian writer who was considered to be the leading Austrian dramatist of the 19th century. His plays were and are frequently performed at the Burgtheater in Vienna. He also wrote the oration for Ludwig van Beethoven's funeral, as well as the epitaph for his friend Franz Schubert.
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Josef Hoffmann
- Occupations
- furniture designerarchitectartistic directoruniversity teacherjewelry designer
- Biography
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Josef Hoffmann was an Austrian-Moravian architect and designer. He was among the founders of Vienna Secession and co-establisher of the Wiener Werkstätte. His most famous architectural work is the Stoclet Palace, in Brussels, (1905–1911) a pioneering work of Modern Architecture, Art Deco and peak of Vienna Secession architecture.
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Gernot Blümel
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- 2002-2009 studied philosophy
- Occupations
- politician
- Biography
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Gernot Blümel is an Austrian politician of the Austrian People's Party (ÖVP). He served as Austria's finance minister from 2020 to 2021, having announced his resignation shortly after Alexander Schallenberg's resignation on 2 December 2021. Since 2015, he has been the chairman of the Vienna branch of the ÖVP. Prior, he was Chancellery minister for European Affairs, Art, Culture, and Media from 2017 to 2019; he was also General Secretary of the ÖVP from 2013 to 2015.
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Adam Stefan Sapieha
- Occupations
- Catholic bishoptheologianCatholic deaconCatholic priestpolitician
- Biography
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Prince Adam Stefan Stanisław Bonifacy Józef Sapieha was a Polish Catholic prelate who served as Archbishop of Kraków from 1911 to 1951. A member of the Polish nobility, between 1922 and 1923 he was a senator of the Second Polish Republic. In 1946, Pope Pius XII made him a cardinal.
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Karl von Frisch
- Occupations
- university teacherethologistentomologistbeekeeper
- Biography
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Karl Ritter von Frisch, ForMemRS was a German-Austrian ethologist who received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1973, along with Nikolaas Tinbergen and Konrad Lorenz.
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Beate Meinl-Reisinger
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Studied in 1996-2002
- Occupations
- politiciantour guidejurist
- Biography
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Beate Meinl-Reisinger is an Austrian politician serving as leader of NEOS – The New Austria and Liberal Forum since June 2018. She is also the leader of the party's parliamentary group in the National Council since 2018. Previously, she was a member of the National Council and from 2015 to 2018, and a member of the Gemeinderat and Landtag of Vienna, where she also led the NEOS group. She returned to the National Council after the resignation of Matthias Strolz in 2018.
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Sándor Ferenczi
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- Studied in 1890-1894
- Occupations
- psychoanalystneurologist
- Biography
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Sándor Ferenczi was a Hungarian psychoanalyst, a key theorist of the psychoanalytic school and a close associate of Sigmund Freud.
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Alma Zadić
- Enrolled in the University of Vienna
- 2003-2007 graduated with Magister Juris in legal science
- Graduated with Doctor of Laws in legal science
- Occupations
- environmentalistpoliticianlawyer
- Biography
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Alma Zadić is a Bosnian-born Austrian lawyer and politician of the Green Party. She has been serving as Minister of Justice since 7 January 2020 in the governments of Chancellors Sebastian Kurz, Alexander Schallenberg and Karl Nehammer.
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Hermann Broch
- Occupations
- essayistprose writerwriterphilosopherplaywright
- Biography
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Hermann Broch was an Austrian writer, best known for two major works of modernist fiction: The Sleepwalkers (Die Schlafwandler, 1930–32) and The Death of Virgil (Der Tod des Vergil, 1945).
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Thomas Klestil
- Occupations
- politiciandiplomateconomist
- Biography
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Thomas Klestil was an Austrian diplomat and politician who served as the president of Austria from 1992 until his death in 2004. He was elected in 1992 and re-elected in 1998.
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Wolfgang Schüssel
- Occupations
- juristpolitician
- Biography
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Wolfgang Schüssel is an Austrian politician. He was Chancellor of Austria for two consecutive terms from February 2000 to January 2007. While being recognised as a rare example of an active reformer in contemporary Austrian politics, his governments were also highly controversial from the beginning, starting with the fact that he formed a coalition government with Jörg Haider's Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ) on both occasions. In 2011, he retired from being an active member of parliament due to a multitude of charges of corruption against members of his governments.
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Jovan Cvijić
- Occupations
- ethnologistdiplomatgeologistgeomorphologistgeographer
- Biography
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Jovan Cvijić was a Serbian geographer and ethnologist, president of the Serbian Royal Academy of Sciences and rector of the University of Belgrade. Cvijić is considered the founder of geography in Serbia. He began his scientific career as a geographer and geologist, and continued his activity as a human geographer and sociologist. He initiated the Serbian Ethnographic Collection (Srpski etnološki zbornik), within which 102 books were published, representing a unique scientific and interdisciplinary project on a global scale. Jovan Cvijić received numerous awards and medals, both domestically and internationally, for his work.
