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Hermann Alexander Graf[1] von Keyserling (20 July [O.S.8] 1880 – 26 April 1946) was a Baltic German philosopher from the Keyserlingk family. His grandfather, Alexander von Keyserling, was a notable geologist of Imperial Russia.
Hermann Graf von Keyserling
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| Born | 20 July [O.S.8] 1880
Könno Manor, Könno, Kreis Pernau, Governorate of Livonia, Russian Empire
(in present-day Könno, Parnu County, Estonia) |
| Died | 26 April 1946(1946-04-26) (aged 65)
Innsbruck, French Zone, Allied-occupied Austria
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| Era | 20th-century philosophy |
| Region | Western philosophy |
Keyserling was born to a wealthy aristocratic family in the Könno Manor, Kreis PernauinGovernorate of Livonia, Russian Empire, now in Estonia. After his education at the universities of Dorpat (Tartu), Heidelberg, and Vienna, he took a trip around the world. He married Maria Goedela von Bismarck-Schönhausen, granddaughter of Otto von Bismarck. His son Arnold Keyserling followed his fathers footsteps and became a renowned philosopher.
Hermann Keyserling interested himself in natural science and in philosophy, and before World War I he was known both as a student of geology and as a popular essayist. The Russian Revolution deprived him of his estate in Livonia, and with the remains of his fortune he founded the Gesellschaft für Freie Philosophie (Society for Free Philosophy) at Darmstadt. The mission of this school was to bring about the intellectual reorientation of Germany.[2]
He was the first to use the term Führerprinzip. One of Keyserling's central claims was that certain "gifted individuals" were "born to rule" on the basis of Social Darwinism.
Although not a doctrinaire pacifist, Keyserling believed that the old German policy of militarism was dead for all time and that Germany's only hope lay in the adoption of international, democratic principles. His best-known work is the Reisetagebuch eines Philosophen ("Travel-journal of a Philosopher"). The book also describes his travels in Asia, America and Southern Europe.
