Gary Lane Herstein

Biography

Dr. Herstein's career originally began in the computer and high-tech industries. This included spending several years in the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Space Flight Operations Facility During the Voyager 2 encounter at Jupiter, and the Voyagers 1 and 2 encounters at Saturn. While it was thrilling to see the first high-resolution images slowly scrolling across the monitors in Mission Control, Herstein was also impressed the numerous issues regarding the maintenance of the computer systems there. Often times, technicians would have no idea why a piece of equipment was malfunctioning, or how it came to be fixed. A phrase he coined at the time went, "we might as well sacrifice a goat by the full moon and burn the entrails." This very practical experience became  his introduction to the philosophical problem of knowledge.

Dr. Herstein continued to work full time at JPL as he put himself through college. But having graduated with his BA in philosophy, he eventually discovered that he still had questions that needed a higher level of scholarly understanding than he could get on his own. This eventually led him to Chicago, where he completed his Master's work, and finally to Carbondale, IL, where he earned his Ph.D.

Dr. Herstein currently resides in Johnston City with his cat, who despairs of him ever learning anything interesting.

Education

BA, Occidental College, Los Angeles, 1984
MA, DePaul University, Chicago, 1992
Ph.D, Southern Illinois Universtiy, Carbondale, 2005

Areas of Research / Professional Expertise

Philosophy  of Science,
Philosophy of Logic,
Process Philosophy,
Alfred North Whitehead

Personal Interests

Fencing (swords, not watches), Horseback riding, Movies, Music

Websites

• Academia Profile

Books