Levels of Knowing and Existence - Author

Author

Harry L. Weinberg was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1913. He received his BS degree from the College of the City of New York in 1933 and his MS in chemistry from the University of Pennsylvania the following year. He worked for a period as a chemist and during the Second World War was engaged with the Merchant Marines. Mr. Weinberg’s interest in general semantics was stirred by a seminar he attended in 1940 in Chicago presented by Alfred Korzybski and by Korzybski’s seminal publication on the subject, Science and Sanity (1933), which Weinberg first read in 1940 and reread during his time with the Merchant Marines. His interest in the field prompted him in 1947 to enroll at Northwestern University for graduate work under Irving J. Lee. He received his Master’s degree from the university in 1948 and his PhD in 1953 in the field of speech.

In 1948 he began teaching at Temple University in Philadelphia as an Instructor in Speech and General Semantics and continued to teach there as a professor until his death in 1968. A former student of his relates that “His classes in General Semantics on introductory and advanced levels were popular, and he became well known as an outstanding teacher.” Although he wrote many papers on general semantics, his greatest academic contribution, in terms of depth and reach, is widely considered to be his book Levels of Knowing and Existence.