Abraham Moles


Abraham Moles was an engineer of electrical engineering and acoustics, and a doctor of physics and philosophy. He was one of the first researchers to establish and analyze links between aesthetics and information theory.
He taught sociology and psychology at the Universities of Ulm, Strasbourg, San Diego, Mexico, Compiègne, and founded the Institute of Social Psychology of Communication in Strasbourg.
Abraham Moles followed technology studies at the University of Grenoble, as well as he was preparing a bachelor in sciences of nature.
He was first appointed as assistant professor at the Laboratory of metal physics, under the direction of Félix Esclangon, then of Louis Néel. There he learned techniques of metal work, then electric and electronic tools. He wrote reports on testing materials and analysis.
At the end of the Second World War, he was hired by the French Research Institute the Centre national de la recherche scientifique, more precisely at the Laboratory of acoustics and vibrations, in Marseille, and at the CRSIM, which was the continuation of the French National Marine Laboratory.
He also followed the philosophy courses of Aimé Forest and Jacques Chevalier at the University of Grenoble, then the courses of Gaston Berger at the University of Aix, and the courses of Gaston Bachelard at the Sorbonne.
In 1952, he defended a PhD on La structure physique du signal musical et phonétique.
He participated to the works of the Centre d’études de la radio-télévision, and, in particular, was a member of the team around Pierre Schaeffer.
But lacking money, he accepted two grants of the Rockefeller Foundation, in order to work at Columbia University.
In 1954, he defended a second PhD, in philosophy, under the title "La création scientifique", under the direction of Bachelard.
From 1954 to 1960, with many interruptions, Abraham Moles was the director of the Laboratoire d’électroacoustique Scherchen, in the small village of Gravesano, in Switzerland, under the direction of Hermann Scherchen, one of the pioneers of Radio Berlin, who had discovered composers as famous as Luciano Berio, Iannis Xenakis, Bruno Maderna, Luigi Nono.
At the same time, Abraham Moles was teaching at the University of Stuttgart, of Bonn, of Berlin and of Utrecht. He was finally appointed full professorship at the Ulm School of Design.
After 1966, he taught in Strasbourg, first in sociology, then in the professorship of social psychology. He created there an Institute for social psychology of communications, usually called École de Strasbourg, by former students now members of the Association internationale de micropsychologie et de psychologie sociale des communications. He developed an article "" into the book Art et ordinateur. transposed for aesthetics the theories of Shannon.
He was also the president of the Société française de cybernétique, founded by Louis Couffignal.

Selected work