Benno Kerry

Benno Kerry (born Benno Kohn) was an Austrian philosopher. He studied under Ernst Laas and Otto Liebmann at the University of Strassburg and from 1877/78 under Franz Brentano at the University of Vienna. In 1881 he obtained his doctorate with the dissertation *Untersuchungen über das Causalproblem auf dem Boden einer Kritik der einschlägigen Lehren J. St. Mills* ("Investigations concerning the problem of causality on the basis of a critique of the relevant doctrines of John Stuart Mill"). In Vienna, as part of the School of Brentano he befriended Alois Höfler. In 1885 he obtained his habilitation as Privatdozent in Strasburg with *Grundzüge einer Theorie der mathematischen und nicht-mathematischen Grenzbegriffe. Ein Beitrag zur Erkenntnistheorie* ("Foundations of a theory of mathematical and non-mathematical limit concepts. A contribution to epistemology") and became the assistant of the neo-Kantian Wilhelm Windelband. Kerry was influenced by Bernard Bolzano and became an important conduit of his work. He was among the first students of Brentano (with Meinong and Höfler) to distinguish clearly between concept and object. Kerry died on 20 May 1889 as a result of an ear infection. Kerry was double first cousins with Fritz Kerry, who was the father of Richard Kerry and grandfather of John Kerry.