Central Europe is not an easy region to live in. This biographee had been born before the first ten years of democratic Czechoslovakia under President Masaryk elapsed (1928). After another ten years he was an involuntary witness of the Munich Agreement and, half a year later, of the occupation of his native country by the Nazis in 1939. He enjoyed the end of WWII in May 1945. In February 1948, he was, from a close, an astonished witness of various events during the communist takeover. He studied on various universities, including Charles University in Prague. He studied history, philosophy, economy, linguistics, and political science. In the following uneasy years (under the then ruling conditions of Marxist dogmatism and not sooner than at the end of the Fifties), his scientific inclinations found a way in an unconventional study of Locke's philosophy as well as in a vindication of the relativity theory. In the five years preceding 1968, he prepared four manuals of logic for teachers. After the occupation of the country by the Soviets in August 1968, he was dismissed from the University for alleged "political reasons". The publication of three of his books was stopped. For more than twenty years he was prevented from continuing his academic career. At the end of the Eighties, a part-time occupation at the Institute of Analytical Chemistry led to his English translation of an important contribution on isotachophoresis. After November 1989, the striking students at the Faculty of Education found in him their candidate for the post of Dean although the rather complicated conditions of the time prevented him from finally striving for the post. As Chair he founded a new department of philoso-phy and civics, also elaborating the corresponding curricula. Since 1995, he is a member of the Faculty of Informatics (Masaryk University). His main concern there lies in the lessons on the developmental trends of scientific thinking as well as the philosophy of mind and language. He either was, or still is, a member of various academic institutions, councils, and boards, and that not only at his University. (For several years he, in several fields of activity, co-worked with Palacky University at Olomouc and is still active in a scientific committee at Charles University in Prague.)
MD publishes articles in philosophy (in particular on Locke or Descartes), politics (Central Europe, Masaryk), ethics (values), philosophy of science (history, trends, explanation problems), philosophy of mind (problems of monist/dualist explanations), philosophy of history (analytical and speculative), religion (Western and Eastern traditions, and their contemporaneity). He has lately published books on the philosophy of history (1992) and toleration (1995), and co-edited, as co-writer, a series of contributions on ethics (1998, 3 vols.). He is now preparing a book on the mind-body problem and another one on the perspectives of Masaryk's legacy in the 21st century. He has also written a book of fiction, "The Apology of Judas" (not yet ready for press). Some of his contributions appeared in English, German, and French.
MD speaks English, German, Russian, Spanish, French.
MD was offered several nominations both by the International Biographical Centre (Cambridge, UK) and the American Biographical Institute (USA). He has been recently nominated by his University for the Ministry of Education Prize (1999). His biography has also been included into "The Europe 500: Leaders for the New Century" by Barons' Who's Who (2001).
The older he is the more he feels admiration towards life as a miraculous phenomenon in our so strange Universe and wonders at the spectacular achievements of the mind in their knowledge.