Aktuell
Tagung: "Construction and Experiment: Philosophical Method in Kant and German Idealism"
Construction and Experiment:
Philosophical Method in Kant and German Idealism
1.9. – 4.9. 2025, Internationales Wissenschaftsforum (IWH) Heidelberg
Hengstberger Symposium an der Universität Heidelberg
Organisation: Dr. Jelscha Schmid (Heidelberg), Dr. Simon Schüz (RPTU)
Gefördert durch Mittel des Klaus-Georg und Sigrid Hengstberger-Preises, der Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) und des ZGaPL Forschungsfonds der RPTU.
To philosophize is always linked to reflecting on the nature and legitimacy of that very activity. How can philosophical reflection arrive at truth as the goal of inquiry? Does philosophy have a method of its own? Is this method as scientific as those of mathematics and the natural sciences?
After the scientific revolutions of the 17th and 18th centuries, this question became increasingly pressing in German philosophy. As is still the case today, philosophers were required to establish the scientific pedigree of their own work. In their attempt to endow philosophy with a scientific method, Kant, Maimon, Fichte, Schelling and Hegel fruitfully drew on the paradigms of the emerging sciences, especially those of geometric construction and scientific experimentation. Before the time of Kant and the German Idealists, these methods had been taken up by early modern philosophers such as Spinoza and Bacon, who clearly influenced the former. The reception and creative adaptation of these scientific and philosophical methods in Kant and German Idealism will be the focus of the conference.
The status of construction and experiment as overarching methodological paradigms within the constellation of classical German philosophy has not yet been systematically researched. There are currently only a few works that consider a cross-section of different authors and texts, whilst taking into account the systematic function of the constructive/experimental method. The conference brings together established specialists as well as more junior scholars to investigate these overarching methodological paradigms in an interrelated and problem-based perspective.
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