Bednarczyk, A. (Author)
Alexander von Humboldt, who had never obtained a systematic and thorough education in natural sciences, and was in fact an autodidact in the field, made natural sciences the subject-matter of his creative research later on in his life. Humboldt's research was dominated by biological and geographical interests. There were roughly three periods, of about twenty years each, in his research activities. The first period, when Humboldt was still a young man, lasted until 1799, the year in which Humboldt embarked on his great American journey. The second period (1799-1834), covered the five-year-long journey (1799-1804), his return to Europe and the writing up of the research material that he had gathered during the journey, as well as the editing of the 'Voyage', completed in 1834. The third period was spent by Humboldt on writing the four volumes of the 'Cosmos'. Humboldts' research in the first period was devoted to diachronic causal regularities, investigated by means of the experimental method (e.g. electrophysiological research); in the second period, Humboldt focused his attention on synchronic morphological (coexistential) laws, which he studied using the descriptive-comparative and typological methods (e.g. phytogeographical studies); as for the third period, Humboldt's research interests dealt with attempts to produce an empirically-based theoretical synthesis of the knowledge about the Cosmos as a whole. Humboldt's research stance was always characterized by empiricism, a tendency to use a quantitative approach in his studies, and to present the results of his research in a visual manner; in the last two periods, Humboldt's methodology was dominated by a holistic approach. Humboldt combined a tendency towards giving a theoretical framework to his research with a negative attitude to the German romanticist natural philosophy (Naturphilosophie). The methodological analyses carried out in the current article lead to an image of Humboldt as scholar of the previous epoch - the Enlightenment.
...MoreDescription Looks at his views from the late 18th century until the end of his life.
Chapter
Daston, Lorraine;
(2010)
The Empire of Observation, 1600--1800
(/isis/citation/CBB001221449/)
Article
Fate, Victor Joseph Di;
(2011)
Is Newton a “Radical Empiricist” about Method?
(/isis/citation/CBB001024138/)
Article
Siemsen, H.;
(2010)
The Psychophysiological Founding of the Analogy Concept by Ernst Mach
(/isis/citation/CBB001232293/)
Thesis
Porter, Dahlia;
(2007)
“Knowledge Broken”: Empiricist Method and the Forms of Romanticism
(/isis/citation/CBB001561366/)
Chapter
Sibum, H. Otto;
(2008)
Machines, Bats, and Scholars: Experimental Knowledge in the Late Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries
(/isis/citation/CBB000831245/)
Article
Silvia Manzo;
(2019)
Historiographical Approaches on Experience and Empiricism in the Early Nineteenth-Century: Degérando and Tennemann
(/isis/citation/CBB444177107/)
Article
Luiz Carlos Soares;
(2017)
John Banks: An Independent and Itinerant Lecturer of Natural and Experimental Philosophy at the Threshold of the English Industrial Revolution
(/isis/citation/CBB025185254/)
Chapter
Arabatzis, Theodore;
(2012)
Hidden Entities and Experimental Practice: Renewing the Dialogue Between History and Philosophy of Science
(/isis/citation/CBB001500247/)
Book
Parsons, Keith M.;
(2014)
It Started with Copernicus: Vital Questions about Science
(/isis/citation/CBB001510107/)
Article
Carus, A. W.;
(2010)
The Pragmatics of Scientific Knowledge: Howard Stein's Reshaping of Logical Empiricism
(/isis/citation/CBB001221444/)
Book
Taper, Mark L.;
Lele, Subhash R.;
(2004)
The Nature of Scientific Evidence: Statistical, Philosophical, and Empirical Considerations
(/isis/citation/CBB000750947/)
Article
Alfredo Ferrarin;
(2019)
Method in Kant and Hegel
(/isis/citation/CBB989725622/)
Article
Redding, Paul;
(2014)
The Role of Logic “Commonly So Called” in Hegel's Science of Logic
(/isis/citation/CBB001201184/)
Article
Kelly, Thomas;
(2010)
Hume, Norton, and Induction without Rules
(/isis/citation/CBB001230086/)
Article
Sara Bianchini;
(2014)
Montaigne e Popper. L'induzione e la scienza
(/isis/citation/CBB849175611/)
Article
Viola, Enrico;
(2013)
The Specificity of Logical Empiricism in the Twentieth-Century History of Scientific Philosophy
(/isis/citation/CBB001320794/)
Article
Ketland, Jeffrey;
(2004)
Empirical Adequacy and Ramsification
(/isis/citation/CBB000410758/)
Article
Lutz, Sebastian;
(2012)
On a Straw Man in the Philosophy of Science: A Defense of the Received View
(/isis/citation/CBB001232111/)
Article
Good, Gregory A.;
(2008)
Between Data, Mathematical Analysis and Physical Theory: Research on Earth's Magnetism in the 19th Century
(/isis/citation/CBB000850425/)
Article
Raiger, Michael;
(2010)
Coleridge's Theory of Symbol and the Distinction between Reason and Understanding: A Genealogical Recovery of the Baconian Method of Science
(/isis/citation/CBB001210458/)
Be the first to comment!