Fundamentals of an Epistemology
of Goethe's worldview
with special consideration of Schiller
GA 2
Translated by Steiner Online Library
3. The Task of Our Science
[ 1 ] For all science, what Goethe so characteristically expresses with the words: “Theory in and of itself is of no use except in so far as it makes us believe in the connection of phenomena.” We always bring separate facts of experience into a context through science. We see causes and effects separately in inorganic nature and search for their connection in the corresponding sciences. In the organic world we perceive species and genera of organisms and endeavor to determine their mutual relationships. In history we are confronted with individual cultural epochs of mankind; we endeavour to recognize the inner dependence of one stage of development on the other. In this way, every science has to work in a certain field of manifestation in the sense of Goethe's sentence above.
[ 2 ] Each science has its field in which it seeks the connection between phenomena. Then there still remains a great contrast in our scientific endeavors: the ideal world gained through the sciences on the one hand and the objects underlying it on the other. There must be a science that clarifies the mutual relationships here as well. The ideal and the real world, the contrast between idea and reality, are the task of such a science. These opposites must also be recognized in their mutual relationship.
[ 3 ] The purpose of the following remarks is to seek these relationships. The fact of science on the one hand and nature and history on the other are to be brought into a relationship. What is the significance of the reflection of the external world in human consciousness, what is the relationship between our thinking about the objects of reality and the latter themselves?