Essence of Philosophy

by Wilhelm Dilthey

Wilhelm Dilthey (1833-1911), the great German humanist, remained a towering figure in Europe long into the twentieth century. Published in 1954, this translation by Stephen A. Emery and William T. Emery was the first English translation of Dilthey's Das Wesen der Philosophie (1907) as well as his first work to be translated completely into English, making Dilthey accessible to scholars of the English-speaking world.

Genres: Philosophy

78 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1907

About the author

Wilhelm Dilthey (German: [ˈdɪltaɪ]) was a German historian, psychologist, sociologist, and hermeneutic philosopher, who held G. W. F. Hegel's Chair in Philosophy at the University of Berlin. As a polymathic philosopher, working in a modern research university, Dilthey's research interests revolved around questions of scientific methodology, historical evidence and history's status as a science. He could be considered an empiricist, in contrast to the idealism prevalent in Germany at the time, but his account of what constitutes the empirical and experiential differs from British empiricism and positivism in its central epistemological and ontological assumptions, which are drawn from German literary and philosophical traditions.

Reviews

[Christine Cordula Dantas]

Dilthey writes clearly but this is not an easy book as it appears at first. There are interesting points regarding the possibility of metaphysics, the similarities and differences of the arts and religion in relation to philosophy, the distinction of natural sciences and humanities, and the role of history as an important ingredient to define the “essence of philosophy”. 3/5

[Igor Capelari]

Segue no mesmo modelo dos outros escritos que li dele. Muita forma, pouco conteúdo. Dilthey realmente não soube desenvolver as suas ideias.

[S]

It did not discuss worldviews as much as I had hoped.