Abstract
As a doctrine of the method in the sciences of the spirit, Diltheys “hermeneutics” introduces a profound theoretical revision into the methodical unity of the modern concept of science through the notion of “understanding (Verstehen)”: that is, of a kind of knowledge that treats empirical data as manifestations of an inwardness, as signs of a psychic life. While the knowledge of natural sciences owes its universal validity to a procedure—“explaining (Erklären)”—which directly brings individual sensitive data back to general, constant, and always identical connections for all the contents of experience (laws of nature), understanding seeks the universal in a vital unity, present in its manifestations as their inner life, referring to an indivisible whole (see horizon).
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Samonà, L. (2020). Hermeneutics. In: Vercellone, F., Tedesco, S. (eds) Glossary of Morphology. Lecture Notes in Morphogenesis. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51324-5_52
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