Between "Bildung" and "Wissenschaft": the 19Th-Century German Ideal of Scientific Education by Bas Van Bommel

Between "Bildung" and "Wissenschaft": The 19th-Century German Ideal of Scientific Education by Bas van Bommel Prior to the 19th century, poetry, rhetoric, historiography and moral philosophy were considered particularly valuable to humane education, as they transmitted knowledge of beauty, goodness and truth. These so‐called "fine sciences" ("schöne Wissenschaften") were discredited by Immanuel Kant, who no longer recognised values as objects of scientific knowledge. Kant advanced an ideal of "rigorous science" entailing a novel concept of "scientific education" ("wissenschaftliche Bildung"): through methodically exploring the harmonious totality of human knowledge, the human mind would take on a correspondingly harmonious form. In the course of the 19th century, the disciplinary differentiation and specialisation that resulted from the new concept of rigorous science proved ever more difficult to reconcile with the educational ideal that had once been its motivating force. TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. Introduction 2. Bildung in the late 18th century: schöne Wissenschaften 3. The Kantian turn 4. Classical philology as "pure science": Friedrich August Wolf 5. Bildung transformed: classical philology as an educational science 6. The educational value of the natural sciences 7. The institutional impact of the German concept of scientific education 8. Scientific education abroad 9. The conflict between science and education 10. Conclusion 11. Appendix 1. Sources 2. Literature 3. Notes Indices Citation Introduction Mathematics and the natural sciences have worked their way up to unsuspected heights, and ... acquired a classicism that can almost compete with the aesthetic classicism of ancient literature.1 Without a doubt, the most influential concept in German university history is that of the "unity of teaching and research" ("Einheit von Lehre und Forschung"). From the late 19th century onwards, university foundations and reforms both in and outside of fEurope have been inspired by the – originally German – idea that universities should not only aim at transmitting knowledge by means of education, but also at increasing it by way of scientific research. In our time, the integration of teaching and research within institutions for higher education is still widely pursued and commonly regarded as the central legacy of the German university. ▲1 The conceptual integration of teaching and research is well known to have been ultimately accomplished by Wilhelm von Humboldt (1767–1835) (➔ Media Link #ab), who was the leading executive of the Prussian university reform in 1809/1810.2 Humboldt aimed to give research a permanent place at the university, not only because he considered it a constitutive part of scientific practice, but also, and more importantly, because he regarded research as being of vital importance to achieve the highest end of all education: "wissenschaftliche Bildung" ("scientific education").3 This Humboldtian belief in the close connection between science (➔ Media Link #ac) (Wissenschaft) and education (Bildung) was based on three different principles.4 Firstly, like the major philosophers of his time – e.g. Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1762–1814) (➔ Media Link #ad), Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph von Schelling (1775–1854) (➔ Media Link #ae) Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831) (➔ Media Link #af), Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768–1834) (➔ Media Link #ag) and Henrich Steffens (1773–1845) (➔ Media Link #ah) – Humboldt postulated the "unity of science" ("Einheit der Wissenschaft"). He conceived of ariscience as the internally coherent totality of human knowledge, in which all subareas were assigned their proper place.5 Secondly, ariscience as the internally coherent totality of human knowledge, in which all subareas were assigned their proper place.5 Secondly, Humboldt argued that since the totality of human knowledge was anything but fully explored, science must be understood as a "noch nicht ganz Gefundenes und nie ganz Aufzufindendes" ("something not yet completely discovered, and never to be completely discovered"), thus underlining scientific research as an integral part of academic practice ("Wissenschaft als Forschung").6 Thirdly, Humboldt believed that the human mind, by being initiated through scientific research into the harmonious coherence of human knowledge, was supposed to take on a proportionally harmonious and equally coherent form, which he called "wahre ... Bildung" ("true science"). In this sense, Humboldt regarded science as ultimately aiming at "the highest, generally‐human" ("das höchst allgemein Menschliche"), which he called the "focal point" ("Brennpunkt") of academic education.7 ▲2 This early 19th century concept of "wissenschaftliche Bildung" ("scientific education") had a profound impact on the history of the German university. At an institutional level, its most obvious consequence was the reorganisation of the philosophical faculty, which can be seen throughout the German states in the 19th century. Setting themselves the task to represent the "unity of science", the philosophical faculties developed ambitious curricula of encyclopaedic breadth, encompassing both the humanities and the natural sciences. (➔ Media Link #ai) No longer being mere appendages to the higher faculties, they were reconceptualised as the pre‐eminent loci of research and Bildung (education): it was here that scholars and students were offered scope to educate their minds by exploring the harmonious and coherent totality of human knowledge through disinterested research. Nearly everywhere in Germany, the reorganised philosophical faculties succeeded in maintaining their newly acquired dominance for a very long time. It was only in the late 19th and early 20th century that new faculties gradually began to dissociate themselves from their unifying grip. ▲3 Yet, for all their durability, it is far from clear whether education at the reorganised philosophical faculties actually had the expected effect of "wissenschaftliche Bildung" ("scientific education") as understood by Humboldt.8 For all scholarly interest in the external conditions that prevented the 19th‐century ideal of "wissenschaftliche Bildung" ("scientific education") from being successfully implemented, the ideal itself has attracted little critical attention. Humboldt and his fellow reformers are usually very positively assessed for having granted Bildung (education) a central place on Prussia's academic and social agenda.9 Yet, at least up to the 1860s, the new concept of "wissenschaftliche Bildung" ("scientific education") encountered serious competition from the still dominant classical ideal of education that had been inherited, ultimately, from Renaissance humanism. Throughout the 19th century, many educationalists stuck to the traditional opinion that humane education should primarily focus, not on the acquisition of new knowledge by means of scientific research, but on a canonical body of exemplary texts that offered aesthetic and ethical models worthy of imitation. In their view, the new model of "wissenschaftliche Bildung" ("scientific education") was so abstractly conceived that it was unlikely to sort much effect in educational practice. The relevance of this criticism would emerge ever more clearly in the course of the late 19th century, when increasing numbers of scholars remained faithful to the concept of "science as research" while abandoning the educational ideal that had once been its motivating force. By examining its tense interplay with the traditional ideal of classical education, we may get a grip on the intrinsic causes why the new ideal of "wissenschaftliche Bildung" ("scientific education") proved so difficult to realise and why it ultimately created the very conditions of its own decline. ▲4 Bildung in the late 18th century: schöne Wissenschaften Up to the early 19th century, only a limited number of sciences was assigned with a potential of humane education (Bildung). In late 18th century Germany, these sciences were usually named "schöne Wissenschaften" ("fine sciences"), an interesting term that originated in the 17th century and reached the peak of its popularity between 1750 and 1780.10 Negatively, the "schöne Wissenschaften" ("fine sciences") distinguished themselves from the "faculty sciences" ("Fakultätswissenschaften") – theology, law and medicine – as well as from other "higher sciences" ("höhere Wissenschaften"), such as mathematics and physics.11 Positively, the "schöne Wissenschaften" ("fine sciences") could be described as aesthetic disciplines, that is, disciplines in which beauty of form plays an essential role: poetry, architecture, painting, music, dance, etc.12 ▲5 Within educational contexts, the "schöne Wissenschaften" ("fine sciences") usually referred only to literary genres: poetry, oratory, historiography and, to a lesser extent, philosophy.13 As the classical Greeks and Romans (➔ Media Link #aj) were widely considered to have brought these literary genres to matchless heights the "fine sciences" were often equated with classical literature, which took pride of place in classical Gymnasium education as well as at the philosophical faculties of the universities.14 Apart from classical literature itself, however, the "schöne Wissenschaften" ("fine sciences") also comprised disciplines that were needed for a full understanding and appreciation of classical texts, such as history, mythology, antiquities and geography.15 Although in these ancillary understanding and appreciation of classical texts, such as history, mythology, antiquities and geography.15 Although

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