Naturphilosophie

References and further reading

	Amrine, F. (1986) Goethe and the Sciences: A Reappraisal, Dordrecht: Kluwer. (Goethe in the history of science and his relevance to philosophical treatment of nature today. Annotated bibliography.)
	Bonsiepen, W. (1997) Die Begründung einer Naturphilosophie bei Kant, Schelling, Fries und Hegel. Mathematische versus spekulative Naturphilosophie (Foundations of the philosophy of nature in Kant, Schelling, Fries and Hegel: mathematical versus speculative philosophy of nature), Frankfurt: Klostermann. (Detailed and thorough account of German idealism’s different philosophies of nature and of the opposing mathematical philosophy of nature of J.F. Fries and his school. Much philosophical and historical context.)
	Böhme, G. (1989) Klassiker der Naturphilosophie. Von den Vorsokratikern bis zur Kopenhagener Schule (Classics of the philosophy of nature: from the Presocratics to the Copenhagen School), Munich: Beck. (Essays on the leading philosophers of nature and philosophical cosmologists, from the Presocratics to Einstein and the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics. Includes entries on Kant, Goethe, Schelling, and Hegel.)
	Caneva, K.L. (1997) ‘Physics and Naturphilosophie: A Reconnaissance’, History of Science 35: 35–107. (Critical and thorough review of claims for the influence of Naturphilosophie on early nineteenth-century physics. Valuable and extensive bibliography.)
	Carnap, R. (1928) Der logische Aufbau der Welt, Berlin-Schlachtensee: Weltkreis-Verlag; trans. R. George as The Logical Structure of the World, Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1967. (Attempt to carry out the programme of early Logical Empiricism to reduce all concepts to elementary experiences. Gives a solution to the mind–body problem in terms of a double-aspect theory that is reminiscent of the Spinozism of Naturphilosophie.)
	Cohen, R.S. and Wartofsky, M.W. (1984) Hegel and the Sciences, Dordrecht: Reidel. (Essays on Hegel’s philosophy of nature, its relation to logic and on his treatment of various sciences.)
	Cunningham, A. and Jardine, N. (1990) Romanticism and the Sciences, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Essays on Romanticism in general and on its relation to the sciences of the organic and inorganic, as well as on Romantic literature and the sciences.)
	Engelhardt, D. von (1978) ‘Bibliographie der Sekundärliteratur zur romantischen Naturforschung und Medizin 1950–1975’ (Bibliography of secondary literature on Romantic science and medicine, 1950–1975), in R. Brinkmann (ed.) Romantik in Deutschland. Ein interdisziplinäres Symposion (Romanticism in Germany: An interdisciplinary symposium), Stuttgart: Metzler, 307–330. (Comprehensive bibliography for the given period. The volume contains other relevant material.)
	Engelhardt, D. von (1988) ‘Romanticism in Germany’, in R. Porter and M. Teich (eds) Romanticism in National Context, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 109–133. (Places Naturphilosophie in the wider context of the German Romantic movement.)
	Engelhardt, D. von and Musto, R. (1993) Annali. Sezione Germanica NS 3: 1–3. (A collection of nineteen essays, in Italian, on a wide range of topics concerning science and philosophy in the age of Romanticism; the collection has no special title.)
	Esposito, J.L. (1977) Schelling’s Idealism and Philosophy of Nature, Lewisburg, PA and London: Associated University Presses. (Short account of Schelling’s philosophy of nature. Useful chapter on Schelling’s contemporary critics and on his influence on nineteenth-century America)
	Fichte, J.G. (1794) Grundlage der gesammten Wissenschaftslehre, Jena/ Leipzig: Gabler; repr. in Sämmtliche Werke, ed. I.H. Fichte, Berlin: Veit, 1845–6, vol. 1, 83–328; trans. P. Heath and J. Lachs as The Science of Knowledge, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982. (Theoretical foundation of Fichte’s philosophical system.)
	Fischer, K. (1902) Schelling’s Leben, Werke und Lehre (Schelling’s life, work, and doctrine), Heidelberg: Winter, 3rd edn. (Elaborate and vivid account of Schelling’s life and work. Sometimes dated but still valuable, with a wealth of information.)
	Frank, M. (1985) Eine Einführung in Schellings Philosophie (An introduction to Schelling’s philosophy), Frankfurt: Suhrkamp. (Short but useful introduction to Schelling’s work which puts stress on his Naturphilosophie.)
	Giovanni, G. di (1979) ‘Kant’s Metaphysics of Nature and Schelling’s Ideas for a Philosophy of Nature’, Journal of the History of Philosophy 17: 197–215. (Argues for the closeness of Schelling’s Ideen to Kant.)
	Gloy, K. and Burger, P. (1993) Die Naturphilosophie im Deutschen Idealismus (The philosophy of nature in German idealism), Stuttgart: Frommann-Holzboog. (Collection of essays on German idealism’s concept of nature: on Kant, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel and the Romantics.)
	Gode-von Aesch, A. (1941) Natural Science in German Romanticism New York: Columbia University Press; repr. New York: AMS Press, 1966. (Deals with science and literature as two intertwined aspects of the German Romantic movement.)
	Gower, B. (1973) ‘Speculation in Physics: The History and Practice of Naturphilosophie ’, Studies in History and Philosophy of Science 3 (4): 301–356. (Authoritative and influential survey which includes treatment of Ritter and Ørsted.)
	Hasler, L. (1981) Schelling. Seine Bedeutung für eine Philosophie der Natur und der Geschichte (Schelling: his significance for a philosophy of nature and history), Stuttgart: Frommann-Holzboog. (Includes essays on Schelling’s relation to the sciences of his day and on his philosophy of history.)
	Heckmann, R., Krings, H. and Meyer, R.W. (1985) Natur und Subjektivität. Zur Auseinandersetzung mit der Naturphilosophie des jungen Schelling (Nature and subjectivity: a discussion of the young Schelling’s Naturphilosophie ), Stuttgart: Frommann-Holzboog. (Essays on the place of Schelling’s Naturphilosophie in German idealism, its reception by its contemporaries and an assessment from a present-day point of view.)
	Hegel, G.W.F. (1817) ‘Naturphilosophie’, part 2 of Enzyklopädie der philosophischen Wissenschaften im Grundrisse, Heidelberg: Oßwald; 2nd edn repr. in Gesammelte Werke, Hamburg: Meiner, 1989, vol. 19, 183–283; trans. M.J. Petry as Hegel’s Philosophy of Nature, London: Allen & Unwin, 1970, 3 vols. (Hegel’s major work on his own specific version of Naturphilosophie.)
	Helmholtz, H. (1855) Ueber das Sehen des Menschen (On human vision), Leipzig: Voss; repr. in Vorträge und Reden, 5th edn, 2 vols, Braunschweig: Vieweg, 1903, vol. 1: 85–117. (One of the first documents of rising Neo-Kantianism. Kant’s epistemology, interpreted in terms of sensory physiology, is proposed as a remedy for the extravagances of Naturphilosophie.)
	Heuser-Keßler, M.-L. (1986) Die Produktivität der Natur. Schellings Naturphilosophie und das neue Paradigma der Selbstorganisation in den Naturwissenschaften (Nature’s productivity: Schelling’s philosophy of nature and the paradigm of self-organization in the natural sciences), Berlin: Duncker & Humblot. (Account of Schelling’s conception of (especially organic) nature and its autogeneric ordering processes. Schelling’s work is related to conceptions of self-organization in present-day science, in the work of I. Prigogine and H. Haken.)
	Heuser-Keßler, M.-L. and Jacobs, W.G. (1994) Schelling und die Selbstorganisation. Neue Forschungsperspektiven (Schelling and self-organization: new research perspectives), Selbstorganisation, vol. 5, Berlin: Duncker & Humblot. (Deals with Schelling’s concept of self-organization, its contemporary and present-day reception.)
	Horstmann, R.-P. and Petry, M.J. (1986) Hegels Philosophie der Natur. Beziehungen zwischen empirischer und spekulativer Naturerkenntnis (Hegel’s philosophy of nature: relations of empirical and speculative natural science), Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta. (Essays on Hegel’s Naturphilosophie.)
	Kant, I. (1781/1787) Kritik der reinen Vernunft, Riga: Hartknoch; trans. N.K. Smithas The Critique of Pure Reason, New York: St Martin’s Press, London: Macmillan, 1964. (Explanation and justification of the a priori forms of reason that constitute the basis of any theoretical knowledge. Kant’s doctrine of the spontaneity of the subject and the autonomy of reason was especially relevant for Naturphilosophie.)
	Kant, I. (1786) Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der Naturwissenschaft, Riga: Hartknoch; trans. J. Ellington as Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, Indianapolis, IN: Bobbs-Merrill, 1970. (In his metaphysics of nature, Kant formulates the principles that specify the transition from the critique of pure reason to actual empirical science. His dynamic definition of matter from attractive and repulsive forces was important for Naturphilosophie.)
	Kant, I. (1790) Kritik der Urteilskraft, Berlin: Lagarde; trans. J.C. Meredith as Kant’s Critique of Judgement, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1952. (In a way, the cornerstone of Kant’s philosophy. Tries to show that the realms of nature and freedom, of causality and teleology are compatible. The second part, ‘Critique of teleological reason’, became especially relevant for Naturphilosophie.)
	Kanz, K.T. (1994) Philosophie des Organischen in der Goethezeit. Studien zu Werk und Wirkung des Naturforschers Carl Friedrich Kielmeyer (1765–1844) (Philosophy of the organic during the time of Goethe: studies in the work and influence of the naturalist Carl Friedrich Kielmeyer), Stuttgart: Steiner. (Essays on Kielmeyer’s vision of the organism and biology in general, its context and influence.)
	Kielmeyer, C.F. (1793) Ueber die Verhältnisse der organischen Kräfte unter einander in der Reihe der verschiedenen Organisationen, die Geseze und Folgen dieser Verhältnisse (On the relation of the organic forces to each other in the series of the different organisms, the laws and the successions of this relation), Stuttgart and Tübingen: Heerbrand; repr., intro. K.T. Kanz, Marburg: Basilisken-Presse, 1993. (Living systems fulfil three main functions: sensation, motion and self-preservation. Organic forms differ from each other by the different amount in which these functions are fulfilled. A concise statement of the problem situation at the end of the eighteenth century.)
	Knittermeyer, H. (1928) Schelling und die romantische Schule (Schelling and the Romantic movement), Munich: Ernst Reinhardt. (Lengthy account of Schelling’s Naturphilosophie and of the ideas of many of his followers, especially from philosophy.)
	Kuhn, Th. S. (1959) ‘Energy Conservation as an Example of Simultaneous Discovery’, in M. Clagett (ed.) Critical Problems in the History of Science, Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 321–356; repr. in The Essential Tension. Selected Studies in Scientific Tradition and Change, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1977, 66–104. (In this influential piece, Kuhn shows how Naturphilosophie served as a philosophical background for the simultaneous discovery of energy conservation by many different scientists. Compare the comments by Caneva 1997.)
	Mutschler, H.-D. (1990) Spekulative und empirische Physik. Aktualität und Grenzen der Naturphilosophie Schellings (Speculative and empirical physics: actuality and limits of Schelling’s Naturphilosophie), Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. (A critique of Schelling’s Naturphilosophie from a present-day point of view.)
	Oken, L. (1843) Lehrbuch der Naturphilosophie, Zurich: Schultheß, 3rd. edn; repr. Hildesheim: Olms, 1991; trans. A. Tulk as Elements of Physiophilosophy, London: Ray Society, 1847. (Exposition of a naturphilosophisches system of the life sciences; a mixture of an unscrupulous usage of polarity principles and of an effusive naturalism.)
	Ørsted, H.Ch. (1803) Materialien zu einer Chemie des Neunzehenten Jahrhunderts (Materials for a chemistry of the nineteenth century), Erstes Stück, Regensburg: Montag & Weiß; repr. in Naturvidenskabelige Skrifter, ed. K. Meyer, Copenhagen: Høst 1920, vol. 1, 133–210. (Enthusiastic exposition of the chemical system of J.J. Winterl, which claimed the principles of electricity as fundamental for acids, bases, heat, light and magnetism.)
	Ørsted, H.Ch. (1849) Aanden i naturen; trans. K.L. Kannegiesser as Der Geist in der Natur, Leipzig: Lorck, 1850; trans. L. Horner and J.B. Horner as The Soul in Nature, London: Bohn, 1852, repr. London: Dawsons of Pall Mall, 1966. (Series of articles exhibiting physical nature as permeated and dominated by the mind.)
	Petry, M.J. (1987) Hegel und die Naturwissenschaften (Hegel and the natural sciences), Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta. (Collection of essays expounding Hegel’s relation to the sciences.)
	Poggi, S. (1996) ‘La “Naturphilosophie” dell’idealismo e del romanticismo: lo stato della ricerca’, (The Naturphilosophie of idealism and of Romanticism: The state of research), Rivista di Filosofia 87 (1): 111–128. (Concise overview of contemporary research on Naturphilosophie.)
	Poggi, S. and Bossi, M. (1994) Romanticism in Science: Science in Europe, 1790–1840, Dordrecht: Kluwer. (Essays on Romanticism and Naturphilosophie in biology, chemistry, psychology, philosophy and mathematics.)
	Sandkühler, H.J. (1984) Natur und geschichtlicher Prozeß. Studien zur Naturphilosophie F.W.J. Schellings (Nature and historical development: studies in Schelling’s Naturphilosophie ), Frankfurt: Suhrkamp. (Collection of essays on Schelling’s Naturphilosophie and its relation to history.)
	Schelling, F.W.J. (1795) Vom Ich als Princip der Philosophie oder über das Unbedingte im menschlichen Wißen, Tübingen: Herrbrandt; repr. in Sämmtliche Werke, ed. K.F.A. Schelling, Stuttgart, 1856–61, vol. 1, 149–244; trans. F. Marti as The Unconditional in Human Knowledge: Four Early Essays 1794–6, Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell University Press, 1980. (On the absolute ego as the foundation of philosophy. A confrontation of Fichte’s philosophy with that of Spinoza.)
	Schelling, F.W.J. (1797) Ideen zu einer Philosophie der Natur als Einleitung in das System dieser Wissenschaft, Leipzig: Breitkopf & Härtel; repr. in Sämmtliche Werke, ed. K.F.A. Schelling, Stuttgart 1856–61, vol. 2, 1–343; trans. E.E. Harris and P. Heath, intro. R. Stern, Ideas for a Philosophy of Nature as Introduction to the Study of that Science, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988. (Schelling’s major work on Naturphilosophie aiming to overcome the split of mind and nature, of subject and object. Follows Kant in constructing matter from expansive and contractive forces.)
	Schelling, F.W.J. (1798) Von der Weltseele, eine Hypothese der höheren Physik zur Erklärung des allgemeinen Organismus (On the world-soul: a hypothesis of higher physics in order to explain the general organism), Hamburg: Perthes; repr. in Sämmtliche Werke, ed. K.F.A. Schelling, Stuttgart 1856–61, vol. 2, 345–583. (Explanation of organic nature in terms of a general dualism of opposing forces.)
	Schelling, F.W.J. (1799) Erster Entwurf eines Systems der Naturphilosophie (Outline of a system of the philosophy of nature), Jena/Leipzig: Gabler; repr. in Sämmtliche Werke, ed. K.F.A. Schelling, Stuttgart 1856–61, vol. 3, 1–268. (Elaboration of a developmental theory of life as proposed in the Weltseele. Influenced by Kielmeyer and Herder.)
	Schelling, F.W.J. (1994) Ergänzungsband zu Werke Band 5 bis 9. Wissenschaftshistorischer Bericht zu Schellings Naturphilosophischen Schriften 1797–1800 (Supplementary volume of vols 5 to 9 of the works: The scientific background of Schelling’s works on Naturphilosophie 1797–1800), Stuttgart: Frommann-Holzboog. (Supplement to the critical edition of the Bavarian academy of the sciences (1976–) ed. H.M. Baumgartner et al. Essays on chemistry, magnetism, electricity, galvanism and physiology in Schelling’s day aiming to recover the contemporary scientific context of Schelling’s Naturphilosophie.)
	Schmied-Kowarzik, W. (1993) ‘Selbst und Existenz. Grundanliegen und Herausforderung der Naturphilosophie Schellings’ (Self and existence: the challenge of Schelling’s Naturphilosophie ), in H.M. Baumgartner and W.G. Jacobs (eds) Philosophie der Subjektivität? Zur Bestimmung des neuzeitlichen Philosophierens (Philosophy of subjectivity? on the characteristics of modern philosophy), Stuttgart: Frommann-Holzboog, vol. 1, 111–130. (Thoughtful defence of Schelling’s approach and an appreciation of its relation to modern science.)
	Snelders, H.A.M. (1970) ‘Romanticism and Naturphilosophie and the Inorganic Natural Sciences 1797–1840: An Introductory Survey’, Studies in Romanticism 9 (3): 193–215. (A clear presentation of the influence of Romantic thinking and Naturphilosophie on the inorganic sciences in Germany. Claims that the influence was positive and fruitful.)
	Snelders, H.A.M. (1994) Wetenschap en intuitie: Het Duitse romantisch-speculatief natuuronderzoek rond 1800 (Science and intuition: German Romantic and speculative natural science around 1800), Baarn: Ambo. (Balanced and authoritative account of the impact of Naturphilosophie on science and vice versa from about 1790 to 1830. Includes vivid and expressive accounts of central and marginal figures of the time. Helpful annotated bibliography.)
	Strack, F. (1994) Evolution des Geistes: Jena um 1800. Natur und Kunst, Philosophie und Wissenschaft im Spannungsfeld der Geschichte (Evolution of the spirit: Jena around 1800. Nature and art, philosophy and science under the tension of history), Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta. (Essays on the most brilliant period of the University of Jena as the origin of the German Romantic movement in philosophy, art, literature and the sciences. Includes essays on philosophical ideas about nature in Goethe, Hölderlin, Novalis, Schelling and Ritter.)
	Wilson, A.D. (1997) ‘Die romantischen Naturphilosophen’ (The romantic Naturphilosophen), in K. von Meyenn, Die grossen Physiker: Erster Band: Von Aristoteles bis Kelvin (Great Physicists. Vol. 1: From Aristotle to Kelvin), Munich: Beck, 319–335. (The role of Naturphilosophie in the physics of Ritter, Ørsted and Faraday.)