Research Seminar March 25th: Moritz Epple (Department of History, Goethe-University Frankfurt) - The Theaetetus Problem: Some Remarks Concerning a History of Weak Knowledge

Moritz Epple 

The Theaetetus Problem: Some Remarks Concerning a History of Weak Knowledge

In philosophy and history of science, knowledge and science have long been viewed as a cultural resource of remarkable epistemic, social, and practical strength. However, many recent studies indicate that both in the period of their emergence and in many other historical circumstances, bodies of knowledge have been epistemically deficient, socially marginal, culturally fragile or weak in other respects. This may be the case even when the knowledge in question is a highly desired resource within a given historical formation. The talk outlines a framework used by a group within Frankfurt's Collaborative Research Centre 1095 to investigate the forms, functions, and dynamics of weak bodies of knowledge. To exemplify this framework I will use, in particular, material from a history of knowledge about the weather in early modern Europe (joint work with Linda Richter).