Journal of the History of Philosophy

566 JOURNAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY 24:4 OCTOBER ~986 between Kant's general logic and his transcendental logic, and, as part of this failure, does not state sufficiently clearly what "content" amounts to for Kant. His gloss of the Anticipations does not stop to reflect on the consequences of the fact that for Kant there is non-additive measurability of some magnitudes as a necessary condition of empirical knowledge. The discussion of the first Analogy relies too heavily on the conservation principle as Kant's intended argumentative goal, and the proofs of the second Analogy are said to be more nearly analytical rather than transcendental, a description both misleading and largely unsubstantiated. Finally, in his account of the Refutation of Idealism, Aschenbrenner induces in the reader the false belief that Berkeley is the target of Kant's argument. Such flaws detract from the otherwise considerable value of the work before us. Students should be encouraged to refer to it but also to use it with the usual grain of salt. RALF MEERBOTE Universityof Rochester Schn~idelbach, Herbert. Philosophy in Germany z83x-x933. Translated by Eric Matthews . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984. Pp. x + ~65- Cloth, $39.5o. Paper, $12.95. This book is a very able translation of a recent work by Schnadelbach, who is already well known through his book on the philosophy of history after Hegel. As its author tells us in his preface, it is an experiment in which he "attempts to present a century in the history of German philosophy in such a way that it becomes clear what was of particular concern to the philosophers of that time in Germany and how much of these concerns still have actuality for us even today" (ix). His stardng point was what he defined as "the identity crisis" in philosophy which arose after Hegel; the method he chose to follow was to devote successive chapters to the development of certain themes which he took to be pervasive in the period. After an introductory chapter on the political, social, and cultural characteristics of the period in Germany, he devoted a chapter to each of the following: history and historicism; interpretations of science and its relation to philosophy; hermeneutics and the problem of understanding generally; the representatives of Lebensphilosopld2; philosophies of value; a growing interest in problems of ontology and the concept of Being; and, finally, an epilogue on philosophical anthropology. Each of these chapters, as well as the book as a whole, is both carefully done and stimulating; it cannot afford to be overlooked by historians of philosophy as a source for those interested in any of the individual topics which the author explores. Yet, there are two basic methodological questions that can be raised concerning the author 's approach. First, philosophy is an activity carried on by individual philosophers, and I think one must hold that the problems which each philosopher sets himself arise out of his relations to his philosophic predecessors and out of his own special concerns with, BOOK REVIEWS 567 say, religious or ethical or political problems, or out of his reactions to the sciences of his day. Consequendy, it is apt to be misleading when one interprets the thought of any philosopher primarily in terms of one or another theme which was characteristic of the period as a whole. While I would not say that this has led to distortions in what Schn~idelbach says concerning the views of those whom he discusses in his book, when taken in itself, what he says about each gives an inadequate view of what each represented in the thought of the period, either for his contemporaries or for his immediate successors. For example, Lotze is almost exclusively discussed with reference to the philosophy of values, with passing r~:ferences to him in the discussion of the development of ontological views, but this leads to a lack of recognition of the importance of his stance with respect to the relations of philosophy and the sciences, and also neglects the impact of his pluralistic idealism. Thus, the claim that the book presents "what was of a particular concern to the philosophers of that time" is true only...