Измерения на идеята за университета (за Хляба, за Науката и за човека)
Dimensions of the Idea on the University

Summary/Abstract: The article analyzes the main dimensions of the university ideal of German thinkers in the early 19th century. The key issue has been raised of the importance and use of scientific pursuits. The indisputable fact has been put forth that studying and the interest in science may have direct practical consequences and be guided by purely material incentives. Thus Brotwissenschaften are sciences which can be directly applied in life and are an integral part of the narrow professional training. The direct association of scientific pursuits with the practical use thereof has significant consequences for the development of science and scientists as well as for higher education. Such an association may result in the substitution of academic criteria and values by objectives which are outside science. The domination of the instrumental attitude to science changes the whole nature of scientific pursuits 􏰸 to a large extent they turn into superficial research limited to stating the results without problematizing their reasons. The spirit of science lives only through and in the spirit of freedom, truth and continuous improvement. The refusal or inability to advance is a denial of the very essence of scientists and men themselves. Despite the differences in their concepts about university life, Fichte, Schleiermacher, Schelling and Humboldt were like-minded in their refusal to subordinate science to crude practicality and to degrade education and culture to professional education and crafts. That refusal found a positive expression in strengthening the self-value of science, of the intellectual and selfless motivation of scientific pursuits and their role in shaping up the individual. A clearly defined scientific ideal underlies the university ideal of German thinkers. The university is not an institutional space constructed in advance in which science subsequently settles. On the contrary 􏰸 the university institutional outlines develop from the very concept of science and follow the requirements of its norms and inner meaning. Only provided that we manage to keep in mind the fundamental differentiation between the attitude to science as a means and purpose of its own shall we be able to understand and reconstruct the main dimensions of the German university ideal.

• Details
• Contents