Introduction

The introduction offers a first presentation of the philosophical tradition of romantic empiricism, enumerates its most important insights, and suggestively indicating its continued relevance. The introduction argues that the romantic empiricists developed a distinctive approach to the study of nature: an approach that emphasized starting with experience, and remaining with the phenomenon, while also recognizing the creative role of the knower in the activity of knowledge. Furthermore, unlike the majority of philosophical traditions and approaches, romantic empiricism regarded art and aesthetic education as crucial in the expansion and deepening of our understanding of nature. The introduction identifies four key representatives of the romantic empiricist movement—Kant Herder, Goethe, and Alexander von Humboldt—and argues that romantic empiricism played foundational roles in the emergence of a number of disciplines, including ecology. The introduction concludes by pointing to the ways in which the romantic empiricist approach can address contemporary questions and concerns.