1833 – 1911
Wilhelm Dilthey (1833–1911) was a German philosopher and historian who founded the philosophy of the human sciences (Geisteswissenschaften), arguing that understanding human life and history requires interpretive methods irreducible to natural-scientific explanation. He developed a systematic hermeneutics grounded in lived experience (Erlebnis), expression, and understanding (Verstehen), profoundly influencing twentieth-century philosophy, sociology, and literary theory. His historicist approach held that all human thought and culture must be understood within the historical context of life itself.
Founded the methodological distinction between natural sciences (Naturwissenschaften) and human sciences (Geisteswissenschaften)
Developed a systematic philosophical hermeneutics centered on Erlebnis (lived experience), Ausdruck (expression), and Verstehen (understanding)
Articulated the hermeneutic circle as a foundational structure of humanistic inquiry
Established historicism as a philosophical method, arguing all knowledge is historically conditioned
Influenced Heidegger, Gadamer, and the broader tradition of twentieth-century continental hermeneutics