STEM for humanities scholars

The beginnings of natural sciences and humanities in antiquity were shared, but by the end of the 19th century, the natural sciences had developed dominantly through their successes. In response to this dominance, the philosopher Wilhelm Dilthey coined the term Geisteswissenschaften (humanities) in 1883. On the other hand, it was clear in the natural sciences that entire areas of the mind were inaccessible to them, such as sensory experiences and consciousness.

This book attempts to show that this sharp divide has softened. Physics has become more intellectual, and the technology of the mind has developed: fundamentally, this is information technology. Physics for the inanimate and computer science (with a physical basis) for all living things and for the computer together explain the world.  With mathematics as its foundation and tool, this results in STEM (MINT in German: Mathematik, Informatik, Naturwissenschaft, Technik).

An intellectual worldview without STEM is not possible with dignity. There are several STEM fields that are directly useful to the humanities. Examples include the principle of the laser and the concept of entropy. A third intellectual domain remains outside: art. But art and STEM are not opposites.

Dr. Walter Hehl is a physicist and author of several books on IT, management, religion, philosophy, and the history of science. His book on Galileo received the 2019 Woitschach Foundation Award for the best critical yet fair science book.

The translation was done with the help of artificial intelligence. A subsequent human revision was done primarily in terms of content.

This book is a translation of an original German edition. The translation was done with the help of artificial intelligence (machine translation by the service DeepL.com). A subsequent human revision was done primarily in terms of content, so that the book will read stylistically differently from a conventional translation.