Max Weber, leitor de Tolstoi

abstract

This article discusses how Max Weber articulates the problem of the meaning of science and the meaning of life, based on the lecture he delivered at the Univesity of Munich in 1917. First, I sketch the intellectual context in which Weber’s work is “rediscovered” in the 1960s and 1970s; I then comment on the reception of the Science as Vocation lecture by specialists; afterwards, I revisit Weber’s view of science and progress; and finally, I explore a literary dimension of Weber’s reflectiions. Weber held that the Russian author Liev Tolstoy had offered the best answer to the question about the relationship between science and the meaning of life, so I therefore rememorate Tolstoy’s tale “The death of Ivan Ilitch.”

keywords:
Max Weber; Tolstoy; Scientific knowledge; Technical domination; Meaning of life