La fine della Bildung e della Paideia occidentale - Hommage an Jörg Ruhloff

The main topic of the article is to reformulate the concept of Bildung. Reformulation in this sense means analyzing the crisis of Social Sciences and, in consequence, their problematic approach to rationalism, which is strictly orientated to the logos of Natural Sciences, even in the field of normative and symbolic spheres. The analysis focuses upon two aspects: on the one side it discusses the external reasons of the crisis which have led to an increasing reversal of the idea of Bildung. On the other side the analysis takes into consideration the internal reasons (loss of educational/pedagogical theory) for this reversal. This double centered investigation offers a revealing insight into the foundation of the educational logos which can not be described as rationalistic logos, but as logos of discourse. In consequence the educational logos requires a semantic reformulation of its main categories and means. The crisis of the foundation of theory of Educational Sciences indicates the general crisis of theory of Social ‘Sciences’, which are no longer aimed at Verstehen (comprehension) but at data-based Empirical Sciences addicted to efficiency. The proposal made in this article is to return to reflection about educational thinking, or, in other words: to get away from ‘science’ and return to thinking.