%0 Journal Article
%T The Ubiquity of Understanding: Dimensions of Understanding in the Social and Natural Sciences
%A Karsten R. Stueber
%J Philosophy of the Social Sciences
%@ 1552-7441
%D 2019
%R 10.1177/0048393119847103
%X Taking my departure from the discussion of the concept of understanding in contemporary epistemology, I will suggest that we need to fine-tune the concept of explanatory understanding in order to comprehensively describe the epistemic endeavors of the natural and social sciences. I will distinguish among the theoretical, narrative, and empathic modes of understanding. None of the sciences are exclusively characterized by one of these modes of understanding. Nevertheless, I will suggest that only the human sciences are characterized by a complex interplay of all three modes. Finally, I will argue that we can account for the explanatory autonomy of rational action explanations in light of this complex interplay
%K empathy
%K narrative
%K understanding
%K action explanation
%K hermeneutics
%K Louis Mink
%K Carl Hempel
%K Donald Davidson
%U https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0048393119847103