ABSTRACT
“The objective validity of all empirical knowledge,” Max Weber remarks in this context, is “based on the presupposition of the value of those truths which empirical knowledge alone is able to give us. Their interest in the theories at the bases of applied knowledge is at best sporadic. Knowledge-seekers often put the emphasis the other way around, though they disagree among themselves in many other respects. It is clear, at any rate, that men vary in their interests when they seek or apply knowledge. In the social sciences the limits of human endeavor consist of the two conditions for the quest for knowledge the author have mentioned: that truth exists only for those who value it, and that the people involved agree on the question to be asked and on some image of man and society which—to them—matters most in the long run.
