Lange, Friedrich Albert

Lange, Friedrich Albert (frē`drĭkh äl`bĕrt läng`ə), 1828–75, German neo-Kantian philosopher. He accepted the materialistic method of investigating phenomena but rejected its concept of nature. In his Geschichte des Materialismus und Kritik seiner Bedeutung in der Gegenwart (1866; tr. A History of Materialism, 3d ed. 1950), Lange argued that some truths about nature are unknowable because their verification would involve moving beyond the sphere of any possible human experience. He advocated limiting the categories used in science to those necessary for the mechanistic explanation of nature. He regarded consciousness as subjective experience, not merely the effect of matter.