Lange Friedrich Albert (1828–75), German philosopher and social scientist. Born at Wald near Solingen, he became a university instructor at Bonn in 1851, professor of inductive logic at Zürich in 1870, and professor at Marburg in 1873, establishing neo-Kantian studies there. He published three books in 1865: Die Arbeiterfrage (The Problem of the Worker), Die Grundlegung der mathematischen Psychologie (The Foundation of Mathematical Psychology), and J. S. Mills Ansichten über die sociale Frage und die angebliche Umwälzung der Socialwissenschaftlichen durch Carey (J. S. Mill’s Views of the Social Question and Carey’s Supposed Social-Scientific Revolution). Lange’s most important work, however, Geschichte des Materialismus (History of Materialism), was published in 1866. An expanded second edition in two volumes appeared in 1873–75 and in three later editions.
The History of Materialism is a rich, detailed study not only of the development of materialism but of then-recent work in physical theory, biological theory, and political economy; it includes a commentary on Kant’s analysis of knowledge. Lange adopts a restricted positivistic approach to scientific interpretations of man and the natural world and a conventionalism in regard to scientific theory, and also encourages the projection of aesthetic interpretations of ‘the All’ from ‘the standpoint of the ideal.’ Rejecting reductive materialism, Lange argues that a strict analysis of materialism leads to ineliminable idealist theoretical issues, and he adopts a form of materio-idealism. In his Geschichte are anticipations of instrumental fictionalism, pragmatism, conventionalism, and psychological egoism. Following the skepticism of the scientists he discusses, Lange adopts an agnosticism about the ultimate constituents of actuality and a radical phenomenalism. His major work was much admired by Russell and significantly influenced the thought of Nietzsche. History of Materialism predicted coming sociopolitical ‘earthquakes’ because of the rise of science, the decline of religion, and the increasing tensions of ‘the social problem.’ Die Arbeiterfrage explores the impact of industrialization and technology on the ‘social problem’ and predicts a coming social ‘struggle for survival’ in terms already recognizable as Social Darwinism. Both theoretically and practically, Lange was a champion of workers and favored a form of democratic socialism. His study of J. S. Mill and the economist Henry Carey was a valuable contribution to social science and political economic theory. See also JAMES-LANGE THEORY, NEO- KANTIANIS. G.J.S.