Abstract

This text refers to the origin of the term epistemology, which relates to the theory of scientific knowledge. The issue focuses on the development of modern science and, particularly, on the crisis of basic concepts in the early twentieth century. This meant that speculative philosophy was no longer able to account for contemporary scientific conceptualizations and theories. As the century drew on, the most outstanding empiricists also had to admit their failure. The rejection of aprioristic and empiricist positions resulted in the need to understand knowledge as a constructive process which evolves, at the individual level, from birth to adult age, and extends to the social level through scientific development.