Human Finitude and the Dialectics of Experience

In this dissertation, I will argue that human experience is characterised by temporality and that it is specifically this temporal dimension that we need to appreciate when thinking about the relationship between experience and the structure of knowledge. I will argue that the concept of experience can only be adequately understood if we situate it within finite human existence. The concept of experience has been an important component of modern philosophical attempts to understand the structure of knowledge. In my dissertation, I will engage with this tradition and show that since Immanuel Kant experience and knowledge have been historically related but that only recently has the concept of experience become important in its own right. My overall claim is that the concept of experience can only be adequately understood if we situate it within finite human existence. In order to show that this is the case, I will explore the historical trajectory of the concept of experience in the work of three important philosophers in this tradition: Immanuel Kant, G. W. F. Hegel and Hans-Georg Gadamer. ii