Abstract

Under the term »cosmology« different projects are hidden. Following Hans Blumenberg it is shown that in thinking about the world one can distinguish between producing meaning and giving explanations. Both projects make monopolistic demands and are often not distinguished clearly enough from another even by their authors. That leads to confusions like the one in which the biblical story about the creation of the world is confronted with the big bang theory of physics. In this essay I analyse the difference between meaning producing and explaining thinking by looking at Poe’s ›Eureka‹ and Alexander von Humboldt’s ›Kosmos‹.