WEBER, JOSEPH. - Philosopher, b. 23 Sept. 1753 at Rain (Upper Bavaria), d. at Augsburg on 14 Feb. 1831.
He studied theology at Augsburg with the Jesuits and philosophy at Dillingen. Ordained priest in 1776, he taught philosophy and physics at Dillingen (1781), at the University of Ingolstadt (1799), and then again at Dillingen (1803). He was also rector of the newly founded Lyceum in that city. He likewise held important ecclesiastical offices. He was the author of about one hundred writings, mostly brief, on religious, scientific, and philosophical subjects.
In his youth he felt the influence of Wolff (v.) Leibniz (v.), then moved away from the dogmatism of scholasticism, drawing close to Kant, whose emphasis on Practical Reason attracted him; later, however, against Kant, he defended metaphysics (Estne metaphysica possibilis?, Dillingen 1795) and hoped to find in Schelling’s (v.) System of Identity the reconciliation of Christianity and philosophy (Philos., Religion und Christentum im Bunde, Munich 1808–1809, and Die Philos. in einer freien Darstellung, ibid. 1911).