Abstract
The paper deals with the central problem of Lessing's Laocoön "Why does not marble Laocoön in his famous depiction scream?" against division of our experience into scientific knowledge and art. First, Lessing's original solution based on the constitutive differences between poetry and plastic arts is generalized leading to the difference between causal and intentional explanation.
Second, the resulting discontinuity between science and art is presented as an instance of a more basic discontinuity between knowledge and its object to be overcome by a reflective account of knowledge as derived from the philosophy of Hegel.