Within the framework of the conference the present article argues that the controversial territories Goethe every so often trespasses are not so much those between science and poetry – as often put forward, but rather a twilight zone between a traditional culture of narrative knowing and a modern culture of scientific knowledge, a distinction set forth by Lyotard (The Postmodern Condition, 1979). In fact, if we examine more closely the forms and means of representation Goethe uses in his dealings with scientific objects, we find that to an astonishingly high degree they exhibit the characteristics which Lyotard considers symptomatic of pre-modern “narrative knowledge”, namely a mixture of various discourse functions such as savoir-faire, savoir-vivre, and savoir-écouter, with the corresponding criteria of usefulness, of justice or happiness, and of aesthetic appeal instead of the exclusive ‘true’/‘false’ criterion of modern science discourse.