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First causes are outside the realm of science.
Claude Bernard
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Interpretation

What this quote means

The quote suggests that fundamental reasons or origins of things cannot be fully explained by scientific inquiry.

Claude Bernard's quote emphasizes the limitations of science in addressing the ultimate causes of existence. It implies that while science is invaluable for understanding the mechanics of the natural world, it may not reach the deeper philosophical questions surrounding the origins and fundamental purposes of life and existence, which often lie beyond empirical observation and reasoning.

Themes

SciencePhilosophyCausationExistenceLimits

In practice

Example use cases

In a lecture about the limitations of scientific inquiry, one might use this quote to illustrate philosophical perspectives.

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Tout est poison, rien n'est poison, tout est une question de dose. Everything is poisonous, nothing is poisonous, it is all a matter of dose.
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When a physician is called to a patient, he should decide on the diagnosis, then the prognosis, and then the treatment. ... Physicians must know the evolution of the disease, its duration and gravity in order to predict its course and outcome. Here statistics intervene to guide physicians, by teaching them the proportion of mortal cases, and if observation has also shown that the successful and unsuccessful cases can be recognized by certain signs, then the prognosis is more certain.
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The goal of scientific physicians in their own science ... is to reduce the indeterminate. Statistics therefore apply only to cases in which the cause of the facts observed is still indeterminate.
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Theories are like a stairway; by climbing, science widens its horizon more and more, because theories embody and necessarily include proportionately more facts as they advance.
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True science teaches us to doubt and, in ignorance, to refrain.
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Now, a living organism is nothing but a wonderful machine endowed with the most marvellous properties and set going by means of the most complex and delicate mechanism.
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King of the animals β€” as thou hast described him β€” I should rather say king of the beasts, thou being the greatest β€” because thou hast spared slaying them, in order that they may give thee their children for the benefit of the gullet, of which thou hast attempted to make a sepulchre for all animals; and I would say still more, if it were allowed me to speak the entire truth.
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