QuoteProject
If the human intellect functions, it is actually in order to solve the problems which the man's inner destiny sets it.
Jose Ortega Y Gasset
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

The human intellect exists to address and solve the challenges posed by our inner purpose.

This quote by Jose Ortega Y Gasset suggests that our intellectual capabilities are not merely for academic pursuits or abstract reasoning, but are fundamentally aimed at tackling the issues and dilemmas that arise from our personal journeys and intrinsic goals. It emphasizes the connection between our thinking and the deeper aspects of what it means to be human, asserting that understanding and solving these challenges is a vital part of our existence.

Themes

IntellectProblemsInner DestinyHuman ExperiencePhilosophy

In practice

Example use cases

This quote can be shared during a philosophy class to illustrate the purpose of human intellect.

More from Jose Ortega Y Gasset

Man adapts himself to everything, to the best and the worst.
Jose Ortega Y GassetRead
"Natural" man is always there, under the changeable historical man. We call him and he comes-a little sleepy, benumbed, without his lost form of instinctive hunter, but, after all, still alive. Natural man is first prehistoric man-the hunter.
Jose Ortega Y GassetRead
We have not reached ethical perfection in hunting. One never achieves perfection in anything, and perhaps it exists precisely so that one can never achieve it. Its purpose is to orient our conduct and to allow us to measure the progress accomplished. In this sense, the advancement achieved in the ethics of hunting is undeniable.
Jose Ortega Y GassetRead
I am myself and what is around me, and if I do not save it, it shall not save me.
Jose Ortega Y GassetRead
We fall in love when our imagination projects nonexistent perfection upon another person. One day, the fantasy evaporates and with it, love dies.
Jose Ortega Y GassetRead
Life is a terrible conflict, a grandiose and atrocious confluence. Hunting submerges man deliberately in that formidable mystery and therefore contains something of religious rite and emotion in which homage is paid to what is divine, transcendent, and in the laws of Nature.
Jose Ortega Y GassetRead

Similar quotes

I have never smuggled anything in my life. Why, then, do I feel an uneasy sense of guilt on approaching a customs barrier?
John SteinbeckRead
Such a great misfortune, not to be able to be alone.
Jean De La BruyereRead
As civilization advances, the sense of wonder declines. Such decline is an alarming symptom of our state of mind. Mankind will not perish for want of information; but only for want of appreciation.
Abraham Joshua HeschelRead
So you cannot, as a Christian, walk away from Africa.
BonoRead
The moon had been observing the earth close-up longer than anyone. It must have witnessed all of the phenomena occurring - and all of the acts carried out - on this earth. But the moon remained silent; it told no stories.
Haruki MurakamiRead
Why do we not care to acknowledge them? The cattle, the body count. We still don't like to admit the war was even partly our fault because so many of our people died. A photograph on every mantlepiece. And all this mourning has veiled the truth. It's not so much lest we forget, as lest we remember. Because you should realise the Cenotaph and the Last Post and all that stuff is concerned, there's no better way of forgetting something than by commemorating it.
Alan BennettRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.