Physicians think they do a lot for a patient when they give his disease a name.
Immanuel KantRead
Human reason has the peculiar fate in one species of its cognitions that it is burdened with questions which it cannot dismiss, since they are given to it as problems by the nature of reason itself, but which it also cannot answer, since they transcend every capacity of human reason.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Human reason grapples with profound questions that it cannot ignore but also cannot fully comprehend.
Immanuel Kant highlights the limitations of human reason in confronting existential questions that its own nature compels it to consider. These questions, while integral to the human experience and reasoning, exceed the capabilities of our understanding, illustrating a deep philosophical conflict between inquiry and comprehension.
Themes
ReasonQuestionsPhilosophyUnderstandingLimitations
In practice
Example use cases
In a philosophical debate about the limits of human understanding.
More from Immanuel Kant
All quotes →The inscrutable wisdom through which we exist is not less worthy of veneration in respect to what it denies us than in respect to what it has granted.
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One cannot avoid a certain feeling of disgust, when one observes the actions of man displayed on the great stage of the world. Wisdom is manifested by individuals here and there; but the web of human history as a whole appears to be woven from folly and childish vanity, often, too, from puerile wickedness and love of destruction: with the result that at the end one is puzzled to know what idea to form of our species which prides itself so much on its advantages.
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I shall never forget my mother, for it was she who planted and nurtured the first seeds of good within me. She opened my heart to the lasting impressions of nature; she awakened my understanding and extended my horizon and her percepts exerted an everlasting influence upon the course of my life.
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. . . as to moral feeling, this supposed special sense, the appeal to it is indeed superficial when those who cannot think believe that feeling will help them out, even in what concerns general laws: and besides, feelings which naturally differ infinitely in degree cannot furnish a uniform standard of good and evil, nor has any one a right to form judgments for others by his own feelings. . . .
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Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing admiration and awe, the oftener and more steadily we reflect on them: the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me.
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