Grounded in the natural philosophy of the Middle Ages, alchemy formed a bridge: on the one hand into the past, to Gnosticism, and on the other into the future, to the modern psychology of the unconscious.
Carl JungRead
Just as we might take Darwin as an example of the normal extraverted thinking type, the normal introverted thinking type could be represented by Kant. The one speaks with facts, the other relies on the subjective factor. Darwin ranges over the wide field of objective reality, Kant restricts himself to a critique of knowledge.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote contrasts two prominent thinkers, Darwin and Kant, highlighting their differing approaches to knowledge and reality.
Carl Jung illustrates the fundamental differences between the thinking styles of Charles Darwin and Immanuel Kant. While Darwin exemplifies extraverted thinking that engages with objective reality and empirical facts, Kant embodies introverted thinking that contemplates the subjective aspects of knowledge and human understanding. This distinction underscores how different cognitive approaches can shape one's interaction with and interpretation of the world.
Themes
DarwinKantThinkingKnowledgeSubjectivityObjectivity
In practice
Example use cases
In a philosophical discussion about scientific reasoning vs. moral reasoning, this quote can illustrate how different thinkers approach knowledge.
More from Carl Jung
All quotes →The majority of my patients consisted not of believers but of those who had lost their faith.
Carl JungRead
Complexes are psychic contents which are outside the control of the conscious mind. They have been split off from consciousness and lead a separate existence in the unconscious, being at all times ready to hinder or to reinforce the conscious intentions.
Carl JungRead
We are in a far better position to observe instincts in animals or in primitives than in ourselves. This is due to the fact that we have grown accustomed to scrutinizing our own actions and to seeking rational explanations for them.
Carl JungRead
From the viewpoint of analytic psychology, the theatre, aside from any aesthetic value, may be considered as an institution for the treatment of the mass complex.
Carl JungRead
I have treated many hundreds of patients. Among those in the second half of life - that is to say, over 35 - there has not been one whose problem in the last resort was not that of finding a religious outlook on life.
Carl JungRead
Similar quotes
The pyramids, attached with age, have forgotten the names of their founders.
R. Buckminster FullerRead
Only those with no memory insist on their originality.
Coco ChanelRead
The brain is not a blind, reactive machine, but a complex, sensitive biocomputer that we can program. And if we don't take the responsibility for programming it, then it will be programmed unwittingly by accident or by the social environnement.
Timothy LearyRead
You get tragedy where the tree, instead of bending, breaks.
Ludwig WittgensteinRead
There is only one perpetrator of evil on the planet: human unconsciousness. That realization is true forgiveness. With forgiveness, your victim identity dissolves, and your true power emerges--the power of Presence. Instead of blaming the darkness, you bring in the light.
Eckhart TolleRead
We are what we imagine. Our very existence consists in our imagination of ourselves. Our best destiny is to imagine, at least, completely, who and what, and that we are. The greatest tragedy that can befall us is to go unimagined.
N. Scott MomadayRead