Whether in the intellectual pursuits of science or in the mystical pursuits of the spirit, the light beckons ahead, and the purpose surging in our nature responds.
Who will observe the observers?
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote questions the nature of perception and who evaluates those who evaluate. It suggests a deeper layer of observation beyond the observable.
Arthur Eddington's quote, 'Who will observe the observers?', invites profound contemplation about the limits of perception and the role of the observer. It highlights the complexity of understanding reality, as it raises the question of who places judgment upon those who analyze or evaluate the world around them. This philosophical inquiry challenges us to think about the nature of knowledge and the layers of interpretation that exist in our understanding of the universe.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
In a philosophical debate about the nature of reality.
More from Arthur Eddington
All quotes βThe physical world is entirely abstract and without actuality apart from its linkage to consciousness.
It is one thing for the human mind to extract from the phenomena of nature the laws which it has itself put into them; it may be a far harder thing to extract laws over which it has no control. It is even possible that laws which have not their origin in the mind may be irrational, and we can never succeed in formulating them.
Whatever else there may be in our nature, responsibility toward truth is one of its attributes.
In the world of physics we watch a shadowgraph performance of the drama of familiar life. The shadow of my elbow rests on the shadow table as the shadow ink flows over the shadow paper. It is all symbolic, and as a symbol the physicist leaves it. ... The frank realisation that physical science is concerned with a world of shadows is one of the most significant of recent advances.
So far as physics is concerned, time's arrow is a property of entropy alone.
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Society really seems to have developed an unquestioning obedience towards spooky types⦠Did we get to where we are today via a slippery slope that was entirely within our control to stop? Or was it a relatively instantaneous sea change that sneaked in undetected because of pervasive government secrecy?
Mysticism is the mistake of an accidental and individual symbol for an universal one.
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe.
It is among the evils of slavery that it taints the very sources of moral principle. It establishes false estimates of virtue and vice: for what can be more false and heartless than this doctrine which makes the first and holiest rights of humanity to depend upon the color of the skin?