The great philosophers and the great works are standards for the selection of what is essential. Everything that we do in studying the history of philosophy ultimately serves their better understanding.
Karl JaspersRead
Philosophy is tested and characterised by the way in which it appropriates its history.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Philosophy evolves through its understanding and integration of historical thought.
This quote by Karl Jaspers emphasizes the importance of history in the development of philosophical thought. It suggests that philosophy is not just an abstract pursuit but is deeply rooted in the past, and its validity and character are shaped by how it engages with historical ideas and traditions.
Themes
PhilosophyHistoryThoughtEvolutionWisdom
In practice
Example use cases
A professor discussing the evolution of philosophical thought in a classroom setting.
More from Karl Jaspers
All quotes βThe community of masses of human beings has produced an order of life in regulated channels which connects individuals in a technically functioning organisation, but not inwardly from the historicity of their souls.
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We must learn to talk with each other, and we mutually must understand and accept one another in our extraordinary differences.
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The study of law left me unsatisfied, because I did not know the aspects of life which it serves. I perceived only the intricate mental juggling with fictions that did not interest me.
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If philosophy is practice, a demand to know the manner in which its history is to be studied is entailed: a theoretical attitude toward it becomes real only in the living appropriation of its contents from the texts.
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Reason is like an open secret that can become known to anyone at any time; it is the quiet space into which everyone can enter through his own thought
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