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Hans-Georg Gadamer
13 quotes
“The more language is a living operation, the less we are aware of it. Thus it follows that from the forgetfulness of language that its real being consists in what is said in it. What is said in it constitutes the common world in which we live. … The real being of language is that into which we are taken up when we hear it — what is said.”
Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900–2002) first seen 1966 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Man and Language (1966)
“Aristotle established the classical definition of man, according to which man is the living being who has logos. In the tradition of the West, this definition became canonical in a form which stated that man is the animal rationale, the rational being, distinguished from all other animals by his capacity for thought. Thus it rendered the Greek word logos as reason or thought. In truth, however, the primary meaning of this word is language.... The word logos means not only thought and language, but also concept and law.”
Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900–2002) first seen 1966 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Man and Language (1966)
“[Although the natural sciences are indispensable to human survival,] this does not mean that people would be able to solve the problems that face us, peaceful coexistence of peoples and the preservation of the balance of nature, with science as such. It is obvious that not mathematics but the linguistic nature of people is the basis of human civilization.”
Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900–2002) first seen 1993 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Ästhetik und Poetik I. Kunst als Aussage (Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr, 1993), p. 342; as quoted in Andrew Bowie, Adorno and the Ends of Philosophy (Cambridge: Polity, 2013), p. 15
“People cannot live without hope; this is one of the statements I can defend without any reservations.”
Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900–2002) first seen 2002 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Die Menschen können nicht ohne Hoffnung leben" (one of his last interviews), Rhein-Neckar-Zeitung (February 11, 2002)
“What man needs is not just the persistent posing of ultimate questions, but the sense of what is feasible, what is possible, what is correct, here and now. The philosopher, of all people, must, I think, be aware of the tension between what he claims to achieve and the reality in which he finds himself.”
Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900–2002) said by 2002 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The hermeneutic consciousness, which must be awakened and kept awake, recognizes that in the age of science philosophy's claim of superiority has something chimerical and unreal about it. But though the will of man is more than ever intensifying its criticism of what has gone before to the point of becoming a utopian or eschatological consciousness, the hermeneutic consciousness seeks to confront that will with something of the truth of remembrance: with what is still and ever again real.”
Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900–2002) said by 2002 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Being that can be understood is language.”
Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900–2002) said by 2002 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In Wahrheit gehört die Geschichte nicht uns, sondern wir gehören ihr. Lange bevor wir uns in der Rückbesinnung selber verstehen, verstehen wir uns auf selbstverständliche Weise in Familie, Gesellschaft und Staat, in denen wir leben. Der Fokus der Subjektivität ist ein Zerrspiegel. Die Selbstbesinnung des Individuums ist nur ein Flackern im geschlossenen Stromkreis des geschichtlichen Lebens. Darum sind die Vorurteile des einzelnen weit mehr als seine Urteile die geschichtliche Wirklichkeit seines Seins.”
Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900–2002) first seen 1995 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: As quoted in Tom Neton, "Hermeneutical Truth and the Structure of Human Experience: Gadamer's Critique of Dilthey" in The Specter of Relativism: Truth, Dialogue, and Phronesis in Philosophical Hermeneutics (1995) edited…
“We cannot understand without wanting to understand, that is, without wanting to let something be said. It would be an inadmissible abstraction to contend that we must first have achieved a contemporaneousness with the author or the original reader by means of a reconstruction of his historical horizon before we could begin to grasp the meaning of what is said. A kind of anticipation of meaning guides the effort to understand from the very beginning.”
Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900–2002) said by 2002 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Das Kunstwerk, das etwas sagt, konfrontiert uns mit uns selbst. Das will sagen, es sagt etwas aus, das so, wie es da gesagt wird, wie eine Entdeckung ist, d.h. die Aufdeckung von etwas Verdecktem. Darauf beruht jene Betroffenheit. «So wahr, so seiend» ist nichts, was man sonst kennt. Alles Bekannte ist übertroffen. Verstehen, was einem das Kunstwerk sagt, ist also gewiß Selbstbegegnung.”
Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900–2002) said by 2002 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The language of art is constituted precisely by the fact that it speaks to the self-understanding of every person, and it does this as ever present and by means of its own contemporaneousness. Indeed, precisely the contemporaneousness of the work allows it to come to expression in language. Everything depends on how something is said.”
Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900–2002) said by 2002 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Understanding does not occur when we try to intercept what someone wants to say to us by claiming we already know it.”
Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900–2002) said by 2002 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The free artist creates without a commission. He seems distinguished by the complete independence of his creativity and thus acquires the characteristic social features of an outsider whose style of life cannot be measured by the standards of public morality. The concept of the bohemian which arose in the nineteenth century reflects this process. The home of the Gypsies became the generic word for the artist's way of life. But at the same time the artist, who is as "free as a bird or a fish," bears the burden of a vocation that makes him an ambiguous figure. For a cultured society that has fallen away from its religious traditions expects more from art than the aesthetic consciousness and the "standpoint of art" can deliver. The Romantic desire for a new mythology... gives the artist and his task in the world the consciousness of a new consecration. He is something like a "secular saviour' for his creations are expected to achieve on a small scale the propitiation of disaster for which an unsaved world hopes.”
Hans-Georg Gadamer (1900–2002) said by 2002 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source