We obtain the concept, as we do the form, by overlooking what is individual and actual; whereas nature is acquainted with no forms and no concepts, and likewise with no species, but only with an X which remains inaccessible and undefinable for us.
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- He says concepts and forms arise by ignoring the individual, while nature itself knows no forms, only an inaccessible X.
- In plain terms
- Concepts hide individuality, but nature itself has no fixed forms.
- What can you take from it?
- Accept that reality may be beyond our categorical grasp.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- How does recognizing nature's unknowability affect your approach?
- When is it okay to impose a form on something?
Another view
Some practical work requires forming provisional concepts despite their limits.
More from Friedrich Nietzsche
Every word instantly becomes a concept precisely insofar as it is not supposed to serve as a reminder of the unique and entirely individual original experience…
Permalink to quote #16 What then is truth? A movable host of metaphors, metonymies, and anthropomorphisms: in short, a sum of human relations which have been poetically and rhetorica…
Permalink to quote #18 We believe that we know something about the things themselves when we speak of trees, colors, snow, and flowers; and yet we possess nothing but metaphors for t…
Permalink to quote #15
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