--- title: "Meaning & Key Takeaway of: To attempt this would be like seeing…" description: "\"To attempt this would be like seeing without eyes or directing the gaze of knowledge behind one's own eye. Modern science can acknowledge no other than..." image: "https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/7c6/wilhelm-dilthey-23833_acknowledge_to-attempt-this-would-be-like-seeing-wit_2540184.jpg" --- # To attempt this would be like seeing without eyes or… ![“To attempt this would be like seeing without eyes or directing the gaze of knowledge behind one's own eye. Modern science can acknowledge no other than this epistemological stand-point.” quote by Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/7c6/wilhelm-dilthey-23833_acknowledge_to-attempt-this-would-be-like-seeing-wit_2540184.jpg) [Download](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/7c6/wilhelm-dilthey-23833_acknowledge_to-attempt-this-would-be-like-seeing-wit_2540184.jpg) [Open image](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/i/7c6/wilhelm-dilthey-23833_acknowledge_to-attempt-this-would-be-like-seeing-wit_2540184.jpg) > “To attempt this would be like seeing without eyes or directing the gaze of knowledge behind one's own eye. Modern science can acknowledge no other than this epistemological stand-point.” [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) ## About This Quote This interpretation was drafted with AI assistance. It is one reading of the quote, not the author's own explanation. Attempting knowledge without perception is like trying to see without eyes; true understanding requires direct experience. **In simple terms:** Knowledge needs direct experience. Key Takeaway Seek firsthand understanding. Themes epistemology perception knowledge Mood contemplative philosophical Type theoretical reflective When to use this quote - scientific research - personal observation - learning processes Key Concepts subjectivity experience Questions to Reflect On - Can we ever fully know without seeing? - What role does intuition play? 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What makes one explanation of the French Revolution better…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/elliott-sober/in-the-history-and-literature-courses-i-took-epistemological/) [Elliott Sober](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/elliott-sober/) > [“The social sciences are obsessed by epistemological questioning in a way that no science, no real science is. You never have a chemistry class…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/bruno-latour/the-social-sciences-are-obsessed-by-epistemological-questioning-in-a/) [Bruno Latour](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/bruno-latour/) > [“Epistemological insiderism” ... is the belief that identity qualifies or disqualifies one from writing with legitimacy and authority about a particular topic. ... Epistemological…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/rogers-brubaker/epistemological-insiderism-is-the-belief-that-identity-qualifies-or/) [Rogers Brubaker](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/rogers-brubaker/) > [“Ultimately there are only two important epistemological questions in philosophy: What is reality? What is man? 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Boulding](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/kenneth-e-boulding/) ## More by Wilhelm Dilthey > [However, the sciences of society and of history retained their old subservient relation to metaphysics for a long time - well into the eighteenth…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wilhelm-dilthey/however-the-sciences-of-society-and-of-history-retained-their-old/) [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) > [All science is experiential; but all experience must be related back to and derives its its validity from the conditions and context of consciousness…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wilhelm-dilthey/all-science-is-experiential-but-all-experience-must-be-related-back/) [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) > [The existence of inherent limits of experience in no way settles the question about the subordination of facts of the human world to our…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wilhelm-dilthey/the-existence-of-inherent-limits-of-experience-in-no-way-settles-the/) [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) > [What man is, only his history tells.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wilhelm-dilthey/what-man-is-only-his-history-tells/) [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) > [“What is experienced from within cannot be categorized in concepts that have been developed for the external world of the senses.”](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wilhelm-dilthey/what-is-experienced-from-within-cannot-be-categorized-in-concepts/) [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) > [“We explain by means of purely intellectual processes, but we understand by means of the cooperation of all the powers of the mind in…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wilhelm-dilthey/we-explain-by-means-of-purely-intellectual-processes-but-we/) [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) > [A knowledge of the forces that rule society, of the causes that have produced its upheavals, and of society's resources for promoting healthy progress…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wilhelm-dilthey/a-knowledge-of-the-forces-that-rule-society-of-the-causes-that-have/) [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) > [The sciences which take socio-historical reality as their subject matter are seeking, more intensively than ever before, their systematic relations to one another and…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wilhelm-dilthey/the-sciences-which-take-socio-historical-reality-as-their-subject/) [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) > [Thus, in accordance with the spirit of the Historical School, knowledge of the principles of the human world falls within that world itself, and…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wilhelm-dilthey/thus-in-accordance-with-the-spirit-of-the-historical-school-knowledge/) [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) > [From the perspective of mere representation, the external world always remains only a phenomenon.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wilhelm-dilthey/from-the-perspective-of-mere-representation-the-external-world-always/) [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) > [The individual always realizes only one of the possibilities in his development, which could always have taken a different turning whenever he had to…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wilhelm-dilthey/the-individual-always-realizes-only-one-of-the-possibilities-in-his/) [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) > [Thus there arose in me both a need and a plan for the foundation of the human sciences.](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wilhelm-dilthey/thus-there-arose-in-me-both-a-need-and-a-plan-for-the-foundation-of/) [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) > [If we conceive all the changes in the physical world as reducible to the motion of atoms, motions generated by means of the fixed…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wilhelm-dilthey/if-we-conceive-all-the-changes-in-the-physical-world-as-reducible-to/) [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) > [On the other hand, for the whole human being who wills, feels, and represents, external reality is given simultaneously and with as much certitude…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wilhelm-dilthey/on-the-other-hand-for-the-whole-human-being-who-wills-feels-and/) [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) > [No real blood flows in the veins of the knowing subject constructed by Locke, Hume, and Kant, but rather the diluted extract of reason…](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/wilhelm-dilthey/no-real-blood-flows-in-the-veins-of-the-knowing-subject-constructed/) [Wilhelm Dilthey](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) [Explore all 25 Wilhelm Dilthey quotes ](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/author/wilhelm-dilthey/) ## 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