“The power of understanding symbols, i.e. of regarding everything about a sense-datum as irrelevant except a certain form that it embodies, is the most characteristic mental trait of mankind. It issues in an unconscious, spontaneous process of abstraction, which goes on all the time in the human mind: a process of recognizing the concept in any configuration given to experience, and forming a conception accordingly. That is the real sense of Aristotle's definition of Man as "the rational animal".”
Quote by Susanne Katherina Langer
Author
Susanne Katherina Langer
Susanne Katherina Langer was an American philosopher of German birth, renowned for her work in aesthetics, semiotics, cognitive psychology, and philosophical anthropology. Her contributions have had a profound impact on 20th-century philosophy. more
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