“Either history is really governed by laws, and in that case a truly human-activity is impossible, except perhaps in a technical sense; or human beings really make their own history, and then the task of theory will not be directed to discovering 'laws', but to the elucidation of the conditions with in which human activity unfolds.”

From an interview conducted on 23 March 1983 for the May-August issue of the French journal Lutter ( "Marx today: the tragicomical paradox " http://www.rebeller.se/m.html). It was translated by Franco Schiavoni for the January 1984 issue of the Australian magazine Thesis Eleven.

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Either history is really governed by laws, and in that case a truly human-activity is impossible, except perhaps in a t…" by Cornelius Castoriadis?
Cornelius Castoriadis photo
Cornelius Castoriadis 6
Greek-French philosopher 1922–1997

Related quotes

Kurt Vonnegut photo

“It was in the nature of truly effective good-luck pieces that human beings never really owned them.”

Source: The Sirens of Titan (1959), Chapter 12 “The Gentleman from Tralfamadore” (p. 301)

Robert Sheckley photo
Viktor Schauberger photo

“Everything is governed by one law. A human being is a microcosmos, i. e. the laws prevailing in the cosmos also operate in the minutest space of the human being.”

Viktor Schauberger (1885–1958) austrian philosopher and inventor

Implosion Magazine, No. 8, p. 6 (Callum Coats: Energy Evolution (2000))
Implosion Magazine

James Joseph Sylvester photo

“The object of pure Physic[s] is the unfolding of the laws of the intelligible world; the object of pure Mathematic[s] that of unfolding the laws of human intelligence.”

James Joseph Sylvester (1814–1897) English mathematician

Reported in: Memorabilia Mathematica by Robert Edouard Moritz, quote #129.

Wilkie Collins photo

“The actions of human beings are not invariably governed by the laws of pure reason”

Vol. I [Chatto & Windus, 1875] ( p. v https://books.google.com/books?id=_w83AAAAIAAJ&pg=PR5)
Also in Gothic Returns in Collins, Dickens, Zola, and Hitchcock by Eleanor Salotto [Springer, 2016, ISBN 1-137-11770-2] ( p. 32 https://books.google.com/books?id=recYDAAAQBAJ&pg=PA32)
The Law and the Lady (1875)

Chris Hedges photo
Karen Blixen photo
Pope Pius XII photo

“The life of an innocent person is sacrosanct, and any direct attempt or aggression against it is a violation of one of the fundamental laws without which secure human society is impossible.”

Pope Pius XII (1876–1958) 260th Pope of the Catholic Church

Allocution to Midwives on the Nature of Their Profession, October 29, 1951. http://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/P511029.HTM http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Pius12/P12midwives.htm
Context: Besides, every human being, even the child in the womb, has the right to life directly from God and not from his parents, not from any society or human authority. Therefore, there is no man, no human authority, no science, no "indication" at all—whether it be medical, eugenic, social, economic, or moral—that may offer or give a valid judicial title for a direct deliberate disposal of an innocent human life, that is, a disposal which aims at its destruction, whether as an end in itself or as a means to achieve the end, perhaps in no way at all illicit. Thus, for example, to save the life of the mother is a very noble act; but the direct killing of the child as a means to such an end is illicit. The direct destruction of so-called "useless lives," already born or still in the womb, practiced extensively a few years ago, can in no wise be justified. Therefore, when this practice was initiated, the Church expressly declared that it was against the natural law and the divine positive law, and consequently that it was unlawful to kill, even by order of the public authorities, those who were innocent, even if on account of some physical or mental defect, they were useless to the State and a burden upon it. The life of an innocent person is sacrosanct, and any direct attempt or aggression against it is a violation of one of the fundamental laws without which secure human society is impossible. We have no need to teach you in detail the meaning and the gravity, in your profession, of this fundamental law. But never forget this: there rises above every human law and above every "indication" the faultless law of God.

Related topics