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Full Idea
Aristotle says that 'humans all desire by nature to understand'. The Greek word here is often translated as 'to know', but this can be misleading. It is not a piling up of known facts, ..but mastery of a field of knowledge, and explaining why.
Gist of Idea
Translate as 'humans all desire by nature to understand' (not as 'to know')
Source
report of Aristotle (Metaphysics [c.324 BCE], 0980a22) by Julia Annas - Ancient Philosophy: very short introduction Ch.1
Book Ref
Annas,Julia: 'Ancient Philosophy: a very short introduction' [OUP 2000], p.15
A Reaction
I take this gloss of Annas's to be highly significant if we are trying to understand Aristotle, since it appears to be the single most significant remark from him of what his life's work was about.
Related Ideas
Idea 17944 'Episteme' is better translated as 'understanding' than as 'knowledge' [Nehamas]
Idea 18226 For Aristotle, contemplation consists purely of understanding [Korsgaard]
Idea 8331 To know something we need understanding, which is grasp of the primary cause [Aristotle]
Idea 543 All men long to understand, as shown by their delight in the senses [Aristotle]
| 12038 | Translate as 'humans all desire by nature to understand' (not as 'to know') [Aristotle, by Annas] |
| 17949 | Inquiry is the cause of philosophy [Aristotle] |
| 19586 | Philosophers feed on problems, hoping they are digestible, and spiced with paradox [Novalis] |
| 7578 | I conceived it my task to create difficulties everywhere [Kierkegaard] |
| 9254 | In philosophy the truth can only be reached via the ruins of the false [Prichard] |
| 15582 | Perhaps the aim of philosophy is to abolish sham problems [Heidegger] |
| 18704 | Philosophy tries to be rid of certain intellectual puzzles, irrelevant to daily life [Wittgenstein] |
| 21239 | Philosophers are marked by a joint love of evidence and ambiguity [Merleau-Ponty] |
| 22337 | Philosophy must keep returning to the beginning [Murdoch] |
| 13477 | The problems are the monuments of philosophy [Hart,WD] |
| 20446 | Philosophy begins in disappointment, notably in religion and politics [Critchley] |
| 7950 | Philosophy tries to explain how the actual is possible, given that it seems impossible [Macdonald,C] |