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Kant, Immanuel - Quotes - On inter composer communication
Identifier
015097
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
A description of the experience
One of the Notes in Dreams of a Spirit Seer
If the conception of a spirit were something taken out of our own empirical conceptions, the procedure to make it clear would be easy; for we should only have to point out those characteristics which the senses reveal to us in that kind of beings, and whereby we distinguish them from material things. But ....the conception of spiritual nature cannot be drawn from experience.
But if you ask, how could this conception arise at all, if not from experience? I answer: many conceptions arise in secret and obscure conclusions incidental to experiences, and afterwards are transmitted to other minds without even the consciousness of that experience or conclusion which has first established the conception.
Such conceptions may be called “surreptitious.”