# Quote — Santiago Ramon Y Cajal, Advice for a Young Investigator

> This history of civilization proves beyond doubt just how sterile the repeated attempts of metaphysics to guess at nature' s laws have been. Instead, there is every reason to believe that when the human intellect ignores reality and concentrates within, it can no longer explain the simplest inner workings of life' s machinery or of the world around us ( p. 2).

- Author: [Santiago Ramon Y Cajal](https://www.leafyquotes.com/santiago-ramon-y-cajal.md)
- Book: [Advice for a Young Investigator](https://www.leafyquotes.com/santiago-ramon-y-cajal/advice-for-a-young-investigator.md)
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Santiago_Ram%C3%B3n_y_Cajal#Advice_for_a_Young_Investigator_(1897)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/santiago-ramon-y-cajal/advice-for-a-young-investigator/this-history-of-civilization

## More from this book

> It is important to note that the most brilliant discoveries have not relied on a formal knowledge of logic. Instead, their discoverers have had an acute inner logic that generates ideas with the same unstudied unconsciousness that allowed Jourdain to create prose.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/santiago-ramon-y-cajal/advice-for-a-young-investigator/it-is-important.md)

> Any man could, if he were so inclined, be the sculptor of his own brain ( p. xv).

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/santiago-ramon-y-cajal/advice-for-a-young-investigator/any-man-could.md)

> Now and then philosophers invade the field of biological sciences with these beguiling generalizations, which tend to be unproductive, purely verbal solutions lacking in substance. At best, they may prove useful when viewed simply as working hypotheses.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/santiago-ramon-y-cajal/advice-for-a-young-investigator/now-and-then.md)