{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 151/1914-01-20/p008","lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"text":"We can thus start from the conviction that when man holds to that which he possesses in his thought, he can find an intimate relation of his being to the Cosmos. But in starting from this point of view we do encounter a difficulty, a great difficulty—not for our understanding but in practice. For it is indeed true that a man lives within every fibre of his thought, and therefore must be able to know his thought more intimately than he can know any perceptual image, but—yes—most people have no thoughts! And as a rule this is not thoroughly realized, for the simple reason that one must have thoughts in order to realize it. What hinders people in the widest circles from having thoughts is that for the ordinary requirements of life they have no need to go as far as thinking; they can get along quite well with words. Most of what we call “thinking” in ordinary life is merely a flow of words: people think in words, and much more often than is generally supposed. Many people, when they ask for an explanation of something, are satisfied if the reply includes some word with a familiar ring, reminding them of this or that. They take the feeling of familiarity for an explanation and then fancy they have grasped the thought","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"Lecture I","site_heading":"Thought as Gateway to Cosmic Understanding","site_heading_note":"A heading the site wrote for this unit from a summary of it; not in the edition, and not the words of Rudolf Steiner or of the translator. Cite the unit by its title and locus, never by this heading, and do not quote it.","date":"1914-01-20","location":null,"word_count":222,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/151/1914-01-20/p008","alignment_confidence":"high","alignment_reason":"beads:length","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":{"scope":"unit","status":"established","translator":"Charles Davy","identified_edition":"RSP1961","book_title":"Human and Cosmic Thought (1961)","publisher":"Rudolf Steiner Press","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA151/English/RSP1961/19140120p01.html","evidence":"edition_cover_credit","note":"The lecture's own page names no translator; the cover of the book it was taken from (https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA151/English/RSP1961/HuCoTh_index.html) lists it and names the translator. Where the cover names several, it does not say which lecture each translated.","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"edition_coverage":{"de":["original"],"en":["English"]},"available_versions":[{"lang":"de","edition":"original","edition_basis":null,"is_original":true,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/151/1914-01-20/p008"},{"lang":"en","edition":"English","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/151/1914-01-20/p008","paragraph_aligned":true}],"record":{"record_type":"unknown","scope":"volume","note":"How this text was taken down (shorthand transcript, listeners' notes or manuscript) is not on record here. Unknown is not an assurance of a stenogram: check the edition's own notes before resting an argument on one word.","evidence":null,"evidence_translation":null,"evidence_source":null},"other_renderings":{"loci":[{"locus":"GA 151/1914-01-20_02","ga":"151","lecture":"1914-01-20_02","kind":"renderings","relation":"another translation or transcription of the same lecture"}],"note":"The same lecture is also served at the loci listed, each with how it relates to this one. They are ONE witness, not independent attestations: quote the rendering you fetched, and do not cite another as corroborating it. Wording differs between translations, so a quotation found in one need not occur in the other."},"german_anchor":{"de_prefix":"1914-01-20","de_passages":[{"locus":"GA 151/1914-01-20/p007","url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/151/1914-01-20/p007"}],"bead_confidence":"high","pairing_state":"proposed","verified":false,"length_check":{"de_words":248,"en_words":222,"ratio":0.9,"partial":false},"correspondence":"established","note":"English passage numbering is edition-relative, so the same number need not name the same paragraph in the German. The German original passage(s) above are the edition-invariant anchor — fetch them (lang='de') to verify wording before quoting across editions."},"paired_german":{"status":"paired","german":[{"locus":"GA 151/1914-01-20/p007","passage_number":7,"text":"Nur hat die Sache eine Schwierigkeit, wenn wir uns auf diesen Gesichtspunkt begeben wollen, eine große Schwierigkeit. Ich meine nicht für unsere Betrachtung, aber für den objektiven Tatbestand hat es eine große Schwierigkeit. Und diese Schwierigkeit besteht darin, daß es zwar wahr ist, daß man in jeder Faser des Gedankens drinnen lebt und daher den Gedanken, wenn man ihn hat, von allen Vorstellungen am intimsten kennen muß; aber, ja aber — die meisten Menschen haben keine Gedanken! Und dies wird gewöhnlich nicht mit aller Gründlichkeit durchdacht, daß die meisten Menschen keine Gedanken haben. Aus dem Grunde wird es nicht mit aller Gründlichkeit durchdacht, weil man dazu - eben Gedanken brauchte! Auf eines muß zunächst aufmerksam gemacht werden. Was im weitesten Umkreise unseres Lebens die Menschen verhindert, Gedanken zu haben, das ist, daß die Menschen für den gewöhnlichen Gebrauch des Lebens gar nicht immer das Bedürfnis haben, wirklich bis zum Gedanken vorzudringen, sondern daß sie statt des Gedankens sich mit dem Worte begnügen. Das meiste von dem, was man im gewöhnlichen Leben Denken nennt, verläuft nämlich in Worten. Man denkt in Worten. Viel mehr, als man glaubt, denkt man in Worten. Und viele Menschen sind, wenn sie nach einer Erklärung von dem oder jenem verlangen, damit zufrieden, daß man ihnen irgendein Wort sagt, das einen für sie bekannten Klang hat, das sie an dieses oder jenes erinnert; und dann halten sie das, was sie bei einem solchen Wort empfinden, für eine Erklärung und glauben, sie hätten dann den Gedanken.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"word_count":248,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/151/1914-01-20/p007"}],"english":["GA 151/1914-01-20/p008"],"method":"length","confidence":"high","correspondence":"established","length_check":{"de_words":248,"en_words":222,"ratio":0.9,"partial":false},"pairing_state":"proposed","verified":false},"witness_completeness":{"ratio":0.97,"band":"comparable","note":null,"word_count":5201,"original_word_count":5374,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"scope":"unit","status":"recorded","translator":"Charles Davy","identified_edition":"RSP1961","book_title":"Human and Cosmic Thought (1961)","publisher":"Rudolf Steiner Press","publisher_inferred":true,"match_score":1.0,"source_url":"https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA151/English/RSP1961/19140120p01.html","evidence":"edition_cover_credit","note":"The lecture's own page names no translator; the cover of the book it was taken from (https://www.rsarchive.org/Lectures/GA151/English/RSP1961/HuCoTh_index.html) lists it and names the translator. Where the cover names several, it does not say which lecture each translated.","publisher_note":"The publisher is inferred from the edition code in this lecture's source URL, not stated by the source page. The translator IS verified for this lecture: its own source names the translator (evidence: the lecture's page, rsarchive's lecture list, or the cover of the book it was published in), and that page's text was matched against this unit (see match_score and source_url). Cite the translator with confidence; attribute the publisher only as probable."},"entity_parity":{"status":"ok","checked_against":["GA 151/1914-01-20/p007"],"missing_from_translation":[],"present_only_in_translation":[],"bead_confidence":"high","note":"Every load-bearing name in the German counterpart appears in this English passage. That is a check on NAMES only: a translation can keep every name and still reverse who acts on whom, change a number, or soften a claim. Read the German for anything you intend to rest an argument on."},"note":"quote_safe certifies the bytes of this text. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}}