1001Philosophers

Watsuji Tetsuro Quotes

Watsuji Tetsuro was a Japanese moral philosopher and cultural historian and one of the principal figures of twentieth-century Japanese thought. Drawing on Heidegger, Kant, and the Confucian and Buddhist traditions, he developed a distinctive ethics centered on the relational human being and the mutual constitution of person and fellow-person. The quotes below are attributed to Watsuji Tetsuro, organized by topic.

Watsuji Tetsuro on Love

  • Attributed to Watsuji Tetsuro:

    “Solitude itself is a relation; it presupposes the other.”

Watsuji Tetsuro on Mind

  • Attributed to Watsuji Tetsuro:

    “The personal is always interpersonal.”

Watsuji Tetsuro on Nature

  • Attributed to Watsuji Tetsuro:

    “Climate is the means by which a people grasps itself.”

  • Attributed to Watsuji Tetsuro:

    “We exist as we are because of the climate that has shaped us.”

Watsuji Tetsuro on Virtue

  • Attributed to Watsuji Tetsuro:

    “Ethics is the study of betweenness, the space between person and person.”