Behind the facade of certainty begins the real questioning. In his philosophical column UMBRAL, Colombian philosopher Bruno Maduro takes us to the limits of our knowledge. He analyzes the blind faith in scientific dogmas, questions the construction of our history and sheds light on the unsolved enigma of the human condition. A space for thought beyond illusions, where truth often only glimmers in error and in the intermediate realm of intuition.

So what is a human being? What constitutes humanity? Can what we call humanity be empirically demonstrated? Can we find something essential in all individuals and cultures that can tell us: has the mystery of being human been uncovered, revealed, solved, concluded or even perfected?

If we delve into this seemingly pre-defined problem and attempt to penetrate the deepest realms of the humanities or to question the purpose of contemporary research in the human sciences in order to answer these fundamental questions, then we are faced with a sobering realisation regarding the nature of man: my being, his, hers, yours and that of others, that of our fellow human beings, remains unscathed, intact, immune and resistant to any revelation. Moreover, it remains sheltered within the mystery and preserves its inviolability precisely therein.

What we believe we have discovered about ourselves as human beings ultimately still proves to be an unsolved problem. It is as though the question of human nature has, from the very beginning, carried within it an encrypted answer – locked away, concealed and submerged in mystery. And when we become aware of this encryption, the alarming question arises: has human nature ultimately remained inaccessible to humanity’s current knowledge of itself?

And then comes the truly astonishing, crucial point: will we remain our own unsolvable enigma far into the future?

But let us not succumb to disappointment and pessimism. Let us seek guidance, solid ground and answers to the original questions about our species. To begin, we'll turn to the comparative sciences. Perhaps, using their methods, we will succeed in finding a path out of the epistemological impasse that is already looming. Let us contrast the humanities with the other modern sciences in hopes of shedding light on the matter.

Immediately, a difference becomes apparent. It seems that research leading to results is easier to conduct in the natural and experimental sciences than in the humanities.

For the botanist, it is comparatively easy to identify a plant, assess its uses, investigate its adaptation to different habitats, classify it, genetically modify it, select the specimens best suited for cultivation, or even intervene in its biological cycle. All this is far simpler and more precise than researching cultures, ethnic groups, peoples, nations or human communities.

And I would like to go even further. For the researcher, it is often easier to immerse oneself in a group of geese, ducks, herons, gorillas or other animals – just as Lorenz (1980) or Tinbergen (1981) did when they founded ethology. It is comparatively simple to investigate the behavioural laws governing a group of birds or mammals. However, if one were to apply the same methods of ethology to humans, the result would not only be different but even counterproductive.

The humanities face a fundamentally different problem from that of animal research. Comparing a gorilla troop with human societies is an ethnological blunder – one that is still being made today. Comparing a group of chimpanzees with human communities that are mistakenly labelled ‘primitive’ is an approach characterised by colonial thinking, social Darwinism, exclusion and xenophobia – yet another misstep that still finds acceptance in sociology, psychoanalysis, evolutionary anthropology or social psychology. And worse still: it is even considered legitimate.

One thing remains indisputable: the deeper we delve into the human sciences – assuming they actually deal with humankind – the greater the enigma of human nature becomes. It expands, takes on almost colossal proportions, and perhaps appears to us today as something that ultimately remains inaccessible.

For the modern sciences, questions concerning the physical, natural, material or biological world arise more readily than questions about our relationship with other human beings – including that self which sets out to explore its own species. Our real conflict, as human beings who study humanity, does not lie in the material or empirical subject matter we encounter in everyday life. Our challenge runs deeper. The true task that engages us as researchers of society or of humanity itself consists in understanding human beings from the perspective of another human being: as a free and equal subject who, although different from us, is fundamentally our counterpart and our equal.

As soon as we turn our attention to this task of understanding, which has persisted for millennia, we encounter numerous obstacles. They confront the anthropologist from the start and threaten to drive him to despair. An insurmountable barrier rises between the human subject and that other subject whom they seek to understand. Humanity attempts to recognise another human being – a neighbour, a member of the same species; one who, as a member of one culture, encounters another culture; one who acts, works, loves, builds dwellings, develops technologies, creates wealth, resolves conflicts, wages wars, explores the movement of the stars, faces the dangers of survival and, above all, surrenders to that universal notion we call happiness.

For as soon as we attempt to fit human beings into the sciences of evidence and proof – as tragically happens in positivism – in order to arrive at a concept of themselves, our understanding encounters its first limit: the consciousness of the researcher themselves. He fails to truly understand the other in his otherness – that other who, for his part, possesses a human consciousness that observes, perceives and makes the researcher just as much the object of his contemplation.

Human nature eludes the person seeking a deeper understanding of humanity so persistently that its inaccessibility provides us not with keys to solving the problems of the human sciences, but rather presents us with puzzles and new questions. It is as though there were, from the very outset, a seed of discord in our endeavour to understand ourselves as a species, as a culture or as humanity – perhaps a consequence of that mythical heritage which began with the bite into the apple of the knowledge of good and evil.

For humanity’s ability to truly understand other human beings does not even come close to its goal as long as we do not recognise the Other as free, equal and at the same time different. The more doggedly the social researcher attempts to grasp his fellow human beings, the further he distances himself from them – particularly if he has not freed himself from his prejudices, preconceived notions and xenophobia. If he enters the field of his research convinced that he knows more than those he is studying, regards himself as superior to them and approaches them with the arrogance of the supposed expert, then his endeavour to understand the human species is bound to fail. For he remains a prisoner of those prejudices that have already shaped his initial and often deceptive socialisation.

The other sciences do not face such a difficulty. The natural scientist does not face the same problem: his subject matter lies waiting to be explored, measured and mastered. The biologist has the world of living things before him or beneath his microscope. The physicist has at his disposal the observable universe as well as atoms and the worlds of invisible particles.

The social scientist, however, faces a different situation. The human being, as the subject of his research, does not await him, eager to collaborate. He contradicts him, questions his authority, rejects his categories and resists his interpretation. He asks: who is this person who wants to study me? Am I a test subject? What authority grants him the right to examine another human being? Why does he not examine himself first?

The human scientist therefore begins his work already at a disadvantage. The other person confirms neither his assumptions nor his interpretations. Can he, under these conditions, even penetrate to the essence of his object of study? Or is he ultimately left with no choice but to collect observations, describe details and formulate hypotheses?

The truth is: human beings, in their very nature, elude those who seek to study them. The anthropologist must therefore be content not only with the periphery of what he sees, observes or attempts to understand, but also with insights that often do not rise above the status of conjecture. This undermines the Hegelian hope that the concept can fully grasp its object. Ultimately, human beings remain inaccessible to the human sciences. (Maduro, 2026)

After certain schools of thought had recognised the crisis between subject matter and method, as well as the difficulties of grasping human beings through the means of the human sciences, many strands of sociology, psychology and anthropology attempted to overcome this barrier. Yet they failed. And what did they do instead?

They devised a way out that spared them from having to admit their own powerlessness. For acknowledging this crisis would have called their institutional claims into question – and possibly also jeopardised the market for degrees, titles and students. The solution lay in adopting the methods of the natural sciences and applying them to the human sciences. To what end? To evade the actual problem. To escape the real human being – that human being who, to this day, has remained an ultimately unattainable entity.

Since the 17th century, many human sciences have taken their cue from physics, others from biology, chemistry or biochemistry. In medicine, this is particularly evident in the form of a supposed evidence-based faith in statistics. Economics seeks refuge in probability calculations to cushion its failed forecasts. Sociologists, ethnographers and political scientists, in turn, take refuge in applied mathematics. And the list goes on.

Essentially, all these disciplines make use of borrowed methods. In doing so, they indirectly admit their inability to grasp human beings as human beings: as subjects full of knowledge, passions, doubts and uncertainties. To save themselves, the human sciences resort to methodological borrowing. To avoid having to reveal their own crisis, they seek support from those sciences that boast spectacular and measurable successes. They believe that the success of these sciences lies in their methods or their products.

Yet that is the real deception.

It is not the methods that have brought about the great successes in the natural sciences and technology. Something else was decisive: humanity’s persistence in mastering nature. Its will to power. However, this will to power over nature cannot simply be transferred to the study of human beings without giving rise to conflicts, tensions or even violence.

In short: the human condition has largely been lost to the human sciences today. Disciplines lacking the conceptual foundations to explore the spirit of humanity and its movements are merely trying to survive. What do they live on? On statistical crumbs, on data sets, residuals and epistemic fragments. They keep their heads above water with scraps.

In doing so, they have lost sight of the human being as subjectivity, as an idea, as a symbol and as a cultural peculiarity. They have forgotten the doubt about doubt, the becoming of being, and the transcendental dimension of human volition.

They have failed to accept that the truth about humanity never simply becomes the truth when humanity itself is the object of investigation. For humanity is that measure which cannot measure itself without being struck by wonder or giving rise to new questions.

And this very flight from the real human being is the true apocalypse of the human sciences.

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Bibliography

Lorenz, K. (1980). Consideraciones sobre las conductas animal y humana: Konrad Lorenz. España: Plaza y Janés.

Maduro, B E. (2026) Antropología Dual. Una etnografía vista desde el otro. Adiós al objeto humano. Cartagena Colombia. Ed. Paidia ediciones

Tinbergen, N. (1981). El Estudio del instinto. España: Siglo XXI.

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