Science Quote by Georg C. Lichtenberg

Lichtenberg lands the punch with a double hinge: he flatters human exceptionalism, then snaps it shut on our fingers. Yes, an ape can’t sketch an ape; representation belongs to humans (and, by extension, to the Enlightenment toolkit of measurement, classification, and “higher” faculties). But the second clause is the real act of sabotage: only humans would treat that talent as proof of being better. The ability is less the point than the vanity it sponsors.

Coming from an 18th-century scientist who watched reason being marketed as moral rank, the line reads like a lab note on species-level self-deception. Drawing isn’t merely a technical skill here; it’s shorthand for symbolic culture, for the power to stand outside oneself and turn life into an object. Lichtenberg grants that this power is distinctive, then exposes how quickly distinction becomes hierarchy. The subtext is anthropological before anthropology: we build status systems out of our own metrics, then declare the winners “naturally” superior.

The joke is also epistemic. If superiority is validated by criteria only humans invent and applaud, it’s a closed circuit: humans judge humans by human standards, then call the verdict objective. Lichtenberg’s skepticism targets the smugness of “progress” narratives that confuse capability with entitlement. He isn’t arguing that humans and apes are the same; he’s arguing that our most human move is to convert difference into self-congratulation, and then call that rationality.